Dockery Plantation
The Dockery Plantation was a 60 km² cotton farm near Ruleville in Sunflower County , Mississippi . The plantation employed several hundred workers who lived with their families on the site and had its own, village-like infrastructure, including a haberdashery store, a furniture store, a church, a cemetery, a sawmill and even a train station. The workers were temporarily paid in their own currency.
Founded in 1895 by Will Dockery, directed by Joe Rice Dockery from 1906 and in operation under his leadership until 1982, it employed the blues musician Charley Patton at times at the beginning of the 20th century . With its increasing fame, numerous other blues musicians moved there, including Son House , Bukka White , Robert Johnson , Howlin 'Wolf , John Lee Hooker and many more. The Dockery Plantation became famous as the "birthplace of the Delta Blues ". Today it is a tourist attraction because of this reputation.