Jackson, Mississippi: an education in the blues and heartache

A down-home journey to the hardscrabble home of the Mississippi blues

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I was expecting Jackson to be livelier.

Pulling into town on a sticky Thursday afternoon, there’s barely a soul in sight. Outside dozens of attorney’s offices, Mississippi state flags clatter against their poles, the Confederate quarter of it still looming large. On every street corner there’s a church: Baptist, Episcopal, Methodist, Presbyterian, Non-denominational, the list goes on. On the front lawn of the Capitol building, a team of six (the most people I’ve seen all day) are erecting a Big Top ahead of National Prayer Day.

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