Retiring Guy's Digest: Population loss in Mississippi: Sunflower County/Indianola

Sunday, October 6, 2019

Population loss in Mississippi: Sunflower County/Indianola

It all started here.

Population loss as in major -- 50% or more.

Source: Wikipedia (Sunflower County, Indianola)

Indianola is the county seat in Sunflower County.

Population loss by degrees: 80-90%, 70-79%, 60-69%, 50-59%.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts

Percentage of population 25 and older with a bachelor's degree:

14.5% - Sunflower County
21.3% - Mississippi
30.9% - U.S.

Percentage of population 65 and older:

13.7% - Sunflower County
15.9% - Mississippi
16.0% - U.S.

% of population living in poverty:

36.2% - Sunflower County
19.7% - Mississippi
11.8% - U.S.

The last time Sunflower County voted for a Republican candidate for president was in 1984. Clinton received 70.1% of the vote in 2016. George Wallace received 50.9% of the vote in 1968.

Sunflower County Library System

Related reading:
B.B. King Returns to a Mississippi Home, and Its Warm Embrace. (The New York Times, 5/30/2015)

Mr. King, one of the most distinctive guitar players in the history of his idiom, died May 14 at age 89 in Las Vegas, where he had lived for many years. He was born in a cabin in the tiny town of Berclair, Miss. But he had long embraced Indianola, a city of 10,000 about 18 miles from his birthplace, as a kind of spiritual hometown, one he returned to year after year to play concerts, commune with old friends and subtly inspire — or so he hoped — a spirit of racial reconciliation in a place long haunted by the cruelties of racial segregation.