The hunt for Robert Johnsons. How else can you describe it? Three different markers for the same man, because no one’s quite sure where he’s buried. I had mapped us to the northernmost location only for us to make our way back south-ish. The problem is that once we leave Elmore James and Lonnie Pitchford, my phone has no service and I have no way to pull up our route.
“Well what city is it near and we can just put it in the car’s GPS?” Mike suggests. I have to dig into my bag and pull out the printed itinerary that Matt drew up a few months ago that just has city names that are different from what I have.
“Oh crap, and I changed the order of these, too…” I mutter, looking at the three Robert Johnsons listed with towns below them. In the end, I pick one: Sheppardtown. It’s close enough to where we need to go, and after twenty minutes of driving north, my phone finally finds signal.
I take us to where we actually need to go: Greenville. But before we cross the bridge on the north side of the town to the first Mount/Little Zion church, we hunt down the Blues Trail markers in town. Between Matt and myself, we tell Mike where to turn and when he finds it, he pulls off to the side of the road while Matt jumps out and takes a picture of the front and the back before hopping back in the car.
People must think we’re crazy. Continue reading
We begin the blues part of our adventure in Tupelo, Mississippi.
Elvis Presley’s birthplace is very much a sight you can see. Not that you need to, but when in Tupelo, you may as well. We do. It rains up until just before we park the car, one of two in the parking lot, as the place opens in four minutes. Rather than wait with the older couple sitting on a bench next to the visitor’s center entrance, we opt to stroll off to the right to the house where Elvis was born.
Elvis’s childhood home, photo credit me
It’s a tiny thing, plain white, a black porch swing still set up. “It looks like that scene out of The American Adventure,” Mom whispers to me and I immediately picture it in my mind, the three animatronics sitting on a gas station porch in the Depression, picking along on a banjo and singing “Brother Can You Spare A Dime.” On the cement surrounding the walkway is a timeline of events of Elvis’s life up until leaving Tupelo in 1948. We take our pictures and head into the visitor’s center to buy tickets to the buildings.
“Do we want one attraction or the grande with everything?” I ask, looking at everyone else. None of us necessarily care if we see everything from the inside (and there’s not much to see).
“Well, this was my idea, so I’ll buy,” Mom responds. “Let’s go for the grande, why not?” Continue reading
My oldest brother and I had one goal on our trip to Chicago: See Howlin’ Wolf’s grave.
He had thought of it a few summers back on a drive-through trip with his wife on their way to visit friends in Indiana, but it had never fallen into place for them to stop. This time, with me backing him up and our mom surprisingly also on board, it came as a three-against-two vote against our significant others, and our trip home found us taking a twenty-minute detour due west to Oakridge Cemetery.
Google Maps has us completely passing the entrance to the place, which happens to be about fifteen times larger than any of us anticipated. “Where exactly is his grave?” My brother asks, turning onto the main road and driving slow.
“Fantastic question,” I reply. Continue reading
CJR Writing 