MERIDIAN, Miss.—When motivational speaker and success coach Dan Duster comes across a hurdle, the usual self-nudge won’t quite cut it. Instead, he channels the spirit of an ancestor.
“When I consider any problems that I’m facing, they’re minute compared to what she went through. Instead of ‘Man up,’ I say, ‘Ida up!’” he shares with a chuckle and a nod to his great-grandmother: investigative journalist, activist and anti-lynching crusader Ida B. Wells. “Braver than most men,” he hails her.
He and siblings Michelle Duster and David Duster visited Meridian on Dec. 15, 2022, to celebrate Wells’ induction into The MAX Hall of Fame, as part of the 2022 class that also included soul-music pioneer Sam Cooke; composer, musician and “Father of the Blues” W.C. Handy; Pulitzer Prize-winning author and poet Alice Walker; and Grammy Award-winning country music artist and archivist Marty Stuart.
Since opening in downtown Meridian in 2018, The Mississippi Arts + Entertainment Experience has saluted 33 famed Mississippi-born and -connected individuals who have significantly contributed to the fields of music, visual and performing arts, literature, civil rights, and other cultural areas.
Those on hand for The MAX Hall of Fame Induction Ceremony on Dec. 15, 2022, included (from left) Dan Duster, Michelle Duster and David Duster (representing their great-grandmother, inductee Ida B. Wells); inductee Marty Stuart; Mistress of Ceremonies Tonea Stewart; and Carla Cooke (representing her father, inductee Sam Cooke). Photo by Sherry Lucas
With three of 2022’s five inductees having long-since passed on, both lineage and legacy mark the day of celebration. Descendants of Wells, Cooke and Handy stand in for their history-making family members and share personal insights, too; they proudly embrace the hall-of-fame honor, the Mississippi paths their forbearers trod and their ancestors’ visionary achievements.
‘The Truth Was Powerful’
Carla Cooke, the youngest daughter of “Father of Soul” Sam Cooke, is also a captivating performer with rich, soul-stirring vocals. Clarksdale-born, Sam Cooke “was founded in gospel music, which was started in Mississippi with his father being a preacher here,” she says. “It is a blessing to be a part of his great legacy. … So