Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, 1941-1942

In 1941 and 1942, the Library of Congress and Fisk University of Nashville, Tennessee, jointly undertook a sociological study of African-American communities centered in Coahoma County, Mississippi, in the Mississippi Delta region. The team of Lewis Jones, John W. Work III, Alan Lomax, and Elizabeth Lomax spent parts of two summers recording church services, songs, and the blues. Best known are seminal recordings of bluesmen Muddy Waters, Son House, and Honeyboy Edwards.