The Yazoo River

The Yazoo River unlocks the door to one of the most unusual and diverse regions in America, the culturally, strategically, and agriculturally rich Delta flatland embraced by two rivers, the Mississippi and the Yazoo. It is a land that has produced the best cotton, the Blues, celebrated personages, and a style of living like that nowhere else.

The author, Frank E. Smith, was a U.S. Congressman from this region. His perspective on the Yazoo Delta Region, therefore, is particularly valuable since it comes from his varied experience as a member of the House of Representatives, where he concentrated on the special problems of conservation and development of natural resources, and from his being a consecrated devotee and native son of the Delta.

In The Yazoo River he recounts the important history, the folklife, and the heritage that make this place unique. Though time and social revolution in the Civil Rights era have brought many changes to the Yazoo region, Frank Smith’s book remains virtually undated in the fair balance he gives his accounts and in his presentation of historical fact.