Back in the early 2000s, I went on a road trip for The Advocate newspaper with my colleague and good friend Chris Frink. We were headed up to East Carroll Parish, in the northeast corner of Louisiana along the Mississippi River. In the Antebellum South, East Carroll was dotted with cotton plantations populated with thousands of slaves. Today, like then, it’s still a mostly agricultural place to live. Unfortunately, its slave/master society helped to produce, at the time of the 2000 U.S. Census, the poorest county in the nation. This was evident as soon as you drove into the county along Highway 65. The road just went to hell. Downtown Lake Providence looked nearly as rundown and abandoned as a Civil War photograph of Atlanta after Sherman came through. Chris and I were there to see how poor the poor could be in the United States. Staggeringly so it turned out.

Rev. Emmanuel Jones, left, and Evangelist Darrin Dixon submerge a convent in the waters of Lake Providence on Sunday, August 1, 2004. The dunking takes no more than a second. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Rev. Emmanuel Jones, left, and Evangelist Darrin Dixon submerge a convent in the waters of Lake Providence on Sunday, August 1, 2004. The dunking takes no more than a second. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon

On the way out of town, after stopping at a pharmacy that still sold products from the 60s and 70s on its shelves, we drove past Lake Providence, an oxbow lake adjacent to the Mississippi River, and the town’s namesake. It’s filled with cypress trees and pesticides. All that agricultural runoff has to go somewhere. Filing out of the lake that afternoon was a line of people all dressed in white. Not the Klan mind you. These good folks were the complete opposite. We were witnessing a group baptism. Chris and I got there right at the end of this joyous celebration. I missed those photographs. Come to find out that it was an annual event, a culmination of a two-week revival made up of parishioners from several local Black Baptist churches. I vowed to go back and did several times. The photos and audio below are a result.

2004 Lake Providence Open Water Baptism

Evangelist Darrin Dixon, left, Rev. Golden Guy, Rev. Emmanuel Jones and Rev. Michael Owens, representing seven Lake Providence, La. area baptist churches, walk hand-in-land into Lake Providence, an oxbow lake of the Mississippi River, at the start of a river baptism on Sunday, August 1, 2004. The baptism concluded a two-week revival by the churches. Lake Providence is the county seat of East Carroll Parish, the poorest county in the nation according to the 2000 census. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Gloria Washington, left, waits for the call to be baptized as Olla Jones, right, cinches a young convert’s baptismal gown prior to the start of the baptism on the shore of Lake Providence. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Rev. Emmanuel Jones motions to worshipers gathered on the bank of Lake Providence to witness another convert’s baptism, one of 23 baptisms performed during the ceremony, which happens only when there are ‘enough souls to be saved to make it worth while,’ according to Rev. Al Thomas, pastor of North Star/Oakland Ridge Church, who delivered the opening scripture and prayer at the ceremony. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Ninety-one-year-old Lucille Stewart of Lake Providence, La. is caught up in the moment as she and her friends watch members of her church being baptized in Lake Providence. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Rev. Emmanuel Jones, left, and Evangelist Darrin Dixon submerge a convent in the waters of Lake Providence. The dunking takes no more than a second. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon
Deacon Oscar Hopkins, center, lifts a young convent out of Lake Providence after a baptism. Photo by Richard Alan Hannon

2007 Lake Providence Open Water Baptism

2015 Lake Providence Open Water Baptism

* Listen to a portion of the 2015 baptism at this Soundcloud link. Recording note: I used two Line Audio CM3s housed in a DIY ORTF mount and tracked to a Sony PCM-M10 with a Sound Devices Mix-Pre D on the front end.

Where is This Place?

* Are you interested in using an image(s)? Get in touch at sales at evocativesound dot com. Note that I do not have model releases for people pictured in these images.