Parchman Prison is in the Mississippi Delta and is notorious for brutal conditions and a very high black population. In 1996, the historian David Oshinsky said, "Throughout the American South, Parchman Farm is synonymous with punishment and brutality. It's the closest thing to slavery that survived the Civil War." Ta-Nehisi Coates quoted Oshinsky's writing in his 2014 Atlantic article, "The Case for Reparations." The prison was founded in 1901, on a former plantation site.

Acclaimed field-recording producer, Ian Brennan, has recently released his latest project, The Oldest Voice in the World (Azerbaijan) “Thank you for bringing me back to the sky,” which features the wisdom and voices of those over 100 years old.