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Exploring Abandoned Clarksdale High School, Which Has a Cemetery on its Lawn (Video)

Exploring Abandoned Clarksdale High School, Which Has a Cemetery on its Lawn (Video)

Bobo Family Cemetery at Clarksdale High School dates from the early 1800s

In this video we are exploring and photographing the big abandoned high school building in Clarksdale Mississippi.

It’s not every day you find an abandoned high school with a graveyard on its lawn, but that’s exactly what they have here in Clarksdale.

Abandoned Clarksdale High School with an old pre-Civil War cemetery on its schoolyard

The Bobo Senior High School Building, later named Clarksdale High School, is an abandoned historic school building on a hill overlooking the Sunflower River in Clarksdale, Mississippi. It opened about 1930 and closed in 1999. The Bobo family cemetery on the school yard dates from time when the land was part of a plantation owned by the Bobo family, who were early settlers in Clarksdale. There are three rows of headstones marking the graves of thirteen family members.


Books about the history of the blues in Clarksdale


Clarksdale is famous as the so-called “birthplace of blues music.” Many of the greatest blues musicians were born here, or got their start here. There’s still an active blues scene here today, and the town celebrates its blues heritage with festivals and such.

Some of the names associated with Clarksdale include Sam Cooke John Lee Hooker, Son House, Robert Johnson, Ike Turner, Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf, W.C. Handy, Tommy Johnson, Charlie Musselwhite, Junior Parker, Charlie Patton, Pinetop Perkins , and Sonny Boy Williamson.

Future of the old building

This 2019 local TV news report claimed that the building would undergo renovation and be converted to use as a senior living center for those 55 or older. In the video, you can see the building had no overgrowth of poison ivy as can be seen now. They claimed the renovation would cost $10 million, but at the time of this blog post two years later, no work has begun.

Black and white fine art photographs available

Thanks for reading.

Be sure to visit me on FacebookInstagram or Pinterest, or on my website at keithdotson.com.

~ Keith

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