Visit Oxford for books, food, football

The home of William Faulkner, the Mannings and top chefs deserve spot on bucket list.

Oxford, Miss., was a bucket list Southern destination for me.

I grew up in Birmingham and lived most of my adult life in the Atlanta area, but I had never set foot in this Mississippi college town celebrated far and wide for three things I love: literature, food and college football.

Perhaps one reason I never ventured to this stately hamlet a few hours to the west was a dearth of downtown accommodations. Until recently, no hotels existed on or near the historic downtown square. That changed with the opening of the Graduate last fall.

Part of a small chain of specialty hotels with locations in prominent university towns, the Graduate sits on a shady street two blocks away from the square. The design and feel of the hotel aims to remind patrons of an upscale college dorm, one they never lived in as students.

Students at the University of Mississippi, or Ole Miss as it’s more commonly called, don’t live at the Graduate, but they do hang out there in the coffee shop and bar, with laptops flung open, gathered in small groups socializing over lattes and lagers.

The hotel welcomes — even encourages — students and townsfolk to hang out in its stylish, bright lobby with walls adorned by local art, globes hanging from the ceiling and a vintage bicycle artfully placed next to the elevators. I was unsure whether the bicycle was an art display or someone’s actual bike, but after two days I noticed it hadn’t moved an inch.

So much in town is named after either something from a story by William Faulkner, who called Oxford home, or members of the famous Manning family who played football at Ole Miss — Archie and sons Eli and Cooper. Peyton Manning broke family tradition and went to the University of Tennessee, an act still viewed as an unpardonable sin by some die-hard locals old enough to remember and care about such things.

At the Graduate, each room contains framed silhouettes of the “King” and “Queen” hanging on the wall. The King and Queen are the nicknames for Archie Manning and his wife Olivia — that’s how revered the Mannings are in Oxford. The rooftop lounge is called the Coop, which sounds like a good name for a bar on a roof where people, instead of chickens, are confined, but it’s also a play on the name Cooper, the first-born son of Archie and Olivia. Cooper’s Ole Miss football career was cut short due to injury, but he’s still royalty in these parts.

From the Coop, you can see the square, filled with what one would expect to see in a college town: bars, restaurants, bookstores, shops and music clubs. But the businesses aren’t all geared toward students.

Square Books and its satellite stores — Off Square Books and Square Books Jr., all three within a block of one another — are perfect examples of this. Square Books is widely considered to be among the best independent bookstores in the country, with a wide selection of new books in a multilevel location housed in a historic building.

Upstairs, there’s a small cafe and a quiet, covered balcony where you can read and sip your coffee in peace with a bird’s-eye view of the square. Inside, the always-busy shop features lots of appearances by authors, wellknown and not. It relishes shining the spotlight on regional writers. In Oxford, writers are treated like rock stars, their readings and book signings well-attended, advertised with flyers posted all over town the way a rock show might be promoted in other college towns.

Oxford’s literary bent has a lot to do with Faulkner, the winner of the 1949 Nobel Prize in Literature. Faulkner called Oxford home for most of his life and wrote many of his novels at Rowan Oak, his estate that’s now one of Oxford’s top tourist attractions. No firsttime visit to Oxford is complete without a stop at Rowan Oak.

The Greek Revival house seems undisturbed, as if the author went out for a drink and never came back. Most astonishing to see are Faulkner’s handwritten notes on the wall of his study, an outline of his novel “A Fable.” In the kitchen pantry, next to the same phone where he received the call informing him that he had won the Nobel Prize, there’s more of his handwriting on the wall, names and numbers that he scribbled in a slant on the white paint, in lieu of a notepad.

And then there’s his last bottle of Jack Daniel’s, a couple of swigs still left in it. The bottle is enclosed in a glass case with other, more literary mementos. One can’t help but wonder what story he had completed when drinking from that bottle, since Faulkner is said to have drunk Jack Daniel’s only to celebrate the completion of a project, opting for cheaper whiskey on a more regular basis.

Beyond Faulkner, perhaps the best-known thing about Oxford among those who aren’t from there is the Grove. This 10-acre grove of old-growth trees in the middle of campus consistently gets ranked as one of the best football tailgating spots in the nation.

On game days in fall, fans take tailgating to a new level, with candelabra and chandeliers providing a deluxe accent to the many tents. The festivities include the Walk of Champions, where the Ole Miss squad marches through a narrow pathway of adoring fans on the way to Vaught–Hemingway Stadium. On nongame days, the Grove is an idyllic spot surrounded by historic academic buildings, and still worth a visit.

One of those buildings — Barnard Observatory, circa 1859 — is home to the Southern Foodways Alliance, part of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture. The SFA investigates and celebrates the rich heritage of Southern culinary arts. The organization’s offices aren’t open to general tourism, because they’re doing some serious work in there, but you can visit and admire the observatory building, which has its own fascinating history and design elements.

It’s no surprise that an organization like the SFA is headquartered in Oxford. The city is a great place to dine. Celebrated restaurants, from high-end to casual, abound in and around town.

Snackbar, located in a nondescript older shopping center, is one of several eateries owned by James Beard award-winning chef John Currence. Don’t let the name or the locale fool you, this isn’t a snack shack. It’s a fancy bistro where the lights are low. I had to use my cellphone to see the menu and wasn’t exactly sure what I ordered. The fish and polenta dish that ended up in front of me was a nice fusion of Southern moxie and Indian spice.

City Grocery on the square is Currence’s flagship restaurant, a landmark spot in town, with exposed brick and white tablecloths. Like Snackbar, it also bears little resemblance to what its name might suggest.

Around the corner from City Grocery, the Second Line awaits. Owned by acclaimed Memphis-based chef Kelly English, this bar and restaurant features New Orleans-style fare in a casual atmosphere. It’s the type of place where you can catch the game on TV while enjoying authentic gumbo, po’boys, Mississippi catfish, crawfish and the Happy Enchiladas, a popular sharing dish that gets its name from a misheard line in a John Prine song.

Among the many perks of staying at the Graduate, the location stands out. You don’t need to get in your car to explore the square and downtown, because it’s all at the hotel’s doorstep.

The Ole Miss campus, Snackbar and Rowan Oak are beyond easy walking distance, unless you’re looking to burn some calories, so you’ll need to drive to those spots, or take advantage of the complimentary shuttle service the hotel offers.

Or maybe you could ask to borrow that mint-condition vintage bike sitting by the elevators and see how far that gets you.

CONTRIBUTED PHOTOS BY BLAKE GUTHRIE Rowan Oak, where William Faulkner lived and wrote many of his novels, is a top attraction in Oxford, Miss.

The Walk of Champions cuts through the heart of the Grove on the Ole Miss campus about a mile from downtown Oxford.

The Graduate’s bright, sleek lobby is adorned with plenty of artwork and other displays, like this vintage bike next to the elevators.