The ninth season of Emmy Award-winning TrueSouth Presented by YellaWood hits the road to the Grand Prairie of Arkansas – one of the premiere duck hunting destinations in the world – on Tuesday, Sept. 29 at 8 p.m. ET. The series revolves around two food stories told from one place, which TrueSouth sets in conversation to make larger points about Southern beliefs and identities.
All episodes of TrueSouth are available on demand on the ESPN App via an applicable subscription immediately after airing. Visit the TrueSouth website to follow the crew throughout the year.
Episode Summary
Hunters come here for the migrating birds, on their way south from breeding grounds, following the big river along the Mississippi Flyway, to winter homes on the Gulf of Mexico and beyond. As rice became an important crop here in the late 1800s and early 1900s, hungry ducks stopped on the Grand Prairie to feed on rice and rice harvest leftovers. Soon, farmers began hunting ducks to protect crops. The duck hunting industry of today – an economic driver for the region, drawing everyday folks and billionaires who swoop in on private jets – grew out of that moment. To explain this and more, the crew sat down with Rex Nelson, columnist for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
This episode revolves around a hunt day, beginning in the pre-dawn as a jon boats snake down a backwater canal, bound for a morning shoot in a flooded timber hunting hole. This episode ends in a no-name juke, decorated with treasures from now shuttered bars, as a band led by Rev. Greg Spadlin sings a song of catfish.
Three restaurants anchor our story: Craig’s Bar-B-Q in Devalls Bluff, open since the 1940s, is beloved for lunches of sliced pork sandwiches capped with slaw. Big K’s Catfish Barn, 13 miles down the road in Hazen, is open from December through March, serving buffet-style dinners in a working barn, tucked in the middle of a farm. Across the highway from Big K’s, Stanley and Becky Young steward Murry’s Restaurant. Like many people here, Stanley Young often serves as a duck hunting guide. But every Friday and Saturday night, he and his family open the doors of their brick restaurant to serve ethereal onion rings, fried catfish with homemade tartar sauce, and bread pudding gilded with whiskey sauce.
Core music for this episode comes from singer and songwriter Bailey Biggers, who grew up in Marion, Arkansas, east of the Grand Prairie. Biggers recorded her first song at 12 and played her first gig in a diner. TrueSouth first tapped her for music in 2023 for our Hot Springs, Ar. episode. This time out, we sampled Biggers’ second album, Resurrection Fern.
Advance press screeners of TrueSouth: Season Nine, Episode Two are available upon request: katie.callahan@espn.com.
About TrueSouth
TrueSouth is a National Emmy Award-winning limited series on Southern food and culture, airing on SEC Network. John T. Edge, author of House of Smoke: A Southerner Goes Searching for Home, writes and hosts the show, which is executive produced by four-time New York Times best-selling author, ESPN senior writer Wright Thompson, and produced by Bluefoot Entertainment.
The series, now in its ninth season, revolves around two food stories told from one place, which TrueSouth sets in conversation to tell bigger stories about Southern beliefs and identities. This season’s featured places are The Shoals, Alabama; Arkansas Flyway; Buford Highway in Atlanta; and Rayna, Louisiana. A special behind-the-scenes episode finishes out season 9. Seasons 1-8 of TrueSouth are available in their entirety on the ESPN App.
Music plays an integral role in TrueSouth’s storytelling via in-episode performances and on-screen credits. The TrueSouth playlist on Spotify shares the full soundtrack of every season. A TrueSouth hub on SECSports.com offers a roster of places the crew has visited, along with a road trip planning feature.
About SEC Network
The Southeastern Conference and ESPN launched SEC Network on August 14, 2014. The network televises hundreds of games across the SEC’s 22 sports annually. Programming includes in-depth analysis and storytelling in studio shows such as SEC Nation, Marty & McGee, Read & React and Rally Cap, daily news and information with The Paul Finebaum Show and SEC Now, original content such as the Emmy Award-winning TrueSouth, SEC Storied and SEC Inside, and more. Hundreds of additional live events are available for streaming exclusively on SEC Network’s digital companion, SEC Network+, via the ESPN App and SECNetwork.com. Follow SEC Network on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook and Twitter/X.