News

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) is now accepting applications for the 2021 Eudora Welty Research Fellowship. Offered in partnership with the Eudora Welty Foundation, this annual fellowship awards a $5,000 stipend to one graduate student to conduct research using the Eudora Welty Collection at MDAH for two weeks during the summer. The deadline is March 26, 2021.

“This is the eleventh consecutive year the Eudora Welty Foundation has funded the award," said David Pilcher, director of MDAH Archives and Record Services. "Their generosity makes it possible for yet another highly-qualified fellow to travel to the state archives and use these one-of-a-kind materials."

Download the application and other materials HERE. The stipend may be used for travel, housing, and other expenses during the fellow’s two-week minimum stay in Jackson.

The Eudora Welty Collection is the world’s finest collection of materials related to Welty and one of the most varied literary collections in the United States. The collection includes manuscripts, letters, photographs, drawings, and essays that span Welty’s entire life.

Beginning in 1957, and over the course of more than forty years, Welty donated materials to the department, primarily literary manuscripts and photographs. At her death the remainder of her papers were bequeathed to MDAH and included unpublished manuscripts and 14,000 items of correspondence with family, friends, scholars, young writers, and noted writers.

The collection may be accessed at the William F. Winter Archives & History Building, 200 North Street, Jackson. The application is available at mdah.ms.gov. For more information about the collection or the fellowship, email April Blevins at ablevins@mdah.ms.gov.

The Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) is partnering with the Daughters of the American Revolution, Mississippi Veterans Affairs, and Mississippi War Veterans Memorial Commission to honor Mississippians who serve and have served in the United States Armed Forces. The event begins at 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, November 10, on Entergy Mississippi Plaza at the Museum of Mississippi History and Mississippi Civil Rights Museum. COVID-19 precautions will be in place. 

“Mississippi’s extraordinary record of military service is one of the most inspiring stories that we share in the museums,” said MDAH director Katie Blount. “We are pleased to join with our military service organizations to pay special tribute to all the many Mississippians who have served our country.”

The program will include a performance by the 41st Army Band, a moment of silence, recognition of the veterans in attendance, memorial volley, wreath laying, and a keynote speech delivered by Major General Janson D. Boyles—the Adjutant General of the Mississippi National Guard.

The museums are offering free admission to those currently serving in the military and veterans and a family member on November 10. The museums open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday. The museums open free of charge on Sundays from noon to 4 p.m.

For more information, call 601-540-2794 or email Colonel Allen McDaniel at amcdaniel@ngams.org.

A partnership with the Community Foundation for Mississippi will fund the development of a podcast and strengthen the History Is Lunch lecture series by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. The gift expands on the Community Foundation’s previous $750,000 donation to the Two Mississippi Museums.

“The Community Foundation has been a strong supporter of the department’s work,” said MDAH director Katie Blount. “We are grateful for this gift from their John and Lucy Shackelford Charitable Fund, which will allow us to expand our outreach of the popular History Is Lunch series and bring in speakers from across the country.”

The History Is Lunch series began in 2005 and explores different aspects of the state’s history. The hour-long programs—in a streaming-only format during the COVID-19 epidemic—are livestreamed at noon Wednesdays on the MDAH Facebook page and can be watched there and on the department’s YouTube channel  anytime afterward. In-person programs will resume on in December.

“We are thrilled to partner in this endeavor,” said CFM president and CEO Jane Alexander. “As many of us are changing the ways we live and interact with one another, it’s more important than ever to invest in programs like these that make our lives worth living.”

By preserving Mississippi's diverse historic resources, and sharing them with people around the world, MDAH inspires discovery of stories that connect our lives and shape our future. For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.

Civil rights icon Fannie Lou Hamer was born October 6, 1917. In honor of Hamer’s birthday, admission to the Museum of Mississippi History and the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum will be free on Tuesday, October 6. Museum staff will highlight Hamer’s life and legacy through guided tours at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m.

“We honor Fannie Lou Hamer’s legacy daily at the Two Mississippi Museums,” said Pamela D.C. Junior, director of the Two Mississippi Museums. “We are offering free admission to the museums so people can learn more about this humble woman who gave of herself to uplift and strengthen her people.”

Born in 1917 in Montgomery County, Hamer worked for most of her life as a sharecropper. In 1962, she joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and encouraged African Americans to register to vote. Hamer was a founding member of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party (MFDP), which challenged the seating of the regular party’s all-white delegation.

Hamer’s powerful testimony to the credentials committee during the 1964 Democratic National Convention is featured in the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum. The MFDP challenge forced the Democratic Party to eventually embrace diversity and forever changed American politics.

Visitors are required to wear masks and observe social distancing guidelines. Masks are available on-site. All public spaces are sanitized and thoroughly cleaned throughout the day. Hand sanitizing stations are provided and staff are on-site to ensure that social distancing guidelines are maintained.

Regular museum hours are Tuesday-Saturday 9 a.m.–4 p.m. The museums are open free of charge on Sundays, noon–4 p.m. Visitors are encouraged to purchase their tickets online at tickets.mdah.ms.gov.

The museums are located at 222 North Street in Jackson. For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.

Effective October 1, the Museum of Mississippi History and the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum will add Sundays to its regular hours of operation. The museums will open free of charge on Sundays from noon to 4 p.m.

Safety Precautions

Visitors are required to wear masks and observe social distancing guidelines. Masks are available on-site. All public spaces are sanitized and thoroughly cleaned throughout the day. Hand sanitizing stations are provided and staff are on-site to ensure that social distancing guidelines are maintained. A limited number of visitors are allowed inside the museums at one time.

Hours are 9 a.m.–4 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday and noon–4 p.m. on Sunday. Visitors are encouraged to purchase their tickets online at tickets.mdah.ms.gov. Tickets are not required on Sundays. The maximum number of people per group is twenty.

The museums are located at 222 North Street in Jackson. For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.

MDAH is continuing to fulfill its mission of empowering people through Mississippi’s many stories by collecting artifacts that document today’s unprecedented times in our state’s history. Mississippi, like the nation, is currently in the midst of a global health pandemic, an economic recession, and a new movement for social justice. MDAH archivists and collections staff have taken on a new task to accumulate an assortment of memorabilia that will preserve the stories of this historic time in Mississippi.

“This is really a crucial change in how we look at collecting,” said Shane Keil, MDAH director of curatorial services. “Much of what we traditionally do involves searching for objects that represent an era in the past. Now we’re looking at current events and searching for objects that will represent this period of pandemic and societal change.”

 Local industries have transitioned to manufacture vital safety items such as sanitizers, face coverings, and disinfectant cleaners. MDAH has added several of these limited items to its collections to depict adapting to a pandemic in the state.

“In the early stages of the pandemic, we began to identify certain artifacts that we would like to collect such as homemade face masks and COVID-19 closure signs,” said Nan Prince, MDAH director of collections. “The Nissan plant in Canton began making face shields for healthcare workers, and we asked them for one to collect. When alcohol industries such as Cathead Distillery, Rich Grain Distillery, and Lazy Magnolia Brewery began making much-needed hand sanitizer, we reached out to collect samples of those bottles. These items are now on display in our Mississippi Distilled: Prohibition, Piety, and Politics exhibit.”

Mississippi has also seen a societal change in the wake of George Floyd’s death and other police brutality cases in the nation. A new wave of social activism among Mississippians stirred citywide protests and rallies against racial discrimination and on June 30, Governor Tate Reeves signed a historic bill to retire the 1894 state flag that contained the Confederate battle flag. MDAH now has the last state flag that flew over the state capitol and will soon have it on display at the Museum of Mississippi History.

“The material we’ve collected from the ongoing racial equality and social justice movements is really a continuation of the civil rights story told in the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum,” said Keil. “We’ve reached out to contacts in the social justice movement and collected ‘I Can’t Breathe’ face masks as well as various signs from protests at the State Capitol and Governor’s Mansion.”

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, MDAH has taken a new direction in utilizing digital content and online resources in its operations. Archives and records are available online for public research requests and museums are now featuring digital programming and social media to highlight collections and artifacts in galleries online.

“While we were closed due to the pandemic, we continued communicating via email with potential donors to give their collections to MDAH,” said Laura Heller, MDAH acquisitions and collections coordinator. “We have encouraged donors to communicate more through email and use smart phone pictures to show the artifacts they would like for us to consider accepting into our collections.”

By collecting these artifacts for historical interpretation and preservation, MDAH is preserving the stories of Mississippi during the COVID-19 pandemic for future generations to remember.

“Documenting these experiences during a pandemic brings a multi-layered story that people can use in the years to come,” said Heller. “The record of these times will show how Mississippians pulled together in a time of need.”

The National Park Service (NPS) has awarded the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) $50,000 in support of the Natchez Outbuilding Survey, a study of nineteenth-century structures built adjacent to antebellum houses in the Natchez area. Of particular focus are the living quarters of enslaved persons and the kitchens, smokehouses, and agricultural buildings where they labored.

The Natchez Outbuilding Survey is a partnership between MDAH and the Historic Natchez Foundation. The money from the NPS Underrepresented Communities Grant will be used to hire a consultant to prepare a National Register of Historic Places nomination. MDAH will issue a request for proposals for the project this month, and the work is expected to be completed in 2023.

“The information gathered through the Natchez Outbuilding Survey has deepened our understanding of nineteenth-century life in Mississippi and the architecture of slavery in the Natchez region,” said MDAH director Katie Blount. “We are especially grateful for our partnership with the Historic Natchez Foundation, and we are thankful to the National Park Service for funding this initiative.”

“The Historic Natchez Foundation is thrilled that MDAH has received an Underrepresented Community Grant from the National Park Service for the Natchez Outbuilding project,” said Carter Burns, executive director of the Historic Natchez Foundation. “We are proud to partner with MDAH on this important endeavor to document and study more than 150 of these structures, which are closely associated with the lives of enslaved African Americans. This grant recognizes the importance of these sites by enabling their nomination to the National Register of Historic Places.”

The Natchez Outbuilding Survey has uncovered information about how enslaved people moved within their environments through examinations of slave outbuildings floorplans, the location of windows and doors, circulation patterns between the outbuildings and the main house, and lines of sight between buildings.

“This thematic nomination will place the important collection of Natchez outbuildings into a national conversation about the landscapes of slavery and servitude,” said MDAH chief architectural historian Jennifer Baughn. “We can see how owners designed control mechanisms for supervision, but also how enslaved people could carve out spaces where they had some agency.”

Natchez was the location of the Forks of the Road, one of the largest slave markets in the United States. Wealthy planters, who accumulated their wealth through slave labor, built what architectural historians have termed “suburban villas” in the town. Enslaved people lived in housing detached from the villas. Researchers estimate Natchez has the largest concentration of slave-related sites in the nation.

By preserving Mississippi's diverse historic resources, and sharing them with people around the world, MDAH inspires discovery of stories that connect our lives and shape our future. For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.

The National Park Service has awarded $88,822 to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH) to support efforts to return the Native American human remains in its archaeological collections to present-day Tribes. MDAH will use the money to hire a new collections manager, provide paid internships for Tribal partners, purchase equipment, and provide staff training.

The Chickasaw Nation and the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma supported the grant and will provide guidance as MDAH staff document the human remains and ceremonial objects from graves in northeast Mississippi. The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) requires consultation with Tribes whose ancestors lived on the land where graves were located.

“One of the department’s highest priorities is the proper care of its significant archaeological collection,” said MDAH director Katie Blount. “In keeping with our standards of excellence, we are embarking on this project with renewed dedication to collaborating with the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma and Chickasaw Nation while becoming fully compliant with NAGPRA.”

MDAH sought the grant after discovering that some of its collection had not been appropriately inventoried. “With this funding, we will properly catalog NAGPRA collections while strengthening our relationships with Tribal partners though a transparent dialogue,” said Meg Cook, director of MDAH archaeology collections. “The project allows us to honor and best care for these individuals through the purchase of culturally appropriate curation material. We do not lose sight of the fact that we are working with people—mothers, fathers, and children.”

“The Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma Historic Preservation Department congratulates the Mississippi Department of Archives and History as NAGPRA grant recipients,” said Deanna Byrd, NAGPRA liaison for the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma. “Our THPO and NAGPRA liaison look forward to working with all of our Tribal partners and MDAH’s compassionate professionals to help facilitate the return of our ancestors. We are committed to supporting MDAH in this collaborative process and know it will be rewarding. Our ancestors will finally know the peace we envisioned for them."

For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.

Commission Votes to Officially Name the Flag “In God We Trust”

JACKSON, MS—The Commission to Redesign the Mississippi State Flag met at the Two Mississippi Museums and selected the “New Magnolia Flag” to become the new state flag. The commissioners submitted the design to the governor and the legislature as instructed in House Bill 1796, which established the commission. Mississippians will vote whether to approve the flag design on November 3. 

The commission voted to brand the flag the “In God We Trust” flag.

The flag was designed by Rocky Vaughan, with design support provided by Sue Anna Joe, Kara Giles, Dominique Pugh, Clay Moss, and Micah Whitson. The design features a white magnolia on a blue banner with red and gold bars on each end. The magnolia is encircled by twenty five-point stars, plus a star representing indigenous Native Americans, and the words “In God We Trust.”

“Our flag should reflect the beauty and good in all of us. It should represent a state that deserves a positive image,” said Vaughan. “The New Magnolia Flag represents the warmth and strength of the good people of Mississippi. Now is the time we show the world that we’re from Mississippi, the Magnolia State.”

Tribal Chief Cyrus Ben, Sherri Carr Bevis, Frank Bordeaux, Mary Graham, Betsey Hamilton, Robyn Tannehill, T.J. Taylor, and J. Mack Varner served on the commission. Judge Reuben Anderson chaired the commission.

“No one worked harder to change Mississippi’s flag than Governor William Winter,” said Anderson, who is also president of the Board of Trustees of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH). “I am thinking of him today as Mississippi takes this historic step toward selecting a state flag that will unify us and make us proud. I am grateful to our state leadership and my colleagues on the commission for their commitment to moving Mississippi forward.”

“MDAH was proud to support the Flag Commission in its historic work,” said MDAH director Katie Blount. “We were especially gratified to see the public engage so significantly in the process. The commissioners worked hard, listening to the experts and to the people, and they came up with a great design to present to voters on November 3.”

On July 1, 2020, Mississippi retired the state’s 1894 flag—the last state flag in the nation to incorporate the Confederate battle flag. The legislature directed that the new design must not include contain that flag but must include the words “In God We Trust.”

All of the meetings were broadcast live on the MDAH Facebook page and placed on the MDAH YouTube Channel afterwards.

Media Availability:
The Honorable Reuben Anderson, chairman of the Commission to Redesign the Mississippi State Flag and president of the Mississippi Department of Archives & History Board of Trustees. Judge Anderson was the first African American to serve on the Mississippi Supreme Court.
 
Katie Blount, Director, Mississippi Department of Archives and History
 
For More information or to schedule interviews contact:
Michael Morris, MDAH Director of Public Relations. mmorris@mdah.ms.gov or 601-576-6822
Holly Lange, Lange Management, holly@langemanagement.com, or 601-906-8698

Use of Flag Design:

The intellectual rights to the In God We Trust flag design have been cleared. The design is owned by the state of Mississippi and can be freely used by members of the public. There are no costs associated with using the design. Download the flag design HERE. The image is courtesy of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.

On Tuesday, August 25, members of the Commission to Redesign the Mississippi State Flag met and chose two flags designs to advance. Images of “The Great River Flag” and “The New Magnolia Flag” have been placed on the MDAH website, alongside a new nonbinding public poll: www.mdah.ms.gov/flagpoll-top2.

Before convening for discussion, commission members gathered at the Old Capitol Museum and viewed each of the five flag finalists, which had been manufactured and were raised on the flagpole. Lieutenant Governor Delbert Hosemann and several state legislators were present.

Commission chair Reuben Anderson presided at the meeting, which took place at the Two Mississippi Museums. Anderson was joined by Cyrus Ben, Sherri Carr Bevis, Frank Bordeaux, Mary Graham, Betsey Hamilton, Robyn Tannehill, T.J. Taylor, and J. Mack Varner.

Information about the flag designs and a comment section are included with the public poll. The comment period and poll and will expire at noon on September 1.

The commission will choose the final design during its September 2 meeting and report its selection to the governor and legislature.

The minutes of the August 18 meeting are posted here. For more information email info@mdah.ms.gov.