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Discover Mid-America — March 2009
Ferriday, Louisiana:
Hometown to celebrities
Down in the river delta country of eastern Louisiana, just west of Natchez, Mississippi, is the small town of Ferriday. Countless travelers pass through the town of 3,700 souls on their way to more important destinations.
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But although Ferriday is small, it may have produced better-known people per square mile than any other small town in America.
At least that’s the premise of Elaine Dundy’s 1991 book, Ferriday, Louisiana. In it she lists the Ferriday-area folks that left the small town to become well known.
For starters, there was Claire Chennault, of WW-II Flying Tigers fame, also ABC news anchor Howard K. Smith, African American trombonist Leon “Pee Wee” Whittaker and CNN correspondent Campbell Brown.
But that only scratches the surface. Probably the best-known trio of celebrities from Ferriday were three cousins. Jimmy Swaggart, popular radio televangelist of the ‘80s whose career tanked when his dalliance with a prostitute was discovered; Jerry Lee Lewis, a rock-and-roll pathfinder once second only to Elvis in popularity who fell from favor with fans when he married his 13-year-old second-cousin; and Mickey Gilley, country music songwriter-performer who rose to fame as the owner of Gilley’s nightclub in Houston, and now operates the Mickey Gilley Family Theater in Branson, MO.
Add a few senators and state representatives, plus Ann Boyar, who married legendary film director Jack Warner, and you can see that Ferriday has spawned celebrities on a major scale.
Ferriday’s history and culture can be sampled at the Delta Music Museum, located in a former post office building at 218 Louisiana Ave. The museum, formerly the Ferriday Museum, contains exhibits of musicians from the Louisiana-Mississippi Delta, and hosts occasional live performances. Important music figures are periodically inducted into the museum’s Hall of Fame, including fifties-era rocker Fats Domino, who received the honor in 2006. The latest artist to be inducted was clarinetist Pete Fountain.
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Each year on the first Saturday of April, the museum hosts the Delta Music Festival and Hall of Fame Induction. The events, live music and the exhibits of famous Delta musicians have attracted visitors from more than 38 states and 14 foreign countries since the museum’s opening in 2002.
Judith Bingham, the museum director, said she had been working with the museum since 1992.
“We’ve added a new section called the Arcade Theater,” she said. “It was built in 1926 as a movie theater. We had to tear it down and start from scratch to comply with regulations about handicapped facilities, etc. But now it’s completed and we have live performances in the building.”
In addition to providing space for a concert hall, and children’s music shows, the Arcade Theater accommodates a small recording studio. A gift shop offers autographed T-shirts, CDs, caps and other music-related items.
Virginia Welch, a tour guide, showed me through the museum in late December.
“Our mission is to collect, preserve and exhibit music of the Delta,” she said. “Much of America’s musical heritage originated in this area, and it’s important to make people aware of it.”
Virginia said that although Ferriday is best known for the “three cousins,” the museum also honors other musical celebrities, including Leon “Peewee” Whittaker, who helped develop several musical styles, including blues, jazz, and rock and roll.”
She showed me large exhibits with photos and personal memorabilia of other music stars. Jimmie Davis, the “Singing Governor” of Louisiana, recorded “You Are My Sunshine” and other hits. Inducted in the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1972, Davis died in 2000 at the age of 101.
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“People come from all over the world to pay homage to Conway Twitty,” Virginia said. “His real name was Harold Jenkins. They say he took his stage name from a road map: Conway, Arkansas and Twitty, Texas.” He had more number one records (55) in the U.S. than the Beatles, Elvis Presley or Frank Sinatra.
Other Delta performers honored at the museum are Aaron Neville, Allen “Puddler” Harris, Percy Sledge, Johnny Horton, Irma Thomas, Clarence “Frogman” Henry, Fats Domino, John Fred Gourrie, Dale Houston, Grace Broussard and Pete Fountain.
“The Hall of Fame induction takes place at the annual festival held the first week in April,” Virginia said. “A performance stage is set up, the street is roped off, and people come from all over to hear the music.”
“We’re proud of our town,” Virginia added. “We’re hoping that downtown Ferriday will be revitalized as people discover its musical heritage.”
The Delta Music Museum, located at 218 Louisiana Ave., is open year ‘round, 9-4, Monday thru Friday. Admission is free, but donations are accepted. Call 318-757-9999 for more information.
Fans of Jerry Lee Lewis will want to visit the home of “The Killer” at 712 Louisiana Ave. in Ferriday. Frankie Jean Lewis Terrel, sister of the famous rocker, manages the home and serves as the tour guide. Filled with photographs and other memorabilia, the house is open from 1-8 p.m. daily. Admission is $6, with students and seniors admitted for $3.50. 318-757-2460
Other attractions in the area include the Frogmore Cotton Plantation and Gins. From March 8 to Nov. 15, visitors can compare a working plantation of the early 1800s with a modern plantation and gin operation. The plantation includes some 18 antebellum buildings. Alongside this facility one can visit a state-of-the-art, computerized 900 bales-per-day gin operations on an 1800-acre plantation. Call 757-757-2453 for more information.
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Between Ferriday and Natchez is Vidalia, a Mississippi River town of 4,500. (No, Vidalia Onions don’t come from here – they’re named for the Georgia town of the same name.) Vidalia’s chief claim to fame is the new Vidalia Riverwalk, with restaurants, a hotel, specialty shops, an amphitheater and a public boat ramp.
Just west of Vidalia is Tacony Plantation, dating to 1845. It was the birthplace, in 1847, of John R. Lynch, Mississippi’s first African-American U.S. Representative and Speaker of the House, who was born a slave on the plantation. Tours are offered, call 318-336-7008.
Ken Weyand can be reached at kweyand1@kc.rr.com
> Traveling with Ken Archive — past columns
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