Featured Image: Visit Oxford Mississippi
When I listen to an audiobook and know that it’s based on somewhere I can drive to before it’s over, it feels like some sort of fun book-ception. I suppose in this case, I can drive back and forth from Nashville to Oxford about 10 times and still have some chapters left. It’s a long one, but worth every minute.
Kathryn Stockett set The Calamity Club in 1930s Oxford, Mississippi, and much of the town she wrote about is still standing. Thankfully, though, the darker threads Stockett pulls on–racism, prostitution, abuse, and an anti-vice league that jailed women for having sex outside marriage, among other things–belong to the 1930s she’s writing into, not the town you’ll visit today.
After you’ve finished the book, head to Oxford to explore some of the places her characters shopped, gossiped, and passed letters, and keep an open mind for all the places she dreamed up on her own.
Neilson’s
Neilson’s has anchored the Square since 1839, which makes it the oldest department store in the South. Stockett’s characters shop here, and it would seem so does everyone else in Oxford.
Estelle’s
The Gathright-Reed Drugstore appears in the novel and was a real spot in 1930s Oxford. Today, the building is a restaurant and cocktail bar called Estelle’s.
McEwen’s
Denton’s Furniture, referenced all through the book, may be gone, but the swanky McEwen’s restaurant serves dinner in its place today.
The Oxford Welcome Center
Birdie spends a good part of the novel at City Hall, mailing letters to her family in Footely and a special someone down in Jackson. You can stand where those letters went out at the Oxford Welcome Center.
Oxford’s historic neighborhoods
Stockett’s Tartt family needed a grand house, and Oxford has no shortage of stately candidates. Head north on Lamar into the older neighborhoods, where the architecture still reads 1930s, and pick the one you think she had in mind.
Square Books
Buy your copy of “The Calamity Club” where much of Oxford buys its books. Square Books is one of the country’s most celebrated independent bookstores, with a café upstairs and a balcony overlooking the Square.
Did you love The Calamity Club? Share this guide with your book club and plan your next meeting right on the Oxford Square.
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