The State Line Mob was an association of criminal elements that operated in the 1950s and 1960s at the Mississippi–Tennessee state line in Alcorn County, Mississippi, and McNairy County, Tennessee, along U.S. Route 45. The State Line Mob was involved in bootlegging, gambling, prostitution, tourist fleecing, robbery, and murder. Many of the members were from Phenix City, Alabama, having been displaced from that town when martial law was declared by the Governor and the Alabama National Guard attempted to clean the town up.
The organization owned and operated motels, restaurants, and clubs at the Mississippi–Tennessee state line and in the northern portion of Alcorn County, just north of Corinth, Mississippi. These establishments were centers for every form of vice and reaped hundreds of thousands of dollars from sales of illegal moonshine and other contraband products. Primary owners were Jack and Louise Hathcock, Carl Douglas "Towhead" White, and W.O. Hathcock.
The State Line Mob gained national attention throughout the 1960s for its ongoing feud with famed McNairy County Sheriff Buford Pusser. The film Walking Tall and its sequels were based on Pusser's war against the State Line Mob and other criminal elements.
State Line Mob is also a southern rock, country duo group from Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Their song titled "McNairy County Line" was written about Buford Pusser and the State Line Mob Outlaws of that era. The song can be found on their debut CD Ruckus.
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Famous quotes containing the words state, line and/or mob:
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—Anonymous, U.S. magazine contributor. Herald of Progress (no dates available)
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—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The mob is man voluntarily descending to the nature of the beast. Its fit hour of activity is night. Its actions are insane like its whole constitution. It persecutes a principle; it would whip a right; it would tar and feather justice, by inflicting fire and outrage upon the houses and persons of those who have these. It resembles the prank of boys, who run with fire-engines to put out the ruddy aurora streaming to the stars.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)