May 10, 2025 • 32 mins
Unusual weather starting in the summer of 1926 pours a huge amount of water in the Mississippi valley. This soon leads to flooding displacing people from their homes and the creation of blues songs illustrating these experiences.
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To contact me:
Email: distortedhistorypod@gmail.com
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Ad free version available through Patreon subscription. Available on Spotify and through podcast aps that use RSS feeds. For more information:
https://www.patreon.com/distortedhistory
Please Rate and Review the podcast
To contact me:
Email: distortedhistorypod@gmail.com
Twitter @DistortedHistor https://twitter.com/DistortedHistor
Bluesky @distortedhistory.bsky.social
If you would like to support the podcast: ko-fi.com/distortedhistory
Ad free version available through Patreon subscription. Available on Spotify and through podcast aps that use RSS feeds. For more information:
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Please Rate and Review the podcast
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
My name is Eric Gaskell, and you're listening to the
Distorted History podcast and program. I didn't give you many
nails and joy a blunder. Look, I'm raveling. I'm not
(00:23):
the brah A long struggle for freedom, it really is
a revolution. In this tale, the nineteen twenty seven Mississippi
Flood and its effects on the Blues. The Mississippi River
itself is the ever present, ominous threat that drives the
(00:46):
events to that end. I spent the first two episodes
in this series looking to kind of establish the river
as its own character by explaining why it was the
way it was. Yet, rather than looking at a person's
childhood and the culture they grew were open to explain
their actions. Since we're talking about a river, we instead
looked at the way the people living around the Mississippi
(01:07):
changed its environment, changes that ensured when a flood happened,
it would be devastating, which brings us through this month's
episode as we finally begin to see the consequences of
these decisions when Mother Nature decides to throw the Mississippi
Valley region a curveball in the form of some particularly
unusual weather, and we also at last begin to talk
about the music that resulted from this cataclysm. Before we
(01:30):
get there, however, first, like always, I want to acknowledge
my sources for this series, which include Richard M. Mazzel
Junior's Backwitter Blues, The Mississippi Flood of nineteen twenty seven
in the African American Imagination, John M. Berry's Rising Tide,
the Great Mississippi Flood of nineteen twenty seven and How
It changed America, and Susan Scott Perishes the Flood Year
(01:51):
nineteen twenty seven a cultural history, And like always, a
full list of these and any other sources like websites
that I used, will be available on this podcast Bluesky
and Covey pages. Plus for anyone who doesn't want to
be bothered skipping through commercials, there is always an ad
free feet available to subscribers at patreon dot com slash
Distorted History. And with all that being said, let's begin.
(02:13):
As we pick back up the Mississippi River Commission, the
federal government and the public living around the river had
all embraceding Levee's only theory. Now, initially this may have
been a partially cynical move to get the federal government
to agree to pay from levees to holbet the river's
rising waters. In time, though it seemed like everyone forgot
the fact that all three of the men who had
(02:35):
studied the river in Nampth had rejected this theory and
has claimed that by constructing levees only, and by cutting
off the river's natural forms of drainage, that its flow
would then carve out the river's bottom, making it deeper
and thus less likely the flood. Indeed, despite the river
being more restricted than ever before, its supposedly more focused
flow was not carving out enough of the riverbed to
(02:56):
compensate for the fact that its natural forms of drainage
had been taken way. This would prove to be a
major reason why the flood of nineteen twenty seven was
as cataclysmic as it was, because, when, as we will see,
the region experienced some strange weather that resulted in an
unusual amount of water being poured into the Mississippi, said
water would have no place to go, so the Mississippi
(03:18):
itself would rise higher and higher until it overwhelmed the
commissions vaunted levies, destroying communities, towns, and cities, creating what
was essentially a vast inland seat in the process. Now,
the nineteen twenty seven flood was obviously a shocking and
devastating event, but it was not when they came without warning,
for example, a flood in nineteen twelve. So the region
around the Lower Mississippi devastated as the river rose to
(03:41):
record heights, notably doing so despite their being less witter
involved than in past non record setting floods, which is
to say that this wasn't a record setting flood in
terms of the amount of water involved. It was likely
average to maybe even below average. Yet in the Lower
Mississippi this water managed to rise to record setting heights,
which damaged the surrounding can comunities, something that should have
(04:01):
been a clear warning sign that the Levee's only policy
was if anything, having the exact opposite effect as had
been predicted. As you see, if the levees only theory
was accurate, the river should have been deeper and thus
there should not be record setting flood heights without a
record setting amount of winter causing it, because if the
river was actually deeper, it would be able to contain
(04:22):
more winter without rising higher. Yet here it was rising
higher than it ever had before with less water than
in the past, meaning that by definition, the river bed
had not been carved out, but had instead likely been
built up thanks to new deposits of sediment. Now, to
be fair, a number of civil engineers did take none
of this and tried to call attention to what was
(04:43):
happening and what it meant. However, they would be ignored
and ridiculed by the Mississippi River Commission. Indeed, even when
some civil engineers did following yet another flood managed to
put enough pressure on the Commission to conduct new studies
concerning outlets and reservoirs. These quote unquote new studies did
not actually collect any new data or perform any new experiments. Instead,
(05:05):
they simply repeated own data and arguments that supported their
established positions. That being said, when a nineteen thirteen flood
resulted in New Orleans demanding a new study, the nation's
second largest port had enough sway to get the Commission
to actually do something. Indeed, after collecting some actual new data,
Major Clark Smith of the Mississippi River Commission would admit
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that there was quote no doubt that a spillway would
reduce extreme food heights at New Orleans, with a spillway
being the same idea as an outlet. In other words,
it was someplace where the wood could go to reduce
the height of the river. Yet, in spite of this,
Smith would not recommend the construction of a spillway, claiming
that it would be expensive and would hardly ever be
of use. Additionally, the Commission also refused to release any
(05:48):
of the new data it had collected, likely because a
contradicted with their whole levi's only policy. As a result,
no changes to the policy would be made. Indeed, all
that actually happened as a result of the back to
back damaging and deadly floods of nineteen twelve and nineteenth
thirteen was a creation of new standards for levees that
were now to be higher and thicker. Meanwhile, in accordance
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to their levees only policy, the Commission would in nineteen
twenty begin the process of sealing off the Mississippi from
the Cypress Creek, thereby giving the water one last place
where it could go to drain, the consequences of which
would be seen as early as nineteen twenty two, as
he flood that year almost hemmedly started setting new records.
For example, on the fifteenth of April the river was
(06:31):
measured in Greenville as being at fifty one feet, which
was a whole new record, and the flood was just
getting started. Indeed, as the flood carried on, it stressed
not just the levees and the people working to maintain them,
but also their supplies and their money as well. You see,
the men working on the levees, most of whom were black,
were constantly having to fill and place sandbags both to
(06:51):
fortify and raise the height of the levees to keep
the rising waters back. However, by the nineteenth they were
already out of sandbags in Greenville, mississipp which sits in
the heart of the Mississippi Delta, where still they were
also out of money to pay for all the various supplies,
including sandbags, that they needed to keep up with the
fight against the river. This was because there was no
such thing as federal relief. As a result, local communities
(07:15):
had to foot the bill. Greenville then had no choice
spout to pull together to try and meet this challenge.
The city then organized so they could feed those working
on the levees and also provide them with things like
lubber and shovels to fortify against the rising waters. Now,
the people of Greenville would manage to hold back the river,
but not every community in the Mississippi Delta was so lucky,
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as numerous counties in the region would be flooded out
in nineteen twenty two, making refugees out of some twenty
thousand people. Meanwhile, as the Mississippi continued to rise, the
water level in the main river got so high that
his tributaries could not drain into it. In fact, the
waters of the Mississippi started pushing back up the rivers
that were supposed to feed into it, further spreading the
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flooding in the process. Elsewhere, these ever rising woods were
creating an especially terrifying situation in New Orleans, where their
population of four hundred and fifty thousand really had no
way to escape the city during a flood, as all
its roads would be cut off. The flood then presented
a clear and present danger to the city and all
its residents. As a result, with the Mississippi continuing to
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progressively rise higher and higher, some three thousand city workers
were dedicated to holding back the woods by raising the
levees to match the record high wooters. The situation then
looked dire especially with locations like Arkansas City being completely flooded,
a location which notably layes ten miles south of the
recently closed Cypress Creek. However, you wouldn't know anything about
(08:41):
how much danger in New Orleans was facing if you
read any of the city's four major newspapers. As you see,
all four papers were owned by rich individuals, individuals who
then looked to use these papers to further their own agendas,
something which does not at all sound similar to our
own media landscape agendas, which included keeping things like the
flood quiet, as panic would thren these status quo and
(09:02):
thus their wealth. However, when Isaac Kline, the chief Regional
officer of the US Weather Bureau, predicted record flood heights,
he was impossible to ignore. Cline, you see, was not
some nameless bureaucrat. He was a famous figure in his
own right, most well known for surviving and claiming to
be a hero during the events of the Galveston Hurricane
of nineteen hundred. For more information on that particular tale,
(09:24):
check out my series on the Galliston Hurricane. So someone
like Isaac Kline, waiting into the fray come the twenty
seventh of April, not even in New Orleans papers could
keep pretending that there is nothing happening, especially since just
one day earlier, the Levies and Faraday Louisiana had collapsed,
forcing an additional twenty thousand people from their homes. This then,
was clearly a flood that needed to be taken seriously.
(09:46):
Yet even when the papers had to finally acknowledge the
record setting high waters on their front pages, they stone
did everything they could do downplay the danger. The Times
Picky un for example, would declare that quote as for
the high water situation, Both Date and federal engineers give
us reassuring reports the levees are in better shape than
they have ever been in The thing was, the people
(10:07):
of New Orleans ultimately had nothing to worry about, as
on the very same day that their papers finally made
mention of the rising water, the problem more or less
solved itself when twelve miles down river, the levees in
Saint Bernard Parish, at a place called Poydras or Perdress,
I'm not sure, collapsed under the sheer power of the
river's current. Now, this was a disaster for both Saint
(10:28):
Bernard and the neighboring plaquam in parish which were flooded
due to the levee collapse. The city of New Orleans, though,
was able to breathe a sigh of relief, as this
collapse also cost the head of the river to drop dramatically,
as the levee breakage effectively acted like an outlet, giving
the flood water someplace to go. In the end, the
nineteen twenty two flood had reached new heights and left
(10:48):
some seventy thousand people homeless in three states. The thing was,
while this flood had set record heights, it again did
not carry a record amount of water. As again, you
would think that if the water was rising higher in
places than it had ever before, that would surely mean
there was more water in the Mississippi than there had
been in the past floods. Yet that wasn't the case
(11:08):
at all, which meant there had to have been other
factors that caused a non record amount of water to
rise higher than ever before, something that you would think
would have sounded alarm bells up and down the Mississippi
that what they were doing was not working. You see,
for those responsible for sending policy considering the river, the
Mississippi River Commission and the Army Corps of Engineers, this
(11:28):
flood was confirmation that they were right. You see, the
way they sawt this flood proved their policies were successful
because the levees that had failled well the ones that
had not been built of their new specifications, while all
the levees that had been built to their standards had
withstood the flood. In coming to this conclusion, these groups
partly ignored the fact that above the recently closed Cypress
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Creek the flood really hadn't been all that notable, or
at least it hadn't come closed to setting any records.
In contrast, below the recently shut off Cypress Creek outlet,
the flood had set records for new heights, which just
makes sense given that a significant amount of water in
years past would have drained off into the Cypress Creek
and beyond. Now, though then water had no place to
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go but further downriver, thereby raising the flood there to
unprecedented levels and threatening every levee and community in the region.
As a result, the Mississippi River Commissioner and the Army
Corps of Engineers and had created a situation where an
average flood could pose an unprecedented danger. The question then,
was what would happen when a flood that was decidedly
(12:32):
above average occurred. Americans had basically ensured through their altering
(13:00):
the environment in the Mississippi Valley and by pursuing their
wrongheaded levies only theory that future Mississippi foods would be
higher and more widespread in their destructive capabilities, even without
unusual weather events fueling them. It's at this point, then,
with all this accomplished, the Mother Nature decided it was
time to step in and may clear the error of
our ways. The prelude of the nineteen twenty seven Mississippi
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Flood started in the late summer of nineteen twenty six,
as from that point through the upcoming winter, an unusual
amount of precipitation in the form of both rain and
eventually snow would fall within the Mississippi Valley region. Things
got started then in late August with a heavy, persistent
rainstorm that started in Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas, and Oklahoma
and then started moving eastward, hitting Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky,
(13:46):
and Ohio as it went. This powerful storm would last
for days, dredging the entire region. Things were just beginning though,
as after a brief forty eight hour respite, a second
heavy rainstorm formed that swept over that exact same region.
Want to Punch was enough to ruin crops and, most
importantly for our story, filled the rivers and streams in
the region that would eventually flow into the Mississippi. And
(14:08):
still things were just getting started as soon even more
rain started to fall. It was at this point in
September that the first of the flooding happened in places
like Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana. High wind that
would then move down the respected rivers until they all
started to combine in the Mississippi. Indeed, the effects were
even then being felt as bridges over the Mississippi in
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the upper Midwest were already being washed out and all
eleven people would die in these various regions from this
round of flooding, and things were just getting started, as
throughout September and into October, rain would continue to pour
down in the upper regions of the Mississippi Valley. For example,
Iowa would receive fifteen inches of rain in three days
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with the slatest round of storms. Then places like Nebraska,
South Dakota, and Oklahoma would all experience flooding. This, however,
didn't seem to alarm anyone in power, as the Weather
Bureau and the Mississippi River Commission were both effectively asleep
at the wheel. I mean, an unprecedented amount of rain
had just fallen, making it so every gate on the Ohio, Missouri,
and Mississippi rivers were at the highest average ever seen.
(15:13):
But apparently no one was all that alarmed by this,
as no warnings were put out and no one in
Washington was alerted to this situation. There was, however, some
seemingly good news, as in late October, the rains finally
seemed to stop. This though was only a temporary reprieve,
as six weeks later more storms began to descend upon
the region. Helena, Montana, for example, would receive nearly thirty
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inches of snow on a thirteenth of December, while Minnesota
would have reports of snow drifts ten feet deep. Meanwhile,
further south, Little Rock, Arkansas, got nearly six inches of
rain in one day, while Johnson City, Tennessee, got over
six inches of rain. As the calendar turned over and
it became nineteen twenty seven, even more storms would descend
upon the region. Once such storm delivered to New Orleans
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obvious rains it had seen in fifty two years, and
they were far from alone. As see times, Picky Yun
would report, quote from the Rockies to the Ozarks, a
blanket of stelle was being laid, adding that this latest
round of stelle was quote in some places, the heaviest
of the winter, which was saying something considering the winter
that many of these regions had already experienced. All this precipitation,
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of course, caused flooding. And keep in mind when we're
talking about rivers flooding, that high water doesn't just affect
one area and dissipate as a high water moves along
through the system, meaning that places further north and further
away from the Mississippi would experience the flooding first. Though
swallen rivers, though, would still carry a fair amount of
that winter further downstream, eventually feeing it all into the Mississippi,
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which of course meant that the flooding there would be
the worst because it was a product of all these
other rivers that had been overwhelmed by this month's long
weather pattern. This, of course, is only made worse by
the fact that, through the actions of the Mississippi River Commission,
no are the ways that the Mississippi would have drained
off naturally had been closed, meaning there was no natural
release foul for all this water, and so the Mississippi
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would just continue to rise higher and higher, testing the
Commission's vaunted levies as it did. This latest round of
flooding would start with the Alleghany and Monongahila rivers, which
both flooded on the twenty third of January. This is
notable because those two rivers flow into the Ohio, which
in turn flooded five days later in Cincinnati. Now, this
was admittedly a minor flood, but it was only the beginning. Indeed,
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as these floods continued, it was taking longer and longer
for the crest of the floods to move from one
end of the system to the other. For example, in January,
a flood crest took twenty nine days ago from Pittsburgh
to New Orleans. By March, though, a flood cress would
take thirty eight days traveling a similar distance. Simply because
there was so much more water in the Mississippi, it
was taking longer for it to travel through the system. Still,
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the Mississippi River Commission had complete faith in the system
of lebbyes they had constructed, and they felt they had
good reason to be so confident, as now all the
levees along the Mississippi met the standards that had been
established by themselves and by the Army Corps of Engineers. Indeed,
the new head of the Army Corps of Engineers, General
Edgar Jadwin, would be clearing his annual report that for
(18:16):
the first time ever, the levees were all of a
standard du quote prevent the destructive efforts of flood. The
Commission then was confident they had finally conquered nature. After all,
the nineteen twenty two flood had seemingly proven that their
system of libby construction was more than up to the task,
as while some levees along the river had failed, notably
those that actually met the standards as set forth by
(18:37):
the Commission and the Army Corps of Engineers had all
stood strong. And to be fair, the federal levees were
quite impressive, as it were massive earthworks that stood two
to three stories high. Indeed, by the government specifications, each
and every one of these levees were thicker than any
levee previously constructed along the Mississippi, and the each stood
three feet higher than the water had ever risen, cautions
(19:00):
that they believed would be more than sufficient to match
whatever Mother Nature threw at them. Now, at first glance,
these levees might not look like much other than big
piles of dirt. Yet these weren't just massive mounds of earth,
as it had been precisely engineered. You see, each levee
stood about a mile back from the river's natural bank.
Then in this landing between the levee and the river
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where groves of willow trees that had been planted as
a barrier to break up and disperse the river's current
and waves, thereby lessening the effect of these forces on
the levees. Then behind this forested area there was a long,
deep trench that sat directly in front of the levees. Now,
in some ways, this was a natural byproduct of the
levee construction process, as the dirt that could prise these
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massive earth and structures had to come from somewhere. That
being said, these trenches served a very practical purposesmall, because
by placing such a pin in front of the levee,
there was another area that they would have had to
fill in first before it could attempt to rise above
the levees. Speaking on the levees, there were also more
than just dirt that had been mild high as were
also top with bermuda grass, whose long and thick roots
(20:04):
served to hold the structure together. Yet, all this confidence
did not stop the levees in Arkansas that were holding
back the wet and Little Red rivers from failing. The
failure all these levees resulted in five thousand people being
displaced from their homes as some one hundred thousand acres
of land were submerged under ten to fifteen feet of water. Still,
though the Mississippi River Commission wasn't worried, as Lee's levees
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were not among those that had been built to their specifications.
If anything, then this likely just reinforced their confidence, as
while sure lesser levees were bound to fail, but their
levees were simply built better. Meanwhile, the precipitation continued to fall.
For example, as March began whyoming, Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska,
as well as parts of Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas were
(20:47):
all struck by a severe blizzard that, as it headed east,
also dumped record amounts of stowe on Tennessee, Virginia and
North Carolina. March would also bring storms that spawned a
series of tornadoes in the lower Mississippi Valley. They killned
forty five people. Now at this point, all this excess
water that had been dumped into the Mississippi River Valley
was really starting to add up, as on the twenty
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fifth of March, the river gage in Cairo, Illinois, where
the Ohio River joined the Mississippi, read the highest it
had ever been. Still, though the Mississippi River Commission remained unworried.
For example, Major Donald Connolly, who was in charge of
the Mississippi River Commission's Memphis District, would declare, confidently, quote
all levees are in fine condition, and we expect no trouble. Similarly,
(21:30):
Captain W. H. Holcombe, who was the head of the
New Orleans District, would proclaim, quote no serious trouble is expected. Now.
While the Mississippi River Commission may have been confident in
the face of these rising waters, the people who lived
along the river were much more nervous, as they started
stationing armed guards all along the river's numerous levees. Part
of their mission was to be on the lookout for
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any signs of weakness in the levees. However, their main
role and the reason why they were armed, was because
they were there to guard the levees for potential sabageurs. Now,
when I first read this, I didn't really understand the
motivation or why they believe someone would try to sabotage
a levee. It just seemed like comic book Supervillian type
behavior of death and destruction for no real purpose. So
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I chalked it up to good old fashioned American paranoia,
figuring maybe they were worried about scary anarchist or something. However,
as I thought about it more, the fear was likely
about someone from a different town sabotaging a levee so
as to spare their own community, because if a levee collapsed,
it effectively acted as an outlet, draining at least some
of the water out of the river, which in turn
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would lessen the danger on other nearby levees. Indeed, on
the sixth of April, guards at one levee would shoot
four men who had been trying to plant over one
hundred sticks of dynamite. Meanwhile, the rain continued to fall.
As a result. By the ninth of April, at least
portions of the Saint Francis, the Black River, the White River,
the Ohio, the Missouri, and the Mississippi were all at
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flood stage, and in some cases were approaching record levels. Indeed,
the widespread and continuing nature of this person in dictation
had already guaranteed that this flood would exceed the one
that had occurred in nineteen twenty two. The effects of
this were already being felt, as both Cincinnati and Pittsburgh's
downtowns had been flooded, and they were far from alone,
as arounding million acres of Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas,
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and Mississippi were already underwater, flooding that had then driven
some fifty thousand people out of their homes, forcing them
to live in tents and box cars. Now, a fair
amount of this flooding was likely due to the phenomenon
known as backwitter. You see, if the water in the
main river that others flow into is high enough, then
it can act almost like a dam, preventing the tributary
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from draining into the main river, at which point, with
nowhere else to go, the wooters pushed back upstream, which
causes flooding. This natural phenomenon and the experience of the
people affected by it, would be described and immortalized in
Blind Lemon Jefferson's Rising High Wood Blues. Now, much of
Jefferson's life is clouded in mystery. What we can say
is that he was born on a farm in Couchman
(23:58):
in Texas, and his parents were shared croppers. However, we
can't say exactly when he was born, other than it
was sometime in the mid eighteen nineties, as census records
places birth on the twenty fourth of September eighteen ninety three,
while his World War One draft registration, which he filled
out himself, lists a date on the twenty sixth of
October eighteen ninety four. We also, notably don't really know
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the cost of his blindness, nor the degree to which
he was blind. Similarly, we can't say for sure when
he first became drawn to the blues or when it
was he first picked up the guitar. However, it is
suspected that Jefferson was likely exposed in the music of
Bluesman Like Henry Ragtime, Texas Thomas and Texas Alexander Is
both traveled around the region of the state where Jefferson
was known to have grown up. Regardless of what first
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planted the seed, though, Jefferson would become a street musician,
performing on street corners and in front of barbershops and
the like in East Texas towns, reportedly performing from eight
at nine until four and in the morning. Then by
nineteen twelve, when he was eighteen or nineteen years old,
Jefferson moved on to Dallas, where he performed in places
like the Deep Element neighborhood, largely because it was one
of the few places where he was allowed to perform
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because of the city's white residents did not want a
black man performing in the cities downtown. The most notable
thing about his time in Downs, though, was the fact
that it was here that he encountered Hutty Ledbetter, who
was better known as led Belly, one of the most
legendary Texas blues men. Jefferson would reportedly learn a lot
from lead Belly, an education in the blues that likely
(25:24):
served Jefferson well. When in nineteen twenty five, a paramount
recording scout who had been dispatched to look for country
blues artists stumbled across him. The scout was clearly impressed
by what he heard, as he brought the blind Bluesman
back with him to Chicago to record. Now, his first
recordings would be done under the name of Deacon L. J. Bates,
although he would soon adopt the moniker Blind Lemon Jefferson.
(25:45):
It was under this day that he would produce hits
like Booster Blues and Dry Southern Blues. Jefferson, then, even
though he wasn't the first country blues artist to be
discovered and recorded in this manner, would become the first
country blues artists to find a nationwide audience. That being said,
his biggest hit seemed to have come after he left
Paramount for OK Records, where he would record his best
(26:06):
selling songs Black Steak Moone and Batchbox Blues, a song
that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame chose as
one of the five hundred songs that shaped rock and roll.
Jefferson's career, though while successful, would be short, lasting only
three years. However, in those three years from nineteen twenty
six to nineteen twenty nine, he managed to record one
hundred and ten sides. His recording career, though, would not
(26:27):
come to an end due to shifting taste in the
audience or anything as mundane as that. Instead, it would
end due to the fact that on the twenty second
of December nineteen twenty nine, blind Lemon Jefferson was found
dead in the middle of a Chicago street, a death
that is as clouded in mystery as the rest of
his life. A death that is as clouded in mystery
as the rest of his life, as no one really
seems to know the how or why of his death. Supposedly,
(26:50):
the official death certificate puts the cause of death as
acute myocarr don is, although some sources say there was
no official cause of death, so I don't know. Plus
you always have to wonder how much effort would have
been put into investigating the death of a black man
in nineteen twenty nine. Meanwhile, there were also rumors of
foul play, including accusations that a jealous silver had poisoned
(27:10):
his coffee, while others have suggested that he died in
the midst of a snowstorm when trying to make his
way to a hotel from the train station. After the
person who had promised to pick him up and failed
to do so. According to this version of the story,
then the noise of the snowstorm served to disorient the
blind or release partially blind musician, causing him to get
lost until he died of exposure. Regardless, though, Paramount would
(27:32):
pay to have Jefferson's body return to Texas, where his
remains were buried in the Warham Negro Cemetery in an
unmarked grave, something that wouldn't be rectified until he finally
received a grave marker in nineteen sixty seven, which in
turn was replaced with a new granite headstone in nineteen
ninety seven that read quote, Lord, it's one kind favor
I'll ask of you, see that my grave is kept clean,
(27:53):
a famous line from his song one Kind Favor. Yet,
Whil's career in life may have been tragically cut short,
blind Leman and Jefferson managed to leave behind a lasting impact.
He was a skilled guitarist and a singer who reportedly
had a two octave vocal range. Meanwhile, his lyrics tended
to be complex, managing to be ironic and even humorous
at times while still being poignant. Blindlemon Jefferson then is
(28:16):
considered to have been heavily influential on the Texas Blues tradition,
and some have even called him the father of Texas Blues. However,
are focus to days on a song of his that
was not about his home state, as you would sing
in Rising high Wood or Blues quote wood are in Arkansas,
people skimming in Tennessee. If I don't leave Memphis, Backwoter
spell all over poor me, a pair of lines that
(28:37):
illustrates both the widespread nature of this disaster with its
striking at least Arkansas and Tennessee, and also the cause Backwitter.
Jefferson then further expounds on the experience of those affected
by this disaster with the lions quote people. Since its
reigning has been for nights and days, thousands of people
stand on the hill looking down where they used to stay.
As again he points in the cause of this tragedy
(28:59):
that consistent that just won't seem to go away. Meanwhile,
also illustrating not only how many were affected by this
flooding thousands, but also the way in which they were impacted,
as these thousands of people were forced from their homes
and now can only look on helplessly from higher ground
as the backwouldter swallows up everything they had and knew.
The song then ends with this final thought quote, the
(29:20):
back would arise and come in my windows and door.
I leave with a prayer in my heart. Back won't
rise no more, which makes this disaster a personal one,
as it acts as a first person account of the
singer song being taken over by the flooding backwitter, thereby
being given no other choice but to abandon their home,
helpless to do anything else but to pray that this
will eventually stop happening. As for the song itself, since
(29:43):
blind lim and Jefferson was a country blues artist, the
music was fairly simple, as country blue songs in general
seem to have just consisted of the vocalists being accompanied
by a singular instrument, typically a guitar, and indeed, Blind
Lemon was reportedly quite the skilled guitarist. Curiously enough, though,
recording of the song that I found online seems to
feature a piano accompanying Jefferson as he sings, which does
(30:06):
make a kind of sense given that his guitar playing
has been compared to that of a ragtime piano. And yes,
I did after reading that description for the first time,
go back and listen to the song to make sure
that what I was hearing was a piano and not
a guitar being played like one, and I am now
confident that a guitar is not playing those notes. Regardless,
I should add that despite this being the first song
(30:26):
that I'm really talking about in this series, it was
not the first one recorded and released the public, as
I will be talking about that song, Bessie Smith's Backwater
Blues more in a subsequent episode, something I wanted to
make clear, as I didn't want to confuse you because
more than likely I will be stating multiple times that
Bessie Smith's song was the first blue song to be
(30:47):
written and released concerning the flood, the timing on that
song and its success is donable, after all, but I
wanted to talk about this now as I think it's
about time I talk about some music in this music series,
and because it serves to illustrated the experience of those
suffering from this back what are flooding. Regardless, the flooding
had begun, and while over fifty thousand had already been
(31:08):
driven from their homes, now the good news was the
federal levees a lone the Mississippi River proper were still
standing strong, but the bad news was the rain just
kept coming. On the thirteenth of April, for example, a
storm featuring heavy rains and destructive tornadoes would effect twelve states.
So while the federal levees may be standing strong for now,
how much longer that would be the case was to question. However,
(31:31):
the story of the ultimate failure of the Mississippi River Commission,
its policies, and its levees will have to for now
remain a story for another time. Thank you for listening
to the started history. If you would like to help out,
please read review the podcasts and tell your friends to
be faith they'll be interested. If you would like ad
(31:53):
for in early episodes, I set up such a feed
over at patreon dot com slash Distorted History by paying
ten bucks one long if you will gain access to
the special ad free feed available on Spotify or likely
through your podcast app as long as it uses an
RSS feed. I will continue to post sources on koffee
and Twitter, though, as it's just a convenient place to
go to access that information regardless. Once again, thank you
(32:16):
for listening, and until next time,
My name is Eric Gaskell, and you're listening to the
Distorted History podcast and program. I didn't give you many
nails and joy a blunder. Look, I'm raveling. I'm not
(00:23):
the brah A long struggle for freedom, it really is
a revolution. In this tale, the nineteen twenty seven Mississippi
Flood and its effects on the Blues. The Mississippi River
itself is the ever present, ominous threat that drives the
(00:46):
events to that end. I spent the first two episodes
in this series looking to kind of establish the river
as its own character by explaining why it was the
way it was. Yet, rather than looking at a person's
childhood and the culture they grew were open to explain
their actions. Since we're talking about a river, we instead
looked at the way the people living around the Mississippi
(01:07):
changed its environment, changes that ensured when a flood happened,
it would be devastating, which brings us through this month's
episode as we finally begin to see the consequences of
these decisions when Mother Nature decides to throw the Mississippi
Valley region a curveball in the form of some particularly
unusual weather, and we also at last begin to talk
about the music that resulted from this cataclysm. Before we
(01:30):
get there, however, first, like always, I want to acknowledge
my sources for this series, which include Richard M. Mazzel
Junior's Backwitter Blues, The Mississippi Flood of nineteen twenty seven
in the African American Imagination, John M. Berry's Rising Tide,
the Great Mississippi Flood of nineteen twenty seven and How
It changed America, and Susan Scott Perishes the Flood Year
(01:51):
nineteen twenty seven a cultural history, And like always, a
full list of these and any other sources like websites
that I used, will be available on this podcast Bluesky
and Covey pages. Plus for anyone who doesn't want to
be bothered skipping through commercials, there is always an ad
free feet available to subscribers at patreon dot com slash
Distorted History. And with all that being said, let's begin.
(02:13):
As we pick back up the Mississippi River Commission, the
federal government and the public living around the river had
all embraceding Levee's only theory. Now, initially this may have
been a partially cynical move to get the federal government
to agree to pay from levees to holbet the river's
rising waters. In time, though it seemed like everyone forgot
the fact that all three of the men who had
(02:35):
studied the river in Nampth had rejected this theory and
has claimed that by constructing levees only, and by cutting
off the river's natural forms of drainage, that its flow
would then carve out the river's bottom, making it deeper
and thus less likely the flood. Indeed, despite the river
being more restricted than ever before, its supposedly more focused
flow was not carving out enough of the riverbed to
(02:56):
compensate for the fact that its natural forms of drainage
had been taken way. This would prove to be a
major reason why the flood of nineteen twenty seven was
as cataclysmic as it was, because, when, as we will see,
the region experienced some strange weather that resulted in an
unusual amount of water being poured into the Mississippi, said
water would have no place to go, so the Mississippi
(03:18):
itself would rise higher and higher until it overwhelmed the
commissions vaunted levies, destroying communities, towns, and cities, creating what
was essentially a vast inland seat in the process. Now,
the nineteen twenty seven flood was obviously a shocking and
devastating event, but it was not when they came without warning,
for example, a flood in nineteen twelve. So the region
around the Lower Mississippi devastated as the river rose to
(03:41):
record heights, notably doing so despite their being less witter
involved than in past non record setting floods, which is
to say that this wasn't a record setting flood in
terms of the amount of water involved. It was likely
average to maybe even below average. Yet in the Lower
Mississippi this water managed to rise to record setting heights,
which damaged the surrounding can comunities, something that should have
(04:01):
been a clear warning sign that the Levee's only policy
was if anything, having the exact opposite effect as had
been predicted. As you see, if the levees only theory
was accurate, the river should have been deeper and thus
there should not be record setting flood heights without a
record setting amount of winter causing it, because if the
river was actually deeper, it would be able to contain
(04:22):
more winter without rising higher. Yet here it was rising
higher than it ever had before with less water than
in the past, meaning that by definition, the river bed
had not been carved out, but had instead likely been
built up thanks to new deposits of sediment. Now, to
be fair, a number of civil engineers did take none
of this and tried to call attention to what was
(04:43):
happening and what it meant. However, they would be ignored
and ridiculed by the Mississippi River Commission. Indeed, even when
some civil engineers did following yet another flood managed to
put enough pressure on the Commission to conduct new studies
concerning outlets and reservoirs. These quote unquote new studies did
not actually collect any new data or perform any new experiments. Instead,
(05:05):
they simply repeated own data and arguments that supported their
established positions. That being said, when a nineteen thirteen flood
resulted in New Orleans demanding a new study, the nation's
second largest port had enough sway to get the Commission
to actually do something. Indeed, after collecting some actual new data,
Major Clark Smith of the Mississippi River Commission would admit
(05:26):
that there was quote no doubt that a spillway would
reduce extreme food heights at New Orleans, with a spillway
being the same idea as an outlet. In other words,
it was someplace where the wood could go to reduce
the height of the river. Yet, in spite of this,
Smith would not recommend the construction of a spillway, claiming
that it would be expensive and would hardly ever be
of use. Additionally, the Commission also refused to release any
(05:48):
of the new data it had collected, likely because a
contradicted with their whole levi's only policy. As a result,
no changes to the policy would be made. Indeed, all
that actually happened as a result of the back to
back damaging and deadly floods of nineteen twelve and nineteenth
thirteen was a creation of new standards for levees that
were now to be higher and thicker. Meanwhile, in accordance
(06:10):
to their levees only policy, the Commission would in nineteen
twenty begin the process of sealing off the Mississippi from
the Cypress Creek, thereby giving the water one last place
where it could go to drain, the consequences of which
would be seen as early as nineteen twenty two, as
he flood that year almost hemmedly started setting new records.
For example, on the fifteenth of April the river was
(06:31):
measured in Greenville as being at fifty one feet, which
was a whole new record, and the flood was just
getting started. Indeed, as the flood carried on, it stressed
not just the levees and the people working to maintain them,
but also their supplies and their money as well. You see,
the men working on the levees, most of whom were black,
were constantly having to fill and place sandbags both to
(06:51):
fortify and raise the height of the levees to keep
the rising waters back. However, by the nineteenth they were
already out of sandbags in Greenville, mississipp which sits in
the heart of the Mississippi Delta, where still they were
also out of money to pay for all the various supplies,
including sandbags, that they needed to keep up with the
fight against the river. This was because there was no
such thing as federal relief. As a result, local communities
(07:15):
had to foot the bill. Greenville then had no choice
spout to pull together to try and meet this challenge.
The city then organized so they could feed those working
on the levees and also provide them with things like
lubber and shovels to fortify against the rising waters. Now,
the people of Greenville would manage to hold back the river,
but not every community in the Mississippi Delta was so lucky,
(07:37):
as numerous counties in the region would be flooded out
in nineteen twenty two, making refugees out of some twenty
thousand people. Meanwhile, as the Mississippi continued to rise, the
water level in the main river got so high that
his tributaries could not drain into it. In fact, the
waters of the Mississippi started pushing back up the rivers
that were supposed to feed into it, further spreading the
(07:58):
flooding in the process. Elsewhere, these ever rising woods were
creating an especially terrifying situation in New Orleans, where their
population of four hundred and fifty thousand really had no
way to escape the city during a flood, as all
its roads would be cut off. The flood then presented
a clear and present danger to the city and all
its residents. As a result, with the Mississippi continuing to
(08:19):
progressively rise higher and higher, some three thousand city workers
were dedicated to holding back the woods by raising the
levees to match the record high wooters. The situation then
looked dire especially with locations like Arkansas City being completely flooded,
a location which notably layes ten miles south of the
recently closed Cypress Creek. However, you wouldn't know anything about
(08:41):
how much danger in New Orleans was facing if you
read any of the city's four major newspapers. As you see,
all four papers were owned by rich individuals, individuals who
then looked to use these papers to further their own agendas,
something which does not at all sound similar to our
own media landscape agendas, which included keeping things like the
flood quiet, as panic would thren these status quo and
(09:02):
thus their wealth. However, when Isaac Kline, the chief Regional
officer of the US Weather Bureau, predicted record flood heights,
he was impossible to ignore. Cline, you see, was not
some nameless bureaucrat. He was a famous figure in his
own right, most well known for surviving and claiming to
be a hero during the events of the Galveston Hurricane
of nineteen hundred. For more information on that particular tale,
(09:24):
check out my series on the Galliston Hurricane. So someone
like Isaac Kline, waiting into the fray come the twenty
seventh of April, not even in New Orleans papers could
keep pretending that there is nothing happening, especially since just
one day earlier, the Levies and Faraday Louisiana had collapsed,
forcing an additional twenty thousand people from their homes. This then,
was clearly a flood that needed to be taken seriously.
(09:46):
Yet even when the papers had to finally acknowledge the
record setting high waters on their front pages, they stone
did everything they could do downplay the danger. The Times
Picky un for example, would declare that quote as for
the high water situation, Both Date and federal engineers give
us reassuring reports the levees are in better shape than
they have ever been in The thing was, the people
(10:07):
of New Orleans ultimately had nothing to worry about, as
on the very same day that their papers finally made
mention of the rising water, the problem more or less
solved itself when twelve miles down river, the levees in
Saint Bernard Parish, at a place called Poydras or Perdress,
I'm not sure, collapsed under the sheer power of the
river's current. Now, this was a disaster for both Saint
(10:28):
Bernard and the neighboring plaquam in parish which were flooded
due to the levee collapse. The city of New Orleans, though,
was able to breathe a sigh of relief, as this
collapse also cost the head of the river to drop dramatically,
as the levee breakage effectively acted like an outlet, giving
the flood water someplace to go. In the end, the
nineteen twenty two flood had reached new heights and left
(10:48):
some seventy thousand people homeless in three states. The thing was,
while this flood had set record heights, it again did
not carry a record amount of water. As again, you
would think that if the water was rising higher in
places than it had ever before, that would surely mean
there was more water in the Mississippi than there had
been in the past floods. Yet that wasn't the case
(11:08):
at all, which meant there had to have been other
factors that caused a non record amount of water to
rise higher than ever before, something that you would think
would have sounded alarm bells up and down the Mississippi
that what they were doing was not working. You see,
for those responsible for sending policy considering the river, the
Mississippi River Commission and the Army Corps of Engineers, this
(11:28):
flood was confirmation that they were right. You see, the
way they sawt this flood proved their policies were successful
because the levees that had failled well the ones that
had not been built of their new specifications, while all
the levees that had been built to their standards had
withstood the flood. In coming to this conclusion, these groups
partly ignored the fact that above the recently closed Cypress
(11:50):
Creek the flood really hadn't been all that notable, or
at least it hadn't come closed to setting any records.
In contrast, below the recently shut off Cypress Creek outlet,
the flood had set records for new heights, which just
makes sense given that a significant amount of water in
years past would have drained off into the Cypress Creek
and beyond. Now, though then water had no place to
(12:11):
go but further downriver, thereby raising the flood there to
unprecedented levels and threatening every levee and community in the region.
As a result, the Mississippi River Commissioner and the Army
Corps of Engineers and had created a situation where an
average flood could pose an unprecedented danger. The question then,
was what would happen when a flood that was decidedly
(12:32):
above average occurred. Americans had basically ensured through their altering
(13:00):
the environment in the Mississippi Valley and by pursuing their
wrongheaded levies only theory that future Mississippi foods would be
higher and more widespread in their destructive capabilities, even without
unusual weather events fueling them. It's at this point, then,
with all this accomplished, the Mother Nature decided it was
time to step in and may clear the error of
our ways. The prelude of the nineteen twenty seven Mississippi
(13:23):
Flood started in the late summer of nineteen twenty six,
as from that point through the upcoming winter, an unusual
amount of precipitation in the form of both rain and
eventually snow would fall within the Mississippi Valley region. Things
got started then in late August with a heavy, persistent
rainstorm that started in Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas, and Oklahoma
and then started moving eastward, hitting Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky,
(13:46):
and Ohio as it went. This powerful storm would last
for days, dredging the entire region. Things were just beginning though,
as after a brief forty eight hour respite, a second
heavy rainstorm formed that swept over that exact same region.
Want to Punch was enough to ruin crops and, most
importantly for our story, filled the rivers and streams in
the region that would eventually flow into the Mississippi. And
(14:08):
still things were just getting started as soon even more
rain started to fall. It was at this point in
September that the first of the flooding happened in places
like Nebraska, Kansas, Iowa, Illinois, and Indiana. High wind that
would then move down the respected rivers until they all
started to combine in the Mississippi. Indeed, the effects were
even then being felt as bridges over the Mississippi in
(14:30):
the upper Midwest were already being washed out and all
eleven people would die in these various regions from this
round of flooding, and things were just getting started, as
throughout September and into October, rain would continue to pour
down in the upper regions of the Mississippi Valley. For example,
Iowa would receive fifteen inches of rain in three days
(14:51):
with the slatest round of storms. Then places like Nebraska,
South Dakota, and Oklahoma would all experience flooding. This, however,
didn't seem to alarm anyone in power, as the Weather
Bureau and the Mississippi River Commission were both effectively asleep
at the wheel. I mean, an unprecedented amount of rain
had just fallen, making it so every gate on the Ohio, Missouri,
and Mississippi rivers were at the highest average ever seen.
(15:13):
But apparently no one was all that alarmed by this,
as no warnings were put out and no one in
Washington was alerted to this situation. There was, however, some
seemingly good news, as in late October, the rains finally
seemed to stop. This though was only a temporary reprieve,
as six weeks later more storms began to descend upon
the region. Helena, Montana, for example, would receive nearly thirty
(15:37):
inches of snow on a thirteenth of December, while Minnesota
would have reports of snow drifts ten feet deep. Meanwhile,
further south, Little Rock, Arkansas, got nearly six inches of
rain in one day, while Johnson City, Tennessee, got over
six inches of rain. As the calendar turned over and
it became nineteen twenty seven, even more storms would descend
upon the region. Once such storm delivered to New Orleans
(16:00):
obvious rains it had seen in fifty two years, and
they were far from alone. As see times, Picky Yun
would report, quote from the Rockies to the Ozarks, a
blanket of stelle was being laid, adding that this latest
round of stelle was quote in some places, the heaviest
of the winter, which was saying something considering the winter
that many of these regions had already experienced. All this precipitation,
(16:22):
of course, caused flooding. And keep in mind when we're
talking about rivers flooding, that high water doesn't just affect
one area and dissipate as a high water moves along
through the system, meaning that places further north and further
away from the Mississippi would experience the flooding first. Though
swallen rivers, though, would still carry a fair amount of
that winter further downstream, eventually feeing it all into the Mississippi,
(16:45):
which of course meant that the flooding there would be
the worst because it was a product of all these
other rivers that had been overwhelmed by this month's long
weather pattern. This, of course, is only made worse by
the fact that, through the actions of the Mississippi River Commission,
no are the ways that the Mississippi would have drained
off naturally had been closed, meaning there was no natural
release foul for all this water, and so the Mississippi
(17:08):
would just continue to rise higher and higher, testing the
Commission's vaunted levies as it did. This latest round of
flooding would start with the Alleghany and Monongahila rivers, which
both flooded on the twenty third of January. This is
notable because those two rivers flow into the Ohio, which
in turn flooded five days later in Cincinnati. Now, this
was admittedly a minor flood, but it was only the beginning. Indeed,
(17:32):
as these floods continued, it was taking longer and longer
for the crest of the floods to move from one
end of the system to the other. For example, in January,
a flood crest took twenty nine days ago from Pittsburgh
to New Orleans. By March, though, a flood cress would
take thirty eight days traveling a similar distance. Simply because
there was so much more water in the Mississippi, it
was taking longer for it to travel through the system. Still,
(17:55):
the Mississippi River Commission had complete faith in the system
of lebbyes they had constructed, and they felt they had
good reason to be so confident, as now all the
levees along the Mississippi met the standards that had been
established by themselves and by the Army Corps of Engineers. Indeed,
the new head of the Army Corps of Engineers, General
Edgar Jadwin, would be clearing his annual report that for
(18:16):
the first time ever, the levees were all of a
standard du quote prevent the destructive efforts of flood. The
Commission then was confident they had finally conquered nature. After all,
the nineteen twenty two flood had seemingly proven that their
system of libby construction was more than up to the task,
as while some levees along the river had failed, notably
those that actually met the standards as set forth by
(18:37):
the Commission and the Army Corps of Engineers had all
stood strong. And to be fair, the federal levees were
quite impressive, as it were massive earthworks that stood two
to three stories high. Indeed, by the government specifications, each
and every one of these levees were thicker than any
levee previously constructed along the Mississippi, and the each stood
three feet higher than the water had ever risen, cautions
(19:00):
that they believed would be more than sufficient to match
whatever Mother Nature threw at them. Now, at first glance,
these levees might not look like much other than big
piles of dirt. Yet these weren't just massive mounds of earth,
as it had been precisely engineered. You see, each levee
stood about a mile back from the river's natural bank.
Then in this landing between the levee and the river
(19:22):
where groves of willow trees that had been planted as
a barrier to break up and disperse the river's current
and waves, thereby lessening the effect of these forces on
the levees. Then behind this forested area there was a long,
deep trench that sat directly in front of the levees. Now,
in some ways, this was a natural byproduct of the
levee construction process, as the dirt that could prise these
(19:42):
massive earth and structures had to come from somewhere. That
being said, these trenches served a very practical purposesmall, because
by placing such a pin in front of the levee,
there was another area that they would have had to
fill in first before it could attempt to rise above
the levees. Speaking on the levees, there were also more
than just dirt that had been mild high as were
also top with bermuda grass, whose long and thick roots
(20:04):
served to hold the structure together. Yet, all this confidence
did not stop the levees in Arkansas that were holding
back the wet and Little Red rivers from failing. The
failure all these levees resulted in five thousand people being
displaced from their homes as some one hundred thousand acres
of land were submerged under ten to fifteen feet of water. Still,
though the Mississippi River Commission wasn't worried, as Lee's levees
(20:25):
were not among those that had been built to their specifications.
If anything, then this likely just reinforced their confidence, as
while sure lesser levees were bound to fail, but their
levees were simply built better. Meanwhile, the precipitation continued to fall.
For example, as March began whyoming, Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska,
as well as parts of Missouri, Oklahoma, and Texas were
(20:47):
all struck by a severe blizzard that, as it headed east,
also dumped record amounts of stowe on Tennessee, Virginia and
North Carolina. March would also bring storms that spawned a
series of tornadoes in the lower Mississippi Valley. They killned
forty five people. Now at this point, all this excess
water that had been dumped into the Mississippi River Valley
was really starting to add up, as on the twenty
(21:07):
fifth of March, the river gage in Cairo, Illinois, where
the Ohio River joined the Mississippi, read the highest it
had ever been. Still, though the Mississippi River Commission remained unworried.
For example, Major Donald Connolly, who was in charge of
the Mississippi River Commission's Memphis District, would declare, confidently, quote
all levees are in fine condition, and we expect no trouble. Similarly,
(21:30):
Captain W. H. Holcombe, who was the head of the
New Orleans District, would proclaim, quote no serious trouble is expected. Now.
While the Mississippi River Commission may have been confident in
the face of these rising waters, the people who lived
along the river were much more nervous, as they started
stationing armed guards all along the river's numerous levees. Part
of their mission was to be on the lookout for
(21:51):
any signs of weakness in the levees. However, their main
role and the reason why they were armed, was because
they were there to guard the levees for potential sabageurs. Now,
when I first read this, I didn't really understand the
motivation or why they believe someone would try to sabotage
a levee. It just seemed like comic book Supervillian type
behavior of death and destruction for no real purpose. So
(22:12):
I chalked it up to good old fashioned American paranoia,
figuring maybe they were worried about scary anarchist or something. However,
as I thought about it more, the fear was likely
about someone from a different town sabotaging a levee so
as to spare their own community, because if a levee collapsed,
it effectively acted as an outlet, draining at least some
of the water out of the river, which in turn
(22:32):
would lessen the danger on other nearby levees. Indeed, on
the sixth of April, guards at one levee would shoot
four men who had been trying to plant over one
hundred sticks of dynamite. Meanwhile, the rain continued to fall.
As a result. By the ninth of April, at least
portions of the Saint Francis, the Black River, the White River,
the Ohio, the Missouri, and the Mississippi were all at
(22:53):
flood stage, and in some cases were approaching record levels. Indeed,
the widespread and continuing nature of this person in dictation
had already guaranteed that this flood would exceed the one
that had occurred in nineteen twenty two. The effects of
this were already being felt, as both Cincinnati and Pittsburgh's
downtowns had been flooded, and they were far from alone,
as arounding million acres of Oklahoma, Missouri, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas,
(23:17):
and Mississippi were already underwater, flooding that had then driven
some fifty thousand people out of their homes, forcing them
to live in tents and box cars. Now, a fair
amount of this flooding was likely due to the phenomenon
known as backwitter. You see, if the water in the
main river that others flow into is high enough, then
it can act almost like a dam, preventing the tributary
(23:37):
from draining into the main river, at which point, with
nowhere else to go, the wooters pushed back upstream, which
causes flooding. This natural phenomenon and the experience of the
people affected by it, would be described and immortalized in
Blind Lemon Jefferson's Rising High Wood Blues. Now, much of
Jefferson's life is clouded in mystery. What we can say
is that he was born on a farm in Couchman
(23:58):
in Texas, and his parents were shared croppers. However, we
can't say exactly when he was born, other than it
was sometime in the mid eighteen nineties, as census records
places birth on the twenty fourth of September eighteen ninety three,
while his World War One draft registration, which he filled
out himself, lists a date on the twenty sixth of
October eighteen ninety four. We also, notably don't really know
(24:19):
the cost of his blindness, nor the degree to which
he was blind. Similarly, we can't say for sure when
he first became drawn to the blues or when it
was he first picked up the guitar. However, it is
suspected that Jefferson was likely exposed in the music of
Bluesman Like Henry Ragtime, Texas Thomas and Texas Alexander Is
both traveled around the region of the state where Jefferson
was known to have grown up. Regardless of what first
(24:42):
planted the seed, though, Jefferson would become a street musician,
performing on street corners and in front of barbershops and
the like in East Texas towns, reportedly performing from eight
at nine until four and in the morning. Then by
nineteen twelve, when he was eighteen or nineteen years old,
Jefferson moved on to Dallas, where he performed in places
like the Deep Element neighborhood, largely because it was one
of the few places where he was allowed to perform
(25:04):
because of the city's white residents did not want a
black man performing in the cities downtown. The most notable
thing about his time in Downs, though, was the fact
that it was here that he encountered Hutty Ledbetter, who
was better known as led Belly, one of the most
legendary Texas blues men. Jefferson would reportedly learn a lot
from lead Belly, an education in the blues that likely
(25:24):
served Jefferson well. When in nineteen twenty five, a paramount
recording scout who had been dispatched to look for country
blues artists stumbled across him. The scout was clearly impressed
by what he heard, as he brought the blind Bluesman
back with him to Chicago to record. Now, his first
recordings would be done under the name of Deacon L. J. Bates,
although he would soon adopt the moniker Blind Lemon Jefferson.
(25:45):
It was under this day that he would produce hits
like Booster Blues and Dry Southern Blues. Jefferson, then, even
though he wasn't the first country blues artist to be
discovered and recorded in this manner, would become the first
country blues artists to find a nationwide audience. That being said,
his biggest hit seemed to have come after he left
Paramount for OK Records, where he would record his best
(26:06):
selling songs Black Steak Moone and Batchbox Blues, a song
that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame chose as
one of the five hundred songs that shaped rock and roll.
Jefferson's career, though while successful, would be short, lasting only
three years. However, in those three years from nineteen twenty
six to nineteen twenty nine, he managed to record one
hundred and ten sides. His recording career, though, would not
(26:27):
come to an end due to shifting taste in the
audience or anything as mundane as that. Instead, it would
end due to the fact that on the twenty second
of December nineteen twenty nine, blind Lemon Jefferson was found
dead in the middle of a Chicago street, a death
that is as clouded in mystery as the rest of
his life. A death that is as clouded in mystery
as the rest of his life, as no one really
seems to know the how or why of his death. Supposedly,
(26:50):
the official death certificate puts the cause of death as
acute myocarr don is, although some sources say there was
no official cause of death, so I don't know. Plus
you always have to wonder how much effort would have
been put into investigating the death of a black man
in nineteen twenty nine. Meanwhile, there were also rumors of
foul play, including accusations that a jealous silver had poisoned
(27:10):
his coffee, while others have suggested that he died in
the midst of a snowstorm when trying to make his
way to a hotel from the train station. After the
person who had promised to pick him up and failed
to do so. According to this version of the story,
then the noise of the snowstorm served to disorient the
blind or release partially blind musician, causing him to get
lost until he died of exposure. Regardless, though, Paramount would
(27:32):
pay to have Jefferson's body return to Texas, where his
remains were buried in the Warham Negro Cemetery in an
unmarked grave, something that wouldn't be rectified until he finally
received a grave marker in nineteen sixty seven, which in
turn was replaced with a new granite headstone in nineteen
ninety seven that read quote, Lord, it's one kind favor
I'll ask of you, see that my grave is kept clean,
(27:53):
a famous line from his song one Kind Favor. Yet,
Whil's career in life may have been tragically cut short,
blind Leman and Jefferson managed to leave behind a lasting impact.
He was a skilled guitarist and a singer who reportedly
had a two octave vocal range. Meanwhile, his lyrics tended
to be complex, managing to be ironic and even humorous
at times while still being poignant. Blindlemon Jefferson then is
(28:16):
considered to have been heavily influential on the Texas Blues tradition,
and some have even called him the father of Texas Blues. However,
are focus to days on a song of his that
was not about his home state, as you would sing
in Rising high Wood or Blues quote wood are in Arkansas,
people skimming in Tennessee. If I don't leave Memphis, Backwoter
spell all over poor me, a pair of lines that
(28:37):
illustrates both the widespread nature of this disaster with its
striking at least Arkansas and Tennessee, and also the cause Backwitter.
Jefferson then further expounds on the experience of those affected
by this disaster with the lions quote people. Since its
reigning has been for nights and days, thousands of people
stand on the hill looking down where they used to stay.
As again he points in the cause of this tragedy
(28:59):
that consistent that just won't seem to go away. Meanwhile,
also illustrating not only how many were affected by this
flooding thousands, but also the way in which they were impacted,
as these thousands of people were forced from their homes
and now can only look on helplessly from higher ground
as the backwouldter swallows up everything they had and knew.
The song then ends with this final thought quote, the
(29:20):
back would arise and come in my windows and door.
I leave with a prayer in my heart. Back won't
rise no more, which makes this disaster a personal one,
as it acts as a first person account of the
singer song being taken over by the flooding backwitter, thereby
being given no other choice but to abandon their home,
helpless to do anything else but to pray that this
will eventually stop happening. As for the song itself, since
(29:43):
blind lim and Jefferson was a country blues artist, the
music was fairly simple, as country blue songs in general
seem to have just consisted of the vocalists being accompanied
by a singular instrument, typically a guitar, and indeed, Blind
Lemon was reportedly quite the skilled guitarist. Curiously enough, though,
recording of the song that I found online seems to
feature a piano accompanying Jefferson as he sings, which does
(30:06):
make a kind of sense given that his guitar playing
has been compared to that of a ragtime piano. And yes,
I did after reading that description for the first time,
go back and listen to the song to make sure
that what I was hearing was a piano and not
a guitar being played like one, and I am now
confident that a guitar is not playing those notes. Regardless,
I should add that despite this being the first song
(30:26):
that I'm really talking about in this series, it was
not the first one recorded and released the public, as
I will be talking about that song, Bessie Smith's Backwater
Blues more in a subsequent episode, something I wanted to
make clear, as I didn't want to confuse you because
more than likely I will be stating multiple times that
Bessie Smith's song was the first blue song to be
(30:47):
written and released concerning the flood, the timing on that
song and its success is donable, after all, but I
wanted to talk about this now as I think it's
about time I talk about some music in this music series,
and because it serves to illustrated the experience of those
suffering from this back what are flooding. Regardless, the flooding
had begun, and while over fifty thousand had already been
(31:08):
driven from their homes, now the good news was the
federal levees a lone the Mississippi River proper were still
standing strong, but the bad news was the rain just
kept coming. On the thirteenth of April, for example, a
storm featuring heavy rains and destructive tornadoes would effect twelve states.
So while the federal levees may be standing strong for now,
how much longer that would be the case was to question. However,
(31:31):
the story of the ultimate failure of the Mississippi River Commission,
its policies, and its levees will have to for now
remain a story for another time. Thank you for listening
to the started history. If you would like to help out,
please read review the podcasts and tell your friends to
be faith they'll be interested. If you would like ad
(31:53):
for in early episodes, I set up such a feed
over at patreon dot com slash Distorted History by paying
ten bucks one long if you will gain access to
the special ad free feed available on Spotify or likely
through your podcast app as long as it uses an
RSS feed. I will continue to post sources on koffee
and Twitter, though, as it's just a convenient place to
go to access that information regardless. Once again, thank you
(32:16):
for listening, and until next time,
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