Mississippi Archives

Silver Rights: The Story of the Carter Family’s Brave Decision to Send Their Children to an All-White Schools and Claim Their Civil Rights

Book — Non-fiction. By Constance Curry. Introduction by Marian Wright Edelman. 1996. 288 pages.
The story of the Carter family's decision to send their children to an all-white school in Drew, Mississippi.

Mississippi Trial, 1955

Book — Fiction. By Chris Crowe. 2003. 240 pages.
Historical fiction about the murder of Emmett Till for high school students.

Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching

Teaching Guide and Website. Edited by Deborah Menkart, Alana D. Murray, and Jenice L. View. 2024. 390 pages.
This second edition provides lessons and articles for K–12 educators on how to go beyond a heroes approach to the Civil Rights Movement, with a focus on education, economics, labor, youth, women, and culture.

Teaching Activity by Deborah Menkart

Eyes on the Prize: America’s Civil Rights Years, 1954-1985

Film. Produced by Henry Hampton. Blackside. 1987. 360 minutes.
Comprehensive documentary history of the Civil Rights Movement.

Freedom Song

Film. By Phil Alden Robinson. 2006. 117 minutes.
Based on the actual history of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), student activism, and voter registration in McComb, Mississippi, during the Civil Rights Movement.

Standing on My Sisters’ Shoulders

Film. By Joan Sadoff, Robert Sadoff, and Laura Lipson. 2002. 60 minutes.
Documentary film on women in the Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi.

Civil Rights Movement Veterans

Digital collection. Resources on the Southern Freedom Movement compiled by those who lived it. Includes a bibliography, timelines, photos, primary source documents, and lists of speakers.

May 15, 1970: Jackson State Killings

College student Phillip Lafayette Gibbs (21) and high school student James Earl Green (17) were killed by the police during an anti-war protest at Jackson State College.

Charles Hamilton Houston, portrait by Robert Shetterly of Americans Who Tell the Truth.

Oct. 29, 1969: Supreme Court Rules Schools Must Desegregate

The Supreme Court ruled that schools in the U.S. had to desegregate “immediately,” instead of the previous ruling of “with all deliberate speed.”

June 10, 1966: Ben Chester White Murdered

Ben Chester White, caretaker on a farm, was brutally murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in Natchez, Mississippi.

James Meredith and Stokely Carmichael. Photo by Bob Fitch.

June 6, 1966: James Meredith and the March Against Fear

Air Force veteran James Meredith began the March Against Fear from Memphis, Tennessee to Jackson, Mississippi.

Jan. 10, 1966: Voting Rights Activist Vernon Dahmer Murdered

Vernon Dahmer was killed when the Ku Klux Klan fired bombed his home. This was one day after Dahmer offered to pay the election poll tax for anyone who could not afford it.

Carter Children | Zinn Education Project

Aug. 12, 1965: Carter Family Insists on Rights Under Brown v. Board

Mae Bertha and Matthew Carter enrolled their children in schools in Sunflower County, Mississippi that had been illegally denied to African Americans. In retaliation, they were evicted from the land they sharecropped and their home was riddled with bullets.

April 1, 1965: Blackwell v. Issaquena Board of Education

The civil rights suit of Blackwell v. Issaquena Board of Education was filed on behalf of 300 African-American students from several schools across Issaquena County in Mississippi who had been suspended for wearing and distributing “freedom” buttons.

Aug. 22, 1964: Sharecroppers Demand Delivery of Full Suffrage in the U.S.

Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer, and the other members of the MFDP at the Democratic National Convention, questioned the nation about the lack of “one person, one vote” in the United States.

Aug. 8, 1964: Freedom Schools Convention

The Freedom Schools Convention was held in Meridian, Mississippi

Aug. 6, 1964: Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Convention

The MFDP held a State Convention with 2,500 people in Jackson, Mississippi.

Missing persons poster created by the FBI in 1964, shows the photographs of Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner.

June 21, 1964: Three Civil Rights Workers Murdered in Mississippi

James Chaney, Michael Schwerner, and Andrew Goodman were tortured and murdered by the Ku Klux Klan in Neshoba County, Mississippi.

SNCC: The New Abolitionists

Book — Non-fiction. By Howard Zinn. 1964; re-published in 2013. 246 pages.
A detailed history of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee.

Clifton Walker (Photo) | Zinn Education Project

Feb. 28, 1964: Clifton Walker Murdered

Korean War veteran Clifton Walker was murdered by the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan while on his way home from his late work shift at the International Paper plant in Mississippi.

Jan. 31, 1964: WWII Veteran Louis Allen Murdered

Louis Allen, a WWII veteran who witnessed and was willing to testify about the murder of a voting rights worker in Mississippi, was murdered.

Jan. 22, 1964: Freedom Day in Hattiesburg

The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) voting rights campaign held a Freedom Day in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

June 12, 1963: Medgar Evers Murdered in Mississippi

Medgar Evers, WWII veteran and civil rights activist, was murdered by a white supremacist in Jackson, Mississippi.

May 28, 1963: Woolworth Sit-in in Jackson, Mississippi

Students and faculty from Tougaloo College held a sit-in at the Woolworth’s lunch counter in Jackson, Mississippi.

May 20, 1963: Medgar Evers Speech on WLBT

Medgar Evers made a 17-minute speech on WLBT in a rare and historic exception to the white supremacist only voice on Mississippi radio and television.