"Johnny was and is the North Star; you could guide your ship by him. The greatest of the greats - then and now." - Bob Dylan
On the road with my family - a southern bound three-week road trip with many stops including Savannah, Georgia where we currently reside. Early in our travels we made an unplanned detour to briefly explore and photograph Johnny Cash's childhood home in the northeast tip of Arkansas.
With some perseverance you can find the Cash homestead at 4791 CR-924 just outside the city limits of Dyess in Mississippi County, Arkansas. Johnny moved to Dyess when he was three and lived here until he graduated high school in 1950. The town began as an agricultural colony during the New Deal. The original township had 500 individually owned and operated farms which were either 20 or 40 acres each. The house was recently purchased by the State University and will eventually become a museum. As you can see it will be some time before it opens as it's currently boarded up and all roads leading to it are heavily washed out. The refurbish will improve things, but no doubt something will be lost that time has gifted it through it's many years of disrepair.
According to his son John Carter Cash, "The rich gumbo dirt here made his spirit strong. His music came from here, as well as his faith and his family. He learned to work hard early in life."
