I grew up in Cleveland, MS, about twenty miles from Moorehead, MS, where the "Southern crossed the Dawg." The Dawg was the Yazoo & Delta, or Yellow Dog from the initials. The phrase became popular in my home because the legend was that W.C. Handy was waiting for the train to Memphis in Tutwiler, MS and heard this refrain from a waiting passenger who was going to Moorehead. Handy later used the refrain in the Yellow Dog Blues, published in 1914. The YD ran north/south, so the Southern must have run east/west because the crossing is still there, and it is a 90 degree. In my youth, one of these lines was called the "Pea Vine" because it wound around the Delta like a growing pea vine. Anybody got any enlightenment for me?

-- Douglas Michie Johnson (skyray@skyray.com), February 10, 2005