Riverside Hotel (Clarksdale, Mississippi)

The fourth marker location on the Mississippi Blues Trail, famed for providing lodging for such blues artists as Sonny Boy Williamson II, Ike Turner, and Robert Nighthawk, it was previously the G.T.

[3] On September 26, 1937, the singer Bessie Smith was taken to the hospital treatment after a car accident outside Clarksdale, which proved fatal.

[5] Ratliff subsequently extended the building to include 21 guest rooms over two floors, with Thomas assisting in the conversion.

[6] As one of the only hotels in the state that allowed African-Americans, the Riverside played host to a great number of touring musicians, including Sonny Boy Williamson II and Duke Ellington.

[7] At some point in the mid-1940s, Ike Turner moved into the Riverside Hotel;[8] his bedroom, in which he reportedly wrote and rehearsed his song "Rocket 88,"[8] is said to have been what is now room #7.