Jackson Jambalaya

Collection of all posts on the Gold Coast 

1946 was the year the Gold Coast blew up.  The notorious Gold Coast culture finally crossed the line.  Beatings, arson, stabbings, and even shootings were not rare occurrences  in that part of Rankin County.  However, there is one time-honored rule among those for whom crime is a regular way of life and it was damn sure true back in 1946: don't kill a cop.  A constable and a major bootlegger fought each other and then shot each other to death.  The death of the lawman finally brought in fire and brimstone just as it did in The Godfather when Michael killed a dirty cop.  The lawlessness of the Gold Coast had gone too far and people said enough is enough. 


Prohibition was in full swing yet fell it fell afoul of the laws of supply in demand.  Too many people in Jackson wanted to have a drink and too many would-be capitalists pigs saw an opportunity to sell them booze at black market prices.  Bootleggers began operating in an area that came to be known as the Gold Coast in what was known as East Jackson several decades ago but is actually the east bank of the Pearl River in Rankin County.  Flood control was virtually non-existent so the area was one of swamps and the river.   Drinking, gambling, and general carousing flourished on the Gold Coast - until the law would come shut it all down.  The forty or so years of the Gold Coast's existence saw a grown-up's game of cat & mouse take place between the bootleggers and the police.  Friendly politicians got fat and happy off of the bootleggers until things got out of hand.  Public outcry would then bring in a new crop of law and order politicians who busted the bootleggers - until the pendulum swung the other way at the ballot box.

The year began with the usual news about the rough ways at the Gold Coast.  The Gold Coast had quieted down somewhat during the war years but the GI's were coming back home.  Young men want to sow their wild oats and the Gold Coast was the main field available for such plowing.  However, a sensational murder took place a month before the killing of the constable.  A young woman went to the Gold Coast with some friends for some drinking and dancing.  She left Rankin County but disappeared later that night.  She was bludgeoned to death.

Constable Norris Overby and bootlegger Sam Seaney killed each other on August 27.  The headlines screamed for a crackdown on the Gold Coast.  The Governor was mad.  The churches were mad.  The District Attorney and Sheriff actually began to take their jobs seriously.  The law came crashing down on the Gold Coast and sent the bootleggers scurrying for cover.  Bootlegging kingpin Red Hydrick his his stash but it was seized a week later.  The bust nearly broke Big Red.  The authorities seized several truckloads of booze on his property that was worth $50,000 ($663,000 value today).  Red had just bought his Christmas inventory and was caught with his pants down just as the Jap carriers were at Midway.   The local drugstores reported a week later that they were selling more cough syrup that contained alcohol.  Some things never change.  The newspaper also noted that there were no traffic fatalities recorded in Hinds or Rankin counties during the following Labor Day weekend.  The newspapers even decreed that the Black Market tax should be repealed but that idea never saw the light of day at the Capitol.  The tax decreasing $20,000 per month ($265,000 value today) after the shutdown of the Gold Coast probably kept that tax alive over all opposition.

The Gold Coast eventually resumed its ways of whiskey but it would never enjoy its former "glory" that existed before Constable Overby was killed.