House Concurrent Resolution 39

A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION COMMENDING AND CONGRATULATING MRS. PANNY FLAUTT MAYFIELD UPON BEING NAMED A 2023 NOEL POLK LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD NOMINEE.

WHEREAS, Mrs. Panny Flautt Mayfield, a lifelong resident of the Mississippi Delta, who grew up in Tutwiler, and has lived in Clarksdale since graduating with honors from the University of Mississippi in 1957, was recently nominated for the 2023 Noel Polk Lifetime Achievement Award; and

WHEREAS, as a student at Ole Miss, Mrs. Mayfield served as editor of the student newspaper, received the Taylor Medal in journalism, and was elected to the Hall of Fame, before commencing her career in journalism as a reporter and featured editor for the Clarksdale Press Register until 2000, and director of public relations at Coahoma Community College before retiring in 2013; and

WHEREAS, since 2020, Mrs. Mayfield has written the online Dispatch from 415 Court Street, Clarksdale, Mississippi, under the byline Journalist Forever, and as an award-winning journalist who has photographed and written about blues and gospel music, playwright Tennessee Williams and Delta life for decades, she has been recognized with more than 30 awards from the Associated Press, the Mississippi Press Association, the Mississippi Film Commission and the College Public Relations Association of Mississippi; and

WHEREAS, having began taking blues photographs in the late 1970s after Sid Graves, director of Clarksdale's Carnegie Public Library, founded the Delta Blues Museum and musicians Wesley Jefferson and James "Super Chikan" Johnson asked her to prepare portfolios to help promote their work, Mrs. Mayfield's photographs have been exhibited in museums across the United States and Europe, and have earned critical acclaim from Aperture magazine; and

WHEREAS, she has served as publicist and documentarian for the Sunflower River Blues and Gospel Festival, launched in 1988 by Living Blues magazine founder and Mississippi's Blues Trail research director Jim O'Neal; and

WHEREAS, Mrs. Mayfield published her book Live from the Mississippi Delta in 2017, which showcases more than 200 black-and-white and color photographs documenting music from the region, and further enriched by her detailed accounts of the lives of local icons like Early Wright, Wade Walton, and the Jelly Roll Kings as well as reports of international superstars who traveled from around the world to pay homage to the legends who influenced their music; and

WHEREAS, Mrs. Mayfield's articles about America's great playwright from Mississippi have been published extensively, and an International Tennessee Williams Conference in France, sponsored by the University of Nantes in the early 1990s, featured her slide presentation and address about Williams and his Delta connections; and

WHEREAS, it was during Mrs. Mayfield's attendance at this conference that scholars encouraged her to organize the Mississippi Delta Tennessee Williams Festival, and Coahoma Community College received a National Endowment for the Arts grant for its inauguration; and

WHEREAS, since its inaugural launch in 1993, Mrs. Mayfield directed, publicized and documented the event until 2018, which has been an outstanding fall event in Clarksdale, hosted the United States Postal Service's Tennessee Williams postage stamp unveiling in 1995, and was recorded for a BBC documentary that aired in the United Kingdom; and

WHEREAS, it is the policy of this Legislature to recognize ambassadors of the arts and letters of Mrs. Mayfield's caliber, who for more than half a century has been truly extraordinary and worthy of special honor:

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES OF THE STATE OF MISSISSIPPI, THE SENATE CONCURRING THEREIN, That we do hereby commend and congratulate Mrs. Panny Flautt Mayfield upon being named a 2023 Noel Polk Lifetime Achievement Award Nominee and extend our best wishes for continued success in all her future endeavors.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, That copies of this resolution be furnished to Mrs. Panny Flautt Mayfield and to the members of the Capitol Press Corps.