Memphis’ Peabody Hotel, often referred to the “South’s Grand Hotel,” is a tourist attraction. It’s not often you might see ducks waddling through a hotel lobby and jumping into a central fountain, but that’s what happens twice a day before curious onlookers. Many people, while enjoying cocktails in the central lounge area, pack the lobby to watch the duck spectacle. It’s a tradition that started in 1933 when the hotel’s manager and a friend placed live decoy ducks in the hotel’s lobby fountain after a late night hunting trip. “The next morning, the general manager tried to get them out. But when the guests saw the ducks in the fountain, they loved them,” says Kenon Walker, the hotel’s “duckmaster.” The tradition continues today with the ducks marching on a red carpet from an elevator to the fountain at 11 a.m., and then back up to their “Rooftop Palace” at 5 p.m. The hotel with its high-ceiling rooms, elegant lobby, and rooftop venue popular for events and weddings, was built at the current downtown location in 1925 replacing the original Peabody Hotel dating back to 1869. The rooftop ballroom hosted swing bands including Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey, the Andrew Sisters, and Lawrence Welk and was one of only three locations for live CBS broadcasts of such events in the late 1930s and ‘40s. Elvis attended his senior prom at the hotel in 1953, and two years later was back signing his original RCA recording contract, which had been typed on official Peabody Hotel letterhead paper. A small museum highlights this and the visits of many famous hotel guests.
Inside the Stax Museum: recording studio and Hall of Records.
and singles the company produced, displaying them floor to ceiling.
In a similar manner, the Memphis Rock ‘n’ Soul Museum also traces the area’s music roots to Mississippi Delta rural communities, and showcases actual recording equipment once used – microphones, guitars, and more – while highlighting the turbulent struggles with segregation and social changes during that period. This era ties into Memphis’ must see National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel, infamous for where civil rights crusader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated in 1968. In fact, the very last part of the museum tour features a walk along a glass partition separating visitors from the reconstructed motel room, 306, where Dr. King spent his last hours. The museum spans the struggle for civil rights from the early plight of enslaved people in America, during the Civil War and Reconstruction, and continuing through the Jim Crow era and up to the present. Special exhibits, for example, highlight Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the Selma marches, and Dr. King’s “I Have a Dream” speech.
The Peabody’s Chez Philippe restaurant is the only
The Peabody Hotel fountain features swimming live ducks.
MUSIC MECCA: MEMPHIS
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