Jackson Free Press

Mississippians are so used to being on the bottom that, without provocation, we'll take aim at our own feet and fire at will just to prove we can blow a damned toe off. That's my thought whenever I hear someone whine about how Mal's St. Paddy's Parade has gotten "too big," or balk at joining the thousands of tiara-ed and sequined "wannabes" who drive, fly and hitchhike into Jackson every March to eat, drink and be friggin' merry enough to last another 11 months or so. It is unfathomable to me that a single Jacksonian would take for granted what Jill Conner Browne has done for this city and its residents.

Since her fame shot to the sky five years ago, after Willie and JoAnne Morris helped the then-YMCA trainer publish her first book, Jill has been a one-woman economic-development machine for this city, and this region. The Wells Methodist Church devotee has showed the world that Jackson, Miss., is populated with progressive, witty, caring, daring, foul-mouthed, loud citizens of at least two genders—not exactly the stereotype Yankees have in mind. Not only that, but she managed to get all these crazy people, mostly women itching to drink, eat and shop, to flock here at least once a year. Jackson=Mecca. Who knew?

I hadn't heard of the Sweet Potato Queens when I moved home almost three years ago. Within a few months I was burrowed into a Nick's sofa drinking and bonding with Jill. Mere weeks later, I was squeezing myself into a very disconcerting outfit to dance around the SPQ float.

At Nick's, though, I learned that Jill was from Tupelo, that she's a proud feminist ("of course," she says), that she was inspired by the Alcorn Golden Girls, that she worked her ass off teaching aerobics after her divorce to care for her daughter and her mother—a job she didn't give up until three years ago. "If I got the flu or sprained my ankle, we'd starve to death," she said of that time. I also heard how determined she was to be creative, to live a big life, to have fun despite problems. In 1982, she crowned herself the "Sweet Potato Queen" for Malcolm White's first (and small) St. Paddy's Parade. She later wrote humor columns under the pseudonym, "Betty Fulton," for White's alternative paper, "Diddy Wah Diddy" and a fitness column for The Clarion-Ledger.

Now, Jill is a best-selling author and travels constantly—but Jackson is still home. "It's not fashionable to like it here," she said, "but I love the people here."

Never been to Mal's St. Paddy's Parade? Well, get yer ass downtown March 20 and give a thumbs-up to a woman who believed in this city when few others did.