Surrounded by the land where the blues began and established in 1979 by the Carnegie Public Library Board of Trustees, the Delta Blues Museum preserves and interprets the history of blues. Since 1999, the museum has been a standalone institution housed in the historic Clarksdale freight depot, built in 1918 for the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad. The building was designated a Mississippi Landmark Property in 1996 and the former freight area—about 5,000 square feet of ground floor space—is devoted to permanent and traveling exhibits.