You'll find this peaceful spot in the Greenville Cemetery in Greenville, Mississippi. Go through the main gate, then turn right and follow the little road for maybe a hundred yards. Can't miss it. There lies the two men who had more impact, good and bad, on the Mississippi Delta than anyone else.   On the right: Leroy Percy Nov 9, 1869 — Dec 24, 1929 In the middle, his son: William Alexander Percy May 14, 1895 — Jan 21, 1942 Notice the tombstone erected by William Alexander for his father. It's a bronze statue of a Crusader resting on his sword. Large letters carved on the pedestal below the statue read: PATRIOT Etched in the bronze near the statue's left foot and in much smaller letters is the name of the artist and the date: MALVINA HOFFMAN 1930 That bronze statue is about seven feet tall. I'm over six feet tall, and I stood on the pedestal beside it and it towered over me. The granite slab behind the statue must be ten feet tall. Even standing on my tip-toes I couldn't touch the top of it. Chiseled into the other side of it–without credit to the author–are the last two stanzas of "The Last Word" by English poet Matthew Arnold (1822 – 1888). Here's the entire poem:             The Last Word           by Matthew Arnold Creep into thy narrow bed, Creep, and let no more be said! Vain thy onset! all stands fast. Thou thyself must break at last! Let the long contention cease! Geese are swans, and swans are geese. Let them have it how they will! Thou art tired; best be still! They out-talked thee, hissed thee, tore thee. Better men fared thus before thee; Fired their ringing shot and passed, Hotly charged -and sank at last. Charge once more, then, and be dumb! Let the victors, when they come, When thy forts of folly fall, Find thy body by the wall! William Alexander Percy spent an estimated $30,000 on his father's tombstone in 1930 during the height of the Great Depression. Think about that—wealth spent so lavishly while 1,000s of Delta people, white and black, either starved or ate potatoes and possums and lived in houses so decrepit they could see the sky through holes in the ceilings and the ground through cracks in the floors. Look at the picture of the $30,000 tombstone again. What you see is not just granite and bronze. You see the contrast between the haves and the have-nots. You see the beginning of a social revolution. You see a crack in the walls around the forts of folly. Here's where Leroy Percy's tombstone money came from—out of cotton sacks like this one hanging from the front wall of Roy's Store in Chatham, Mississippi. Stretched on a frame to the right of the cotton sack, you see a possum hide. If that possum lived circa 1929, the sweat from the brows of the people who ate its carcass probably helped buy Leroy Percy's tombstone. Using the front doors of Roy's Store as a reference, you can see that the cotton sack is about six feet long. On the left and open end, the looped strap goes around the picker's shoulder. The picker drags the sack between two rows. The procedure is a seemingly endless pick and drag . . . pick and drag . . . pick and drag. . . . All out in the middle of a huge field with the sun blazing down and, to the picker's eye, at least a mile to the shade and the water jug at the end of the row. All with blood oozing from where the strap rubbed the picker's shoulder raw and with blood dripping from where the thorn-like cotton boll husks pricked the picker's fingers. Not only sweat bought Leroy Percy's tombstone, so did blood.

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For a much closer look at the Percys read Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood Of 1927 And How It Changed America by John M. Barry.  Click on the prices and get it at Amazon.com   (Paperback about $12 or Hardback about $19) or check it out of your local library.