Radio Sweethearts

So, over on my personal Twitter, I said something stupid. And “The Bryant Park Project,” the NPR program it was directed to, responded. I promised them a photo of where Jeff Buckley died, as a response to a recent story they did.

In somewhat small glory, here’s the picture:

Click for full size. This is shot from a trolley bridge looking over the intersection at the foot of Beale Street. Just out of sight, at the very edge of the water, is where Buckley’s body was found.

I had always assumed the accuracy of statements like the BPP’s that:

Buckley drowned attempting to swim across the Wolf River, a tributary of the Mississippi outside Memphis, Tenn.

However, if you’ll look at that pointy outcropping of an island in the middle of the river, what you don’t see is that you’re looking at the confluence of two rivers, the Mississippi and the Wolf. The marina is really only about a mile up, in what is now a condo community (and example of New Urbanism, though the real city is just over a short bridge). I’m not sure what makes this Mud Island instead of Mud Peninsula, but I’m not actually from here. I’ll leave that up to Kerry.

We shot more pictures at the Marina, but as you can see, the sun was going down, and the even “bright lights of Memphis” Lowell George sang about couldn’t make up for the fact that I bought a fairly crappy camera.

So, Laura C. of the BPP: There’s your photo.

Edit: “The Bryant Park Project” has picked this up; you can see their post here. Laura Conaway pointed out something I wasn’t totally clear about stating: Buckley did die in the Wolf River. I was merely surprised to find that the Wolf was so close to Beale Street. So, thanks again, Laura Conaway and the “BPP” as a whole!