In John Grisham's book The Last Juror the novel is set in the fictional town of Clanton, Mississippi, which is in Ford County, during the 1970's. As Grisham describes the region during the times of the Civil Rights era, Grisham provides examples of good things of the region along with the bad. The narrator and one of many main characters is Willie Traynor.

Traynor is a Memphis-born twenty-three year old dropout from Syracuse. He went to Syracuse to earn his degree in journalism. Traynor found his way to Ford County after their newspaper, The Ford County Times, went bankrupt. He soon bought the paper for $50,000 with the help of his grandmother; he was now the new owner of the newspaper. Traynor was quick to find out that the townspeople didn't accept him because they viewed him as an outsider. "It takes at least...