Sunflower

Formed January 23, 1844 (59^th county)

Sunflower County (25,973), Indianola (9,640)

The 1967 red brick Modern Classical Revival facility looks older.  It is at the intersection of Main Street and Court Avenue.  United States Highway 49W is eight blocks to the east of the site.  Thomas H. Johnson, Jr., & Associates provided the designs.  There was an 1898 courthouse earlier also in Indianola.  The facility and its grounds feature columns and a Liberty Bell.  The county was formed on January 23, 1844 from Bolivar County as the 59^th county.  Leflore County was cut out in 1871.  Clayton, McNutt, Johnsonville, Eureka, and finally Indianola have been the county seats.  Eureka changed its name to Indianola.  The county is named for the river.  The county seat name was created for its location on a Native American village site.  Sunflower County was the birthplace for 1 Mississippi Governor, D. Phillip Bryant. 

Sunflower County government consists of a sheriff, an administrator, an attorney, a collector, a coroner, an assessor and a clerk (executive).  It has 5 Supervisors (legislative.)  Three Chancery Court Judges serve Sunflower, Humphreys, Issaquena, Sharkey, Warren, and Washington counties, Three District Court Judges serve Sunflower, LeFlore, and Washington counties and a court clerk serves Sunflower County (judicial.) Sunflower County is in western Mississippi.  Jackson, Mississippi is south and Memphis, Tennessee is north of the county.  The county center is 12.2 miles Northeast of Indianola nearer Doddsville.  The county is surrounded clockwise by Coahoma, Tallahatchie, Leflore, Humphreys, Washington, and Bolivar counties. 

The area of the county is 694 square miles.  It is 21 out of 82 in the state.  It ranks 36 out of 82 in population in the state.  It has a density of 37.4 persons per square mile making it 45 out of 82 in the state.  Sunflower County has 69.2% of its population in its incorporated areas.  United States Highway 49 West crosses the county north to south from Tallahatchie County to Humphreys County.  United States Highway 82 goes east to west from Leflore County to Washington County.  The county looks like a skinny letter J.  Indianola is located in the southwest quarter of the county.  Indianola is the county seat and the largest city.  It is 37.1% of the county population.  The county seat is pronounced IN-DEE-AN-OE-LA.  This county is in the Indianola Micropolitan Statistical Area.