Macon, Georgia is on the loop that includes some of the best touring cities in America: Atlanta, Macon and Savannah in Georgia and Charleston in South Carolina.

Locally, Macon is famous for it’s antebellum houses which includes the birth place of the Nineteenth Century lyric poet Sidney Lanier; The Old Cannonball House and the Hay House.

Nationally, Macon is renowned as the hometowns of the rhythm and blues singers Otis Redding and Little Richard.

San Francisco Bay was probably the inspiration for this great R&B song. Otis had just returned from a successful performance at the Monterrey Pop Festival (1967) when he wrote it while staying in Sausalito, CA.

My first experience with rhythm and blues was as a teenager in Detroit, MI where we used to ride around on 50 cents worth of gas listening to a radio station broadcasting out of Nashville, TN. This was before rock and roll. We were fascinated with the blues sound which hadn’t hit Detroit or the nation at that time. In fact, we had to secretly listen to this music as it was considered by adults to be unacceptable “race” music. One title I remember where you had to shut the bedroom door to listen to was, ANNIE HAD A BABY. And a great line from another song was, “He was so bad that two men had to hold him when he shaved.” What a powerful radio station that could broadcast from Nashville to Detroit!

Sidney Lanier (1842-1881) wrote lyric poetry about the his native south and the Civil War in which he saw action as a blockade runner. He was captured and put in a federal prison for a year. There he contracted tuberculosis and eventually died from it.

After the war he became first flutist with Baltimore, Maryland’s Peabody Orchestra , in 1873. Later, he joined John Hopkins University as a professor.

One of his poems about the Civil War:

THE DYING WORDS OF STONEWALL JACKSON.

"Order A.P. Hill to prepare for battle."

"Tell Major Hawks to advance the commissary train."

"Let us cross the river and rest in the shade."

The stars of Night contain the glittering Day

And rain his glory down with sweeter grace

Upon the dark World's grand, enchanted face --

All loath to turn away.

And so the Day, about to yield his breath,

Utters the stars unto the listening Night,

To stand for burning fare-thee-wells of light

Said on the verge of death.

O hero-life that lit us like the sun!

O hero-words that glittered like the stars

And stood and shone above the gloomy wars

When the hero-life was done!

The phantoms of a battle came to dwell

I' the fitful vision of his dying eyes --

Yet even in battle-dreams, he sends supplies

To those he loved so well.

His army stands in battle-line arrayed:

His couriers fly: all's done: now God decide!

-- And not till then saw he the Other Side

Or would accept the shade.

Thou land whose sun is gone, thy stars remain!

Still shine the words that miniature his deeds.

O thrice-beloved, where'er thy great heart bleeds,

Solace hast thou for pain!

Our guide, who liked to style himself in appearance after Sidney Lanier, stands in front of Macon's famous CANNONBALL HOUSE (856 Mulberry St.)and tells the story of how the house got it's name.

During one of the battles of the Civil War. A Yankee cannonball bounced in front of the house, went through one of the columns, smashed the front of the house and landed in the foyer. The owners never removed the cannonball so as to keep it as a memento of the war. When you take the City Tour, the first thing that greets you inside is the original cannonball near the steps.

HAY HOUSE (934 Georgia Ave. One block away from the CANNONBALL HOUSE).

Macon's HAY HOUSE is affectionately called the "Palace of the South." When I visited there (1990) it was undergoing restoration to its former glory. It even has secret passages that pass from one floor to the next. the house was built in the late 1850s in an elaborate Italianate style by entrepreneur William Johnston who made his fortune as an entrepreneur in banking, textiles, railroads and insurance companies. Ceiling with chandalier in HAY HOUSE