June 26, 1893

Blues musician “Big Bill” Broonzy was born in Scott, Mississippi, one of seventeen children. Although Broonzy achieved fame and success in the Chicago blues scene and in the folk revival in the United States and abroad, some of his earliest encounters with the blues and his earliest experiences as a performer and songwriter were in Arkansas. Broonzy moved at a young age with his family to the Pine Bluff area (Jefferson County), where he spent most of his childhood. He began performing music at an early age, playing for social and church events on the fiddle.