Jackson is the capital of Mississippi and, with around 150,000 people, the largest city in one of the smallest and poorest states in America. It sits in the middle of the state on a low bluff above the Pearl River, and its story is in many ways the story of the Deep South in microcosm: a cotton town on the western edge of the Choctaw homeland; a Confederate railhead burned by Sherman in 1863 (the locals nicknamed it "Chimneyville" afterwards, because that was most of what was left); a battleground of the 1960s civil rights movement; and, since then, a slow, complicated attempt at reinvention.
The reason to come is the history. Medgar Evers, the NAACP state field secretary, was assassinated outside his Jackson home in 1963 — his house on Margaret Walker Alexander Drive is now a museum. The Mississippi Civil Rights Museum and the Museum of Mississippi History, which share a building downtown, together tell that story with unusual honesty and depth: the slave economy, Jim Crow, the Freedom Riders, the Klan, the painful, halting progress toward something better. They are among the best civil rights museums in the country and justify the trip on their own. A few blocks away, the restored Eudora Welty House — the writer lived there from 1925 until her death in 2001 — is a quietly moving literary pilgrimage for anyone who loves her stories.
The city itself is struggling with the things a lot of mid-sized Southern cities struggle with: depopulation, an eroded tax base, a troubled water system. Downtown is quieter than it should be after 5pm. But Fondren, the walkable arts-and-restaurants district a couple of miles north of downtown, has a real neighbourhood feel — independent bookstores, coffee shops, live music — and the Mississippi Museum of Art and the Mississippi Children's Museum are both worth a few hours.
Eat catfish, grits, and collard greens — Jackson is unapologetically Southern food country — and take the drive out to the Natchez Trace Parkway, which starts nearby and runs 444 miles through some of the prettiest country in the state.