MEMPHIS, Tenn. (WMC/Gray News) – A search for a group of missing men in Tennessee has come to a tragic end at Meeman-Shelby State Park.

According to the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office, three men went missing Tuesday while swimming and fishing in the Mississippi River.

Authorities said rescue personnel recovered the three bodies on Wednesday morning just south of a boat ramp.

Multiple agencies responded and were involved in the search and recovery effort, including Shelby County Search and Rescue and the U.S. Coast Guard.

John Morris, the public information officer with the sheriff’s department, said two bodies were first recovered around 11 a.m., with the third located at 12:45 p.m.

It has been a difficult day for the families of the three missing men. There was a growing crowd of loved ones in the forest along the Mississippi River as agencies searched the water.

Family members said one of the missing men was 52-year-old Francis Yanes, who was fishing with two friends on the river.

Yanes’ family said he has six children, the youngest of whom was 12 years old.

Doug Ammons, the owner of a general store a few miles from the river, says people getting lost or drowning in the area happens too often.

“This is a horrific tragedy right here, and it happens way too often,” Ammons said. “But I understand how it happens.”

Ammons urges people to just stay out of the Mississippi River, calling it “lethally dangerous.”

“The probability of one-on-one taking on the mighty Mississippi, you’re going to lose. Especially without a flotation device,” he said.

Authorities said the medical examiner is still determining the cause of death.

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WOODVILLE — On Friday at approximately 6:50 a.m., the Mississippi Highway Patrol responded to
a fatal crash on Highway 24 in Wilkinson County.

A 2015 Ram Pickup driven by 49-year-old Justin Green of Woodville, traveled east on
Highway 24 when it collided with a 2015 Nissan Altima driven by 78-year-old James Mathena of
Memphis, Tennessee, traveling west on Highway 24.

James Mathena received fatal injuries from the crash and was pronounced dead on the scene.

This crash remains under investigation by the Mississippi Highway Patrol.

When I first moved to Vicksburg way back in 2014 to take a job across the river in Louisiana, someone described it as a “nice little Delta town.” I really didn’t know what that meant back then, and after getting my own little tour of the area known as the Mississippi Delta earlier this month, I realize I still didn’t fully grasp its significance.

I think the idea of the Mississippi Delta really began to come into focus for me the first time I heard the quote attributed to writer David Cohn that said, “The Mississippi Delta begins in the lobby of the Peabody Hotel in Memphis and ends on Catfish Row in Vicksburg.”

By that time, I was already working here at The Post, so I knew what Catfish Row meant. I had also recently taken my kids for a quick weekend in Memphis, where we stayed at the Peabody and got to witness the famous ducks in the lobby. So, I had more of an idea of at least the geographical borders of the area.

But a quick trip with the girlfriend over the Fourth of July weekend really opened my eyes to so many things I had only heard about, and plenty of others I had no idea existed.

In Cleveland, for example — a place I have driven through countless times when the kiddos still went to school in Tate County — I had never ventured farther from the highway than Walmart or Kroger. So, boy was I surprised when we turned the opposite direction off Highway 161 and suddenly there was the GRAMMY Museum and Delta State University. Did you know Mississippi has the most Grammy winners per capita of any state? Did you know Delta State’s unofficial mascot is the Fighting Okra?  Because I didn’t. But I do now!

Headed north, we came to a town I had at least driven through once — Greenville —- although it had been a quick trip to drop something off at the newspaper there. The girlfriend having grown up in Greenville, I got to see how much more the town has to offer, including what I now understand to be a not-so-hidden gem in Doe’s Eat Place. If you haven’t made the trip to this nondescript cinder-block building where you enter through the kitchen, sit within inches of other people’s tables and have some of the absolute best food of your life in the process, I obviously recommend it highly. Again: who knew? Apparently a lot of folks, because it was packed. 

Yet another stop that taught me something I didn’t know about Delta culture was a visit to McCarty’s Pottery in Merigold. I won’t pretend to be a person that knows much about art. I’ve been told that whatever art you like is good art. If that’s the case, McCarty’s is really good art. Aside from the wide variety of pottery, the winding building it is housed in and the accompanying grounds alone are worth the trip.

At the northernmost point on our trip, I finally had the chance to step foot into Clarksdale. Being a big music fan, people who know me are always shocked when they find out I haven’t visited. Well, now I have, and from the famous crossroads where Robert Johnson supposedly sold his soul to the Devil to become an amazing guitar player to the Ground Zero Blues Club owned by Morgan Freeman, I was able to check several things off my Mississippi travel bucket list.

And I guess we picked an appropriate time to make the trip. We made it home just as the movie “Sinners” was making its debut on streaming. And if you missed Mississippi Today’s glowing review of the film’s precise portrayal of the Mississippi Delta, it’s worth the watch. Even for someone newly educated on the area, it was neat to see and seemed a historically accurate depiction of the region, aside from the vampires, that is. We didn’t see any of those. 

Maybe next time.

Blake Bell is the general manager and executive editor of The Vicksburg Post. He can be reached at blake.bell@vicksburgpost.com.