Memphis --living in the Mid-South

What's special about Memphis?
Before we moved to Tennessee, I couldn't tell you much of anything about Memphis, other than it's home to Elvis Presley's Graceland, which is visited annually by more than 600,000 people, making it the second most-visited home in the U.S. (behind the White House).
It's home to the NBA's "Memphis Grizzlies," whom Mitchell's Mike Miller played for from 2003 to 2008.
That's not much to go on when we moved just 15 miles north of Memphis. So here's what else I've discovered...
Located on the banks of the Mississippi River, Memphis has a population of 662,897 (2010 census), and is Tennessee's largest city and the 20th largest in the nation. Its metro area has a population of 1.3 million. It is also the nation's 5th most dangerous city.
A resident of Memphis is referred to as a Memphian, and the Memphis region is known, particularly to media outlets, as the "Mid-South."
Memphis is known as the "Home of the Blues" and the "Birthplace of Rock 'n' Roll." It has been the subject of or at least mentioned in many songs. Some are among my favorites, including "Maybe it was Memphis" by Pam Tillis, "Walking in Memphis" by Marc Cohn, and "Memphis" by Johnny Rivers, to name a few. Wikipedia states that "Memphis is thought to be one of the most mentioned cities (if not the most) in recorded music. There are over 1,000 commercial recordings of over 800 distinct songs containing "Memphis" in them." In case you were wondering, the Web site "memphisrocknsoul.org" lists 1,074 songs that mention Memphis in their lyrics. In addition, almost 20% of the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame's earliest inductees hailed from within a 100-mile radius of Memphis.
What else?
* Historic Beale Street was voted the second most popular entertainment district following New Orleans' Bourbon Street.
* Memphis is named for its Egyptian sister city on the Nile.
* Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis on April 4, 1968.
* The name Memphis means "established" and "beautiful."
* Memphis is home to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, founded in 1962, by entertainer Danny Thomas. St. Jude is one of the world's premier centers for research and treatment of catastrophic diseases in children and has treated more than 16,000 children from the U.S. and 60 foreign countries.
* Memphis is the largest spot cotton market in the world, with nearly half of the U.S. cotton crop going through Memphis.
Even the lion that roared at the start of MGM's films lived at the Memphis Zoo until his death in 1944.
There's even more colorful history to be found at memphistravel.com. Now we know a little bit more about this southern belle. The rest we'll explore on our own.