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" Sometimes people from the outside can see something and can be more enthusiastic than local people. "
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By Norm Shaw
The train station sits on the edge of downtown Clarksdale, abandoned and run down, like so many other small-town stations that are long past their heyday. Broken or boarded-up windows, kicked-in doors and trash are the dominant features. It is hard to imagine it as anything but an eyesore. The people who owned it figured they could sell it to someone who wanted it for the brick and copper. But Skip Henderson sees something else. Henderson sees a public facility, with a performance hall featuring state-of-the-art sound and recording equipment. He sees a blues club. He sees a restaurant. He sees Bluesland. Welcome to Skip Henderson`s world, where all is possible and the only limits are budgetary and energy. And after spending a few hours with Henderson, you soon realize there may well be no limits. Henderson heads a drive to renovate Clarksdale Station into a blues tourist attraction. It is a goal he has been chasing for a few years and led him to buy the station. As his idea grew and he gained support, an amazing thing happened. It all worked out. "I bought it, and then we got the grant," Henderson says while sitting behind his brand-new computer. "I couldn`t own the building under the terms of the grant, so I had to sell it back to the county." "The grant," usually said in reverential tones, is the thing that made all the difference in Henderson`s plan. It gave him the freedom to build his dream and it gave him instant respect in the community. A million dollars can do that for you. "I remember I went home and told my family I was selling my guitar business and buying a train station in Clarksdale," Henderson says. "My wife was crying. My mother was crying. And then they found out no trains were coming through the station and they r eally thought I was crazy. "Actually, my wife and mother didn`t cry, but they were skeptical. And then the $1 million came through. That made believers out of everybody. It was real sweet." It wasn`t just Henderson`s family that became believers after the $1,018,862 grant came from the Mississippi Department of Transportation. City and county officials in Clarksdale began to see the potential for blues heritage tourism in a big way as well. "Sometimes people from the outside can see something and can be more enthusiastic than local people," says Ron Hudson, head of the Clarksdale Chamber of Commerce and Tourism Commission. "Skip is such an enthusiastic guy, with so many ideas. He`s the type of person needed to get a project like this off the ground." Hudson said Bluesland at Clarksdale Station is exactly what the city needs to boost tourism. County Administrator Hugh Jack Stubbs agrees. "We really think this project has a lot of potential," Stubbs says. What Henderson will do with the $1 million is potentially one of the biggest boons for blues in the Delta. He will turn the railway station that once was the gateway to the north for such blues greats as Muddy Waters into a public performance hall. The hall will be available to all kinds of music and all kinds of performers. "The Rev. Willie Morganfield (a first cousin to Muddy Waters) can bring his choir in to perform. And they can make a live direct-to-DAT recording. They can then reproduce it as a cassette, and they can do all that right there. It will offer multiple benefits laid one on top of another." The developer also sees a good bit of irony in the project. The 13,000-square-foot station was built in 1926, and in keeping with the times, it included virtually two of everything. One side for whites, the other for blacks. The mirror-image design creates unique opportunities, such as putting a drink station in the old ticket booth, which will create one side for a bar and one side alcohol free. "In the white dining room, we want to put a soul-food restaurant," he says. "I love the irony of that." Bluesland Inc. also is a way Henderson says he can give back to the community. Benefit shows will be a big part of the performance hall. The restaurant will be a pass-through for community restaurants ("Abe`s Ribs closes at 9 p.m., but we`ll be able to sell Abe`s Ribs until 2 a.m.," Henderson says). The interest in giving back to the community comes naturally to Henderson. He worked in Juvenile Justice on the East Coast for several years before opening a vintage guitar shop. He first came to the Delta at the urging of Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top. He now feels completely at home in the South, and will be moving his family to Clarksdale next spring. His enthusiasm for Clarksdale is apparent as he tools around town in his vintage, fire-engine red Cadillac Coupe Deville. A visit to the Delta Blues Museum in the Clarksdale Library brings smiles and waves from all the employees. He talks excitedly about the people who have signed the guest registry at the museum. The visitors in the week prior had come from Egypt, Australia, Colombia, Kazikstan, Italy, Portugal, Mexico, England and more. These are the people Henderson sees flocking to Bluesland. "It`s amazing to me," he says. "There are people coming (to the museum) from all over the world, but my mailman has never been here." The station renovation, which should be completed by next fall, is the first step in many that Henderson sees for his ventures in Clarksdale. He plans to make guitars, sell guitar strings, help expand and move the Delta Blues Museum, and continue his work through the non-profit Mt. Zion Fund to honor blues greats no longer alive. A crowded palette. But somehow you get the impression Skip Henderson is up to the task. As with the train station, Henderson often sees opportunity where others see despair. As he drives away from the station, he tells the story about driving around Clarksdale with a real estate agent. As they drove down Issequena Avenue, past a boarding house, the agent pointed to a group of African-American men sitting on the sidewalk drinking from brown paper bags. "The Realtor said, `To us, this is the blues,`" Henderson says while shaking his head. "I see this as a human resource," he continues. Some local folks are threatened by what they see on Issequena, Henderson says. "I see these guys as survivors. Who knows, one of these old guys must have heard Charley Patton. It just makes you wonder." Clarksdale should be happy Henderson is wondering about the town`s future. He may well be its savior.
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