Rod Steiger plays Sheriff Bill Gillespie in the film "In the Heat of the Night." What is the name of the town where Gillespie enforces the law?

In the Heat of the Night (1967) won five Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Best Actor for Rod Steiger. Steiger was lauded for his performance as a Mississippi police chief who learns to respect an African-American officer. Sidney Poitier as Detective Virgil Tibbs must work with Steiger as the chief as they both search for a killer in the small town of Sparta, Mississippi.

Notwithstanding the fact that the film was set in the fictional Mississippi town of Sparta (with no connection to the real Sparta, Mississippi), people still in 2016 believed that the movie was partially filmed in the real city of Sparta and that actual citizens were used as unnamed very minor character actors and actresses.

In the film, the main characters go through a number of trials and tribulations. But, at the end of their ordeal and with the job done, Tibbs boards the Gulf, Mobile & Ohio train out of town, after being bid farewell by a respectful and now open-minded Gillespie, "Virgil, . . you take care, . . you hear."