JACKSON, Miss. (AP) — Bill Luckett was an legal professional, small-town mayor, candidate for governor, blues promoter, buddy and enterprise associate of Morgan Freeman and irrepressible teller of tales in regards to the folks and tradition of his beloved Mississippi.
Luckett died Thursday at 73, a yr after being recognized with most cancers. He will probably be remembered Tuesday at a celebration he ordered up and would have cherished to host.
Instead of a funeral, his household is having a celebration of Luckett’s life with free music and leisure at Ground Zero Blues Club — the joint that he, the Academy Award-winning actor and others had owned for 20 years in Clarksdale, Mississippi.
The membership’s title refers back to the the birthplace of the blues: Legend has it that early blues guitarist Robert Johnson offered his soul to the satan at a crossroads within the Mississippi Delta. Clarksdale stakes its declare with big guitars marking the intersection of U.S. highways 61 and 49. Nearby Rosedale additionally claims to be the positioning of Johnson’s Faustian discount. Luckett shrugged and acknowledged the satan’s crossroads promotion was good for Clarksdale, a spot that depends on tourism to help an anemic economic system.
Luckett was typically at Ground Zero to introduce acts and drink and dance with blues pilgrims who had traveled from far corners of the globe.
“Dad cherished Clarksdale, its music, and its folks with all of his coronary heart,” considered one of his sons, Oliver Luckett, mentioned in a press release. “In true Bill Luckett type, considered one of his remaining requests was to forgo a funeral and as a substitute invite the neighborhood and anybody that wishes to return to Clarksdale for some nice music at Ground Zero Blues Club — on the home.”
Luckett ran for Mississippi governor in 2011, pledging to enhance roads, well being care and expertise providers within the largely rural state that has lengthy been one of many poorest within the U.S. He misplaced within the Democratic major to Johnny DuPree, then the mayor of Hattiesburg. DuPree turned the primary Black candidate to win a significant social gathering’s nomination for governor of Mississippi, and in a state the place Republicans maintain most statewide workplaces, misplaced within the normal election to Republican Phil Bryant.
In 2013, Luckett was elected mayor of his hometown of Clarksdale, which then had a inhabitants of about 17,700. Clarksdale is within the impoverished Mississippi Delta, and town’s inhabitants had declined to about 15,700. Luckett served one four-year time period as mayor.
Luckett and Freeman, who lives close to the Delta city of Charleston, additionally ran an upscale restaurant known as Madidi, in Clarksdale for a number of years.
“The Delta has simply been in a decline economically for in regards to the previous 30, 40 years, and I believe it is gotten to, in impact, the underside now — or it did within the late ’90s,” Luckett instructed The Associated Press in 2015. “And we’ve been attempting to convey it again round with this restaurant, with Ground Zero Blues Club.”
Luckett had lived in Mississippi since he was six weeks previous, and thought-about his start in Fort Worth, Texas, to be only a quirk earlier than his household returned to the place the place they had been rooted.
Luckett was a part of the June Bugs, a loose-knit group of Mississippi politicians, judges and others — together with U.S. District Judge Mike Mills and U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker — who rejoice the state’s musical and literary heritage, typically with tongue-in-cheek displays.
This yr, the June Bugs held a ceremony close to Greenwood to recollect the fictional Billy Joe McAllister, the younger man who ended his life by leaping from the Tallahatchie Bridge in “Ode to Billy Joe,” the 1967 his tune by Mississippi-born Bobbie Gentry.
The Greenwood Commonwealth reported that Luckett dressed as a pope and spoke in regards to the risk that Billy Joe dedicated some sins, together with taking his personal life by leaping into the Tallahatchie. Luckett introduced that he “grants, conveys and bestows and publicly pronounces a particular dispensation” for Billy Joe.
In addition to his son Oliver, Luckett’s survivors embrace his spouse of 37 years, Francine; daughter Whitney Luckett; stepson Park Dodge and stepdaughter Douglas Dunavant.
Burns Strider, a Democratic guide, labored on Luckett’s gubernatorial marketing campaign and thought-about Luckett a mentor.
“I believe Bill had one of many largest intellects I’ve ever encountered. And, I’ve encountered many,” Strider wrote on Facebook. “But, right here’s what made Bill Luckett stand out: For each ounce of mind, there was two ounces of coronary heart. He cherished his household and mates. He cherished Clarksdale. He cherished Mississippi. Bill cherished life. And, he made life matter. He made it enjoyable.”
Emily Wagster Pettus, The Associated Press
