Levon Helm Boyhood Home

Mark Lavon “Levon” Helm grew up in a small and simple home in Turkey Scratch, Arkansas, about 80 miles southwest of Memphis. From a young age, he helped on his family’s cotton farm. By age six, Helm knew he wanted to leave to pursue a career in music, after seeing legendary bluegrass mandolinist and singer Bill Monroe perform. He took up guitar at age eight, and then drums. 

His first break came when he was 17 years old, when rockabilly star Ronnie Hawkins found himself performing at the West Helena Delta Supper Club without a drummer. Hawkins’ band took Helm to Toronto, Canada, where the band eventually broke away from Hawkins and began making a name for themselves. Folk legend Bob Dylan took note and asked them to join him on a 1966 tour of the United Kingdom. 

After recording with Dylan in Woodstock, New York, inside a pink house, the Band, as they were now called, released their debut album in 1968, called Music from Big Pink, which, with its country and western, R&B, and Appalachian influences, among others, countered the psychedelic musical culture of the time. Several tours and albums followed until they linked up again with Dylan for the album Planet Waves in 1974.

In 1976, the Band performed its final show, called “The Last Waltz,” which Martin Scorcese filmed and made into a renowned documentary of the same name in 1978. Featured guests included legendary performers Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, Van Morrison, and Muddy Waters.

Not only a musician, Helm also starred alongside Sissy Spacek in Coal Miner’s Daughter, the story of country singer Loretta Lynn, among several other films.  

In 2017, Levon Helm’s Boyhood Home, made of simple board-and-batten siding with a sheet metal roof, was moved from its original location in Turkey Scratch to Marvell, where Helm attended high school and formed his first band, the Jungle Bush Beaters. A bronze bust of Helm, created by Arkansas native artist Kevin Kresse, was installed at the site the next year. 

Helm passed away in 2012, and in 2017, U.S. Highway 49 from Helena-West Helena to Marvell, Arkansas, was named the Levon Helm Memorial Highway in honor of his legacy. The attraction opened to the public in 2019.