Birthplace of Mississippi Rodeo

Two local businessmen sponsored the state's first rodeo, held September 24 to 26, 1935: rancher Samuel Hickman of the B Bar H Ranch and George Baylis, who owned Baylis Drug Store. It ran under electric lights and is recognized as the nation's first outdoor rodeo held at night. A few Canadian cowboys had brought horses to a local ranch and stayed through the summer, and three of the six married local women. The Bascom brothers, Earl and Weldon, brought Brahman bulls from the New Orleans stockyards, said to be the first used in bull bucking.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• John Ford Home — 16 mi
  A frontier house on the Pearl River where the 1816 Pearl River Convention met, kept by the Marion County Historical Society and open to the public since 1963.
• Salmon Site (Tatum Salt Dome) — 16 mi
  The only place east of the Mississippi River where the United States detonated nuclear devices, two underground tests in 1964 and 1966 in Lamar County.
• Prentiss Institute — 24 mi
  A school for Black Mississippians founded in 1907 in a former plantation house, with a restored 1926 Rosenwald building that now holds a museum.

More markers nearby

• Gov. Hugh L. White Mansion — 0.4 mi
• Hanging of Will Purvis — 0.8 mi
• Temporary State Capital — 0.9 mi
• Conerly's P. O. and Lampton's Store — 21 mi