What is a hometown?
Grenada,
Mississippi USA
When I was 10 year old, my dad moved our family to the pre-civil rights American
south, Grenada,
Mississippi USA, from southern California, thinking it was the last
frontier, meaning for a farmer/rancher, cheap land, free water. He
called my mom and said "Get on a plane, it's raining and
beautiful". In Calipatria, California, aka
Calipat, in Imperial Valley, when it
rained, we got out of school, called 'Mud Holidays'.
The vast supply
of labor for $5 dollars a day, less for legions of "chunkers",
including kids, when clearing land was never mentioned, but may have been a draw
also.
My dad loved Mississippi because it was lushly beautiful and the
people were friendly, and warm, and he thought we were getting out of
the rat race, the fast pace of southern California, though I can
hardly imagine many rats wanting to race to Calipat, which touts the
Salton Sea as its best recreational offering, and its main employer
as the nifty new state prison, with inmates outnumbering the
population of Calipat 3 to 1. There are lots of nice people
there, though.
I really would like to visit Calipat,
and see anyone who is still there, that was there in 1951-1961, when I
was. I would especially like to correspond with anyone who may have
known my grandparents, Earl and Beulah Johnson, when they lived in
Imperial Valley prior to World War II, or who may have known my aunt
Earlene Johnson, who died several years ago. Anyone have a
picture of the class or '69?
In 1967, my Grenada, Mississippi high school was integrated, violently. The integration
wasn't violent, the reaction to it was very. I found it very
interesting to read an account of a Jewish (a self-described
"Four-Nevers Jew, " Never forget,
Never forgive, Never again, and Never stand by and let that happen to
anyone else") civil rights worker, Bruce Hartford, assigned to Grenada, Mississippi,
"where one of
the longest-sustained mass-movements of the era fought for voter
registration, jobs, and school desegregation" took place.
Talk about perspectives, I was on the inside, he was helping make
the change happen. The last day of school the spring before the fall
integration, we were called together in assembly, and Mr. Ainsworth,
our principal, who was a very conscientious school administrator, told
us that the way of life that we had lived was about to change forever.
It was to let us know that the school had been targeted for integration, one of the first in the state of Mississippi, the next
fall. There was no racial invective, just a profound something, not
sadness, but resignation?
Mississippi Sovereignty in the minds of southerners meant that never
again would someone,
"outsiders", who didn't like us (the Southern ruling class, Pinkies),
rule over us Pinkies. The Bruce Hartfords
were Yankees, Carpetbaggers and Commies*.
What most people don't comprehend, is that Mississippi was two
nations. One pink, one brun. There was a great deal of
"amalgamation", though legally prohibited. Actually,
impregnating black women was not against the law, only the reverse.
Perhaps Emmett Till's whistling at a white woman was as much a social
revolutionary statement of rebellion, a way to say, "I ain't
afraid of you so-and-so's", as it was appreciation of
pulchritude.
To allow those with heavy tans to
vote, was to cede the governance, and hence the resources of the
Pinkies to illiterate, uneducated Brownies, like the Freedmen of the era of
Reconstruction.
*Yankees
were invaders; Carpetbaggers were those who profited monetarily
from the defeat and disenfranchisement of the South (whitesouth), Commies are Jews from out
South.
Now, the Mississippi Historical Society publishes stuff about the
Civil Rights era, and I get emails from Bob Khayat to donate to the
James Meredith Memorial. Mr. Khayat was a law professor and assistant dean when I was in school, and I think had previously been president
of the NCAA, even though he wasn't even Black, which shows how
Mississippians believe in diversity a lot more than there are
represented in the liberal press.
The links below are for the most part perspectives of those on the outside. An
interesting complement would be the perspective of the whitesouth that
lived through it. An interesting book by the former commissioner of
the Mississippi Sovereignty
Commission is out of print. I'd like to have one. My friend Betti
Smith interviewed the author, but won't let me borrow her copy, and
she lives in NY! Hmph! The same Betti Smith who lived
with me for several months between apartments in New York. Yes!
I
think the slight may be racially motivated, as I beat her in the 440.
Assignments
- Someone interview Helen Jones. Her husband Dick Jones was
Governor William Winter's foreman for his Grenada County farm.
During the horror of the hate 'n whomp'em time, he apologized to
the other workers for the unseemly behaviour of the Klanny types.
He was a credit to his race.
- Someone interview Auny Burkley. She lived across from the
school, and came out to let the bruties know that each should stop
whomping and kicking his fellowman, that such behaviour was
"not Christian", for which she was roundly denounced by
the mobites.
- Someone interview Dorothy Johnson of Fancy Gap, Virginia. She
was a Grenadier, though not a Mississippi native. When Miss Dot
was taking the kids to Grenada's John Rundle High School, ax
handlers were bashing out the windows all around of the car in
front of her that was taking little kids to register at the Lizzie
Horn Elementary School, next door to the high school. They were so
small that they were on the back seat, screaming their nappy
little heads off. One of the smart axes told Aunty Dotty that she
must ought back up and go some other way, because they were about
to turn that car over. Aunty Dot told them, "You turn that
car over, and I'll run over you."
- If anyone can find Jane Metts Sease, her perspective illustrated
how clueless we all were. I was talking to her last year, and she
says she mostly remembers that she wanted to go hear Joan Baez play,
but her folks assured her that wouldn't be advisable. She may be
floating by now, they are sailors.
- The most interesting interview would be of my best friend's
brother, who was one of those that followed the intergratra's
home, two pale and pasty folk at one end of the block, one at the
other, to trap and beat up the school kid, which they did. His
perspective on why he did what he did, and how he feels now,
would be interesting. First we'd need to get a waiver of suit of
sorts from the beatee, so that candor wouldn't be inhibited by
threat of retribution. The Beator later felt himself
the cruel victim of racial bigotry in a personal injury lawsuit in south Tejas,
where hueros are a decided minority. Life is like that, no?
- Would love to include video footage if anyone can locate any.
All three major networks were there getting their cameras baxed.
- I'd love to interview with Joan Baez. Telephone or email
is fine is fine. Did you record the song "The
Night they Drove Ole Dixie
Down" to let the south know you harbored no ill will towards
your fellow?
- There is a lot more to Grenada than it's Civil Rights history.
How bout somebody interviewing the mayor, a veteran of the Civil
Rights movement in Grenada, who is a woman of color?
Imagine.......
- How bout an interview with what it is like being the minority
now? What are the schools like?
Google on Grenada..............
-
Grenada Mississippi, 1966
Civil Rights Movement
History of civil rights
movement in Grenada Mississippi ...
Grenada Mississippi, 1966 — Chronology of a
Movement ... of Peace Ayers, who has jurisdiction over many of the
cases of civil rights workers and activists
arrested in Grenada ...
www.crmvet.org/info/grenada.htm
-
Civil Rights Movement
Home : On Violence and Nonviolence. Poster, printed
by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, questions the role
of the Mississippi State Highway Patrol in
violence against Blacks. ... of Southern
Mississippi. Civil rights protesters encourage a boycott in
Grenada, Mississippi. ... and Archives,
University of Southern Mississippi.
Mississippi Valley State University ...
mshistory.k12.ms.us/features/feature24/ms_civil_rights.html
- Southern
Freedom Movement Links
Southern Freedom Movement Links. NOTICE — This list
of web information sources is provided for research purposes only.
... Grenada MS, Movement. Fannie Lou Hamer
(1917-1977) ... Wednesdays in Mississippi: Civil
Rights as Women's Work ...
www.crmvet.org/crmlinks.htm
-
Free Speech Movement and the Mississippi
Sovereignty Commission
... He also traveled to Grenada,
Mississippi in August of 1966, where he took photos of the
demonstrations ... the latter worked in the
Mississippi Civil Rights Movement. Cloke worked with ...
www.jofreeman.com/sixtiesprotest/FSMMiss.htm
-
USM Libraries - Collections Listed by Subject >
Civil Rights Collections
Manuscripts and Archives > Collections Listed by
Subject > Civil Rights Collections. A B C D
E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z. Adickes (Sandra E.) ...
Mississippi during the
Civil Rights Movement of the sixties, 2 reels with guide.
F.B.I. Files: Grenada, Mississippi ...
www.lib.usm.edu/~archives/subj-cr.php
-
Mississippi Civil Rights Movement
... Home : When Youth Protest: The
Mississippi Civil Rights Movement ... the route through
Mississippi many students participated in
places like Grenada, Greenwood,
Philadelphia, and Canton ...
mshistory.k12.ms.us/features/feature21/civilrights.html
-
Oral History Transcripts
... For transcripts in the. Civil
Rights in Mississippi Digital
Archive ... Jasper Neely. civil rights
activist, NAACP president in Grenada in
1968 ...
www.usm.edu/crdp/html/transcripts.shtml
-
Oral History Index, part 1
... with these significant figures in the
Mississippi civil rights struggle. This
audio is delivered using ... being active in civil
rights marches in Grenada, Mississippi.
In 1967, he ...
www.lib.usm.edu/~spcol/crda/oh/indexlist6.htm
-
Home - Black Mississippi
BlackMississippi.com, Inc. - The Best of
Mississippi ... Columbia Columbus
Greenville Greenwood Grenada Gulfport
Hattiesburg Holly Springs ... newspaper's failures in covering the
1960s civil rights movement ... Brain
Research. MISSISSIPPI FORWARD ...
www.blackmississippi.com/indexarticle.html?page=main&id=-1&grid=&fid=8...
-
Grenada - Great Lakes, Great Times - Anytime
... and the Mississippi
Central train companies, Grenada was a
center of Confederate activity during much of the
Civil War ... 1999-2004 Grenada
Tourism Commission. All rights reserved.
...
www.grenadamississippi.com/gtc_www/gtc_war.html
-
The Daily Sentinel Star
The Daily (Sentinel) Star and
Grenada Lake Herald is delivered into over 13,000 homes each
week. We have been in business since 1854 serving
Grenada County and the surrounding areas in North Central
Mississippi. ... comparisons between gay
rights and the civil
rights movement. ... correlation between gay
rights and civil rights
compared to what ... from poor, Massachusetts from
Mississippi," he said. " ...
www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?BRD=1433&dept_id=170174&newsid=11089364&PA...
- 50
Years After Brown, Parents and Students Fight for Equality in
Mississippi's Delta Schools - Rural Roots,
Volume 5...
... away to a largely black high school in
Grenada when the mostly white high school
in Winona was ... learning has roots in the
Mississippi civil rights movement. In the 1960s ...
www.ruraledu.org/roots/rr501a.htm
-
The James Meredith March
Browse through a selection from Jo Freeman's
personal collection of photos from the James Meredith March. ...
that federal registrars be sent to Mississippi,
civil rights leaders took groups of marchers to nearby ...
gathered around this momument in Grenada
one stuck an American flag into ...
www.jofreeman.com/photos/meredith.html
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