Themed Photo Gallery and Information : Tutwiler, Mississippi
Tutwiler is a town in Tallahatchie County, Mississippi, United States. The population at the 2010 census was 3,550.
In 1899, Tom Tutwiler, a civil engineer for a local railroad, made his headquarters seven miles northwest of Sumner. The town of Tutwiler was founded and named for him. When the railroad was built, the first depot erected was a two-story building. The railroad gave the town use of the top floor as a public school. Captain H.B. Fitch built and operated the first store in town. His wife took charge of the school, which began with five pupils.
In 1900, a Black mob murdered a Black man remembered as “Dago Pete.” He was suspected of attacking local women.
In 1905, the town was incorporated, and W.E. Fite elected Mayor. J.O. Clay was the station depot agent. In 1900, the Illinois Central Railroad, running from Yazoo City to Lambert, crossed at Tutwiler, where the company built a railroad yard.
In 1928, a high school was built at a cost of $40,000. The town grew rapidly until 1929 when the railroad yard was moved to Clarksdale. At that time businesses and finally the population began to decline. The population in 1929 before the railroad yard was moved was 1,010 people.
Like many other towns in the Mississippi Delta, Tutwiler stakes a claim to being the “birthplace of the blues”. This is the site where W. C. Handy reportedly “discovered” the blues in 1903, on a train platform in the town. Handy had heard something akin to the blues as early as 1892, but it was while waiting for an overdue train to Memphis that he heard an itinerant bluesman (legend says it was a local field hand named Henry Sloan). The man was playing slide guitar and singing about “goin’ where the Southern cross the Dog”, referring to the junction of the Southern Railway and Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad farther south. (The Y&D railroad was locally called the “Yellow Dog”). Handy called it “the weirdest music I had ever heard”. A Mississippi Blues Trail marker honoring Handy was erected at the site on November 25, 2009. Tutwiler was also the childhood home of bluesmen John Lee Hooker and Frank Stokes.
Handy and his family lived there for six years. In 1903, while waiting for a train in Tutwiler, in the Mississippi Delta, Handy had the following experience:
A lean loose-jointed Negro had commenced plunking a guitar beside me while I slept … As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of the guitar in a manner popularized by Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars. … The singer repeated the line three times, accompanying himself on the guitar with the weirdest music I had ever heard.
Tutwiler has a variety of Christian churches, including Baptist, Church of God In Christ, Protestant, and non-denominational. Seven Catholic nuns and their staff operate community services in the town, mainly at the Tutwiler Community Education Center, which was established in 1993. They operate the site of town meetings and voting, direct outreach programs for children and senior citizens, operate a health clinic, and maintain the grave of Sonny Boy Williamson.
Souce: Wikipedia
Mississippi Blues Trail Markers
Full text:
Bandleader W. C. Handy was waiting for a train here at the Tutwiler railway station circa 1903 when he heard a man playing slide guitar with a knife and singing “Goin’ where the Southern cross’ the Dog.” Handy later published an adaptation of this song as “Yellow Dog Blues,” and became known as the “Father of the Blues” after he based many of his popular orchestrations on the sounds he heard in the Delta.
Tutwiler has been celebrated as “the birthplace of the blues” in honor of W. C. Handy’s encounter here with a solitary guitarist who was performing one of the earliest documented blues songs. Handy, who led an orchestra in Clarksdale from 1903 to 1905, traveled throughout the Delta and beyond, playing dances for both white and African American audiences, but he began to incorporate blues into his repertoire only after hearing the Tutwiler guitarist and a string band in Cleveland, Mississippi. Although Handy’s writings never gave a specific date for the Tutwiler event, the U. S. Senate accepted 1903 when it declared 2003 the centennial “Year of the Blues.”
In his 1941 autobiography, Father of the Blues, Handy wrote: “A lean, loose-jointed Negro had commenced plunking a guitar beside me while I slept. His clothes were rags; his feet peeped out of his shoes. His face had on it some of the sadness of the ages. As he played, he pressed a knife on the strings of a guitar in a manner popularized by Hawaiian guitarists who used steel bars. The effect was unforgettable. His song, too, struck me instantly. ‘Goin’ where the Southern cross’ the Dog.’ The singer repeated the line three times, accompanying himself on the guitar with the weirdest music I ever heard.” The song referred to the crossing of the Southern and Yazoo & Mississippi Valley railroads in Moorhead, forty-two miles to the south; the Y&MV (sometimes called the Yazoo Delta or Y.D.) was nicknamed the “Dog,” or “Yellow Dog.” After moving to Memphis in 1905, Handy adapted the blues into a series of compositions that helped sparked America’s first blues craze, including “Memphis Blues,” “Yellow Dog Blues,” “Beale Street Blues,” and, most popularly, the classic “St. Louis Blues.” He was already being hailed as the “Daddy of the Blues” by 1919.
Another pivotal figure in blues history, Sonny Boy Williamson No. 2, lies buried two miles northwest of here beside the old Whitfield M. B. Church site. A world-renowned singer, harmonicist, and songwriter, Williamson played a pioneering role in broadcasting the blues on the Helena, Arkansas, radio show, King Biscuit Time. His songs included “Eyesight to the Blind,” “Help Me,” and “Don’t Start Me Talkin’.” Williamson’s influence extended from his bases in the Delta and Chicago to England, where his 1960s tours helped inspire the British blues movement. He died May 25, 1965.
Other former Tutwiler performers include banjo and fiddle player Tom Dumas, whose music harked back to Handy’s era, and pianist-guitarist Lee Kizart. Both were documented by folklorist Bill Ferris here in 1968 and were featured in the 2009 Ferris book Give My Poor Heart Ease.
Photo Gallery
Blues Alley to the right with the railroad track and depot:
Tutwiler Murals
Located adjacent to the Railroad Blues Park on Blues Alley, the Tutwiler Murals depict scenes where ‘Father of the Blues’, W.C. Handy, wrote in his autobiography that he first heard the Blues played in 1895 at Tutwiler’s railroad station. A memorial tribute to Bluesman Sonny Boy Williamson is included in the murals, along with a map to his grave site. The mural was painted be local artist Cristen Carven Barnard in 1996, funded by the Mississippi Arts Commission.
Tutwiler Railroad Deport site:
Sonny Boy Williamson’s grave site:
