mississippi delta
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Google Celebrates Late, Great Blues Legend B.B. King on 94th Birthday
Never ever forget the great ones who came before you. We give props to the folks at Google for keeping some of our historical events and figures at the forefront through its remarkable Google Doodle initiative, which dates back to 1998 and aims to “enliven the Google homepage and bring smiles to the faces of…
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Unita Blackwell, Civil Rights Activist and the 1st Black Woman to Be Elected a Mayor in Mississippi, Dies at 86
Unita Blackwell, a veteran of the civil rights movement and winner of a MacArthur “genius” grant who was the first black woman to be elected a mayor in the state of Mississippi, has died. She was 86. Blackwell’s son confirmed that she died Monday, according to the Associated Press. Blackwell was born in the impoverished…
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Black Mississippi High School Grad Charges Her Salutatorian Honor Was Given to Less Qualified White Student to Appease Racist Townspeople
Apparently, in at least one Mississippi town, black folks can’t even come in second place without raising racist ire. According to a federal lawsuit, recent high school graduate Olecia James charges she was denied her rightful place as salutatorian of her Mississippi high school’s graduating class in a move the district made so as not…
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Justice for Jasmine: Black Miss. Teen Forced to Share Valedictorian Title Sues
A black mother brought a federal lawsuit against a Mississippi school district last week, claiming that it made her daughter “co-valedictorian” with a white student who had a lower grade-point average. Jasmine Shepard, the very first black valedictorian in 110 years in the Cleveland, Miss., school district, says that the day before graduation last year,…