On this strange and possibly unprecedented July 4th, I wanted to share with you an essay of mine entitled “Closing Time in America,” which is about F. Scott Fitzgerald, my quasi-neighbor and Asheville, North Carolina. And about the addictions that make America who it is. And about sobriety. It's an essay in which I talk about alcohol and my own experience with it. But it's not really about alcohol at all.

I want to wish you a thoughtful and reflective day on this booziest of American holidays. And I’m honored to be able to spend some time with you virtually today.

Back on Episode One, I told you about Hurricane Plantation on Davis Bend south of Vicksburg, a plantation owned by the brother of the President of the Confederacy. I told you then that the story of Hurricane Bend has another chapter. This episode is that chapter, the next chapter in the story of Davis Bend. Mississippi: the establishment of pioneering all-Black settlement in the Mississippi Delta. Join us as we stop in Mound Bayou, learn about how white people co-opted and sentimentalized a landmark of Black independence, and how its visionary founder ultimately contributed to the vengeful return of white supremacy to Mississippi law in 1890. This is The DETOURIST.

This week’s episode features a special excerpt from my forthcoming book, A DEEPER SOUTH: The Beauty, Mystery, and Sorrow of the Southern Road. Available for pre-order now!

[00:00:00] Didn’t See That One Coming: How Jefferson Davis’s Brother Influenced The Foundation of an All-Black Town

[00:03:06] Mississippi 1890: We Don’t Like Equality After All

[00:06:02] An Experiment in Eccentricity

[00:08:36] Here Come the Whites

[00:11:04] The Crowe’s Nest: The Signs Don’t Say Everything

[00:12:53] Mound Bayou Hitches Its Wagon to the Booker T. Washington Express Train

[00:14:32] “A Noble Speech” Has Disastrous Results

[00:20:00] Frederick Douglass Would Like a Word

[00:22:49] The Delta Is Ready When You Are

An inconspicuous address in the heart of the Mississippi Delta turns out to have enormous significance for American politics and history. This is the story of 626 East Lafayette St. in Ruleville and what it means for us. Join me as we explore Sunflower County, Mississippi, a region rife with contradictions, with villains and saints—home to Mississippi's notorious state penitentiary, site of the until-recently erased site of Emmett Till's final moments, the home of one of America's most prominent voices for white supremacy and segregation, and also the home of one of the nation’s most powerful voices for freedom. This is the DETOURIST.

[00:00:00] An Inconspicuous Address

[00:02:00] Same Street, Different Worlds: Fannie Lou Hamer and James O. Eastland

[00:04:00] A Revolution Begins in a Brick Church in Ruleville

[00:06:37] A Simple Song Lights a Flame

[00:09:29] Misruleville: Sunflower County

[00:11:17] A Procession to a Barn

[00:15:58] A Tale of Two High Schools

[00:17:57] Chinese Groceries, Tamales, Italian Beef Sandwiches: The Delta’s Micro-cultures

[00:21:49] The Civil Rights Movement Hobbles into Atlantic City

[00:24:17] The President is Getting Antsy

[00:29:41] A Black Sharecropper Helps Capsize 20th Century American Party Politics

[00:33:21] You Are Warmly Invited to a National Crisis of Conscience