St. James Missionary Baptist Church of Canton: I've Been Redeemed (1978)

Bessie Smith: In Memoriam

Bessie Smith was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee on April 15, 1894. As an adult, Bessie was what my uncle Mack would call a "big ol’ fine woman!" She stood around 6 feet tall and weighed in excess of 200 lbs. She was a heavy weight, big boned, thick, dark and lovely, big beautiful woman (BBW) of African descent; an Empress. Did I say Empress?

Yes, they called her the Empress of the Blues. She knew the Blues personally and sang them like the evening news. Bessie could curse and caress in the same breath. She was a very quiet and sweet woman, but with her money and feelings you couldn’t mess. She loved hard liquor, hard men, but a woman soft and sweet she’d take. She was an equal opportunity lover and in her lyrics she wouldn’t fake. She’d croon:

“I ain’t no high yella, I’m a deep killer brown.
I ain’t gonna marry, ain’t gonna settle down.
I’m gonna drink good moonshine and rub these browns down,
See that long lonesome road, Lawd you know it’s gonna end,
And I’m a good woman and I can get plenty men…”

Bessie would wail while patrons swooned over the queen that was broader than Broadway and just as bright. She helped to pave the way for many that would come. She was the Empress of the Blues. It was early one Sunday morning on September 26, 1937 as the story goes. Bessie was traveling in Dixie through Clarksdale when her career took a bad turn; a car accident. It was in that crooked letter state. It was where Emmett Till would meet his fate. Yes, Mississippi!

“Trouble, trouble, I’ve had it all my days,
Trouble, trouble, I’ve had it all my days,
It seems that trouble’s going to follow me to my grave.”

Bessie would also meet her fate that morning. The car that she was in hit a parked panel truck and overturned. There was extensive damage to the Empress. There was internal bleeding and bruises and cuts about her neck and face. The accident nearly severed one of her big, beautiful arms. It was one of the arms that she’d greet with, cut with, fight with, and love with. In the end, Jim Crow wouldn’t let her go to a white hospital so she died on the way to the colored one. The Empress was gone. She passed the baton on to singers like Billie Holiday and Carmen McCrae. She would also influence contemporary artist like Nina Simone, Mahalia Jackson, Janis Joplin and Norah Jones. In 1970, singers Janis Joplin and Juanita Green shared the cost for a proper tomb stone on Bessie’s unmarked grave. It was the only proper thing to do for this Empress who impacted so many lives.

Yes, they called her the Empress of the Blues. She knew the Blues personally and sang them like the evening news.

This poem is featured in Liquid Lunch:  Blues-Inspired poetry:


Note: Bessie Smith was a great woman. One of the things that I love about Bessie is that she looks familiar. There are women in my family that share her statue and complexion. She looks like so many women that I've known or have seen on the streets and subways. God Rest her soul.


Sources: bluesnet.hub.org, wikipedia, and britannica.com

Find out more about the Empress at: Blues Online© Bessie Smith.

Mr. Emmett Till

The day was Saturday, August 20, 1955. Mamie Till rushed her son, Emmett down to the 63rd Street station on Chicago’s Southside to meet Uncle Moses.  It was a southbound train going to Greenwood, Mississippi. “Now remember what I told you Emmett,” Mamie said with her soft voice and sad eyes. Mamie told Emmett about the rules of Jim Crow and how to conduct himself in the Apartheid south. “Never look them in the eye, Emmett and always say yes sir/ma’am when you have to speak.” She told Emmett about the separate water fountains, separate restrooms, and separate restaurants. She told him to look for the signs that said, “Colored.” “Look for the signs, Emmett!” “Okay, momma. I’ll be alright.” Mamie would not be there to protect her son so she emphasized the peculiarity of the place. I imagine that Emmett gave his mother an assuring smile, but even asserted his manhood as he boarded that train to Greenwood, Mississippi. She probably gave him a shoebox filled with her home fried chicken as she hugged her son for the last time that Saturday afternoon. Emmett gave his mother is wrist watch.  "I won't be needing this where I'm going, Mama."  Emmett was fourteen.

Emmett would travel all night from Chicago and arrive in Greenwood, Mississippi on Sunday, August 21st. He was happy to see his cousins and the rest of the family when he arrived with his great uncle, Moses Wright. Emmett was only there for a few days, and then there was the incident! You know…the wolf whistle. Yes, Emmett was in Mississippi for only a week when he whistled at a white woman in the grocery store. It was a boyish act. Besides, Emmett was just a boy. It was the boyish act that would ignite a movement.

The town was Money, Mississippi.  Emmett wanted to buy 10 cents worth of penny candy at the Bryant Store.  He gave her the dime, but he touched her hand.  The woman was twenty one-year-old Carolyn Bryant, accomplice. Her husband was Roy Bryant, murderer. The system was Jim Crow/American Apartheid. A few days later and late one evening, Emmett Till was taken from the home of his great uncle, Moses Wright. Carolyn’s husband, Roy Bryant and his half brother, J.W. Milam had to teach Emmett a lesson. Emmett did not know that the penalty for whistling at a white woman in Mississippi was death and that there wasn’t a court in the entire state of Mississippi that would convict those men for doing so. Emmett paid with his life.

Emmett's beaten and mutilated body was found floating in the Tallahatchie River. The date was Sunday, August 28, 1955. He had just arrived in Mississippi last Sunday.The men were never convicted. In the end, Mamie Till lost a son, and a fourteen-year-old boy lost his life. Emmett’s opened casket (Mamie’s request) left a nation in terror and outrage. A few months later Rosa Parks would refuse to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama and the Civil Rights movement was born.

Note: The last time that I was in Chicago I stopped at a Starbucks on the corner of Stony Island and 71st streets. I noticed an additional sign above the 71st street sign which read "Emmett Till St." Today, Emmett would be around the age of my father. God bless his soul. Rest in peace Mr. Till. Rest

sources: photo provided by humanarts.org
link: http://www.emmetttillmurder.com/

To find out more about Emmett Till click post title.