Digital Snapshots

The Great Mississippi River Flood of 1927 displaced almost three-quarters of a million men, women, and children, caused 247 deaths, and submerged 27,000 square miles of land. African American communities were especially hard-hit because they comprised 75-percent of the population living in the Delta lowlands, 95-percent of the labor force, and suffered under unequal refugee programs that prioritized employers interests over those of Black laborers. This exhibit features fifty-five of the collection’s 124 photographs, which were taken by the Illinois Central Railroad company's flood committee in April, May, and October of 1927 in areas from Memphis, Tennessee through Delhi, Louisiana.

Quakers Hannah and Mary Townsend created The Anti-Slavery Alphabet for the 1846 Anti-Slavery Fair held in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The Townsends sold these books to raise funds to support abolitionist efforts that they were involved in. They also hoped it would be used in households to inspire children to understand the horrors of slavery and to think of ways that they, regardless of youth, could fight against it.

The collection consists of thirty-nine exterior-view photographs of buildings - one courthouse and the remainder churches - from urban to rural contexts. Located across the state, the photographs were taken in the 1930s by the Works Progress Administration. Towns and cities represented in the collection include Belzoni, Brandon, Canton, Charleston, Church Hill, Drew, Grenada, Greenwood, Jackson, Natchez, Raymond, Ruleville, Water Valley, and Winona; as well as rural churches in Claiborne and DeSoto counties. This exhibit focuses on churches from the collection that are no longer in existence due to natural phenomena or congregation expansion, or that underwent dramatic renovations, as a way to demonstrate the use of photography in historic preservation and the role of religion in Mississippi history.

In July 2005, historian and Mound Bayou-native, Milburn J. Crowe, donated a late-nineteenth-century photograph album of the Benjamin Thornton Montgomery family and their associates to the Mississippi Department of Archives and History (MDAH).

The album consists of ninety photographs, including images of Benjamin and Isaiah Montgomery, Benjamin Green, Frederick Douglass (a correspondent of Isaiah's brother, William Thornton), as well as numerous members of the Montgomery, Lewis (who were relatives of Benjamin Montgomery's wife, Mary), and Green families, in addition to other family-members and friends.

The Mississippi Freedom Summer Project in 1964, also known as “Freedom Summer,” was a mass volunteer effort in the state of Mississippi to both register as many African Americans to vote as possible, and voters. The Foner (Thomas) Freedom Summer Papers features correspondence, a voter registration plan, photographs, and newspaper articles related to this mass effort to increase African American voter-ship, as well as provide and support educational opportunities, known as “Freedom Schools,” in Mississippi.

Tropical cyclones are a type of storm system denoted by specific characteristics, like winds, heavy rains, temperatures and pressure, and rotation. Strong types of these systems that form in the Atlantic Ocean or northeastern Pacific Ocean, are called hurricanes. These storms are natural occurrences and their intensity can range from that of a typical thunderstorm, to natural disasters—a natural event that causes great damages and/or loss of life.

Hurricanes Camille (August 1969) and Katrina (August 2005) are two infamous natural disasters that greatly impacted communities along the Gulf Coast, the Midwest, Southeast, and Northeastern regions of the United States. This exhibit features photographs, a home video, and manuscript detailing the impact of these hurricanes on places and people of the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

Established in 1901, the Mississippi State Penitentiary, or “Parchman Farm,” is a prison farm in Sunflower County, located in the Mississippi Delta. Also known as “Parchman,” this facility has largely been a prison or penal farm where imprisoned individuals are forced to work, primarily in agriculture and livestock, logging, or industrial labor.

Items in this exhibit depict the types of labor that those imprisoned have been required to complete. While images include men laboring in fields, photographs also depict other types of hard labor, such as brick-making and laying, caring for livestock, construction, and women sewing. Also highlighted are buildings within the facility that demonstrate the differences in conditions for those imprisoned versus officials working at Parchman.

The Mississippi State Department of Health Photograph Album, ca. 1930s, highlights the medical conditions across the state during the first half of the twentieth century. The photographs capture Mississippi leaders' attempts to combat major health concerns—from diseases, like tuberculosis and malaria, efforts to professionalize and standardize medical practices, and to launch early education through home health programs.

The Mississippi State Sovereignty Commission (MSSC) was a state-sponsored investigative unit created in the wake of Brown v. Board of Education to combat racial desegregation in the Magnolia State. Between 1956 and 1973 the MSSC, directed by the governor and other top elected officials, employed former law enforcement officials and others to observe and report on the activities of private citizens suspected of engaging in civil rights activism. In the ensuing years, this expanded to include investigations into suspected communism, homosexuality, religious activity, and more. For nearly twenty years, the MSSC was funded by public tax dollars, but unaccountable to the public. It operated as a clandestine investigative unit that worked behind the scenes to funnel resources and information to a variety of organizations fighting against fundamental civil rights across Mississippi and the larger United States.

The Eudora Welty Digital Archives highlights materials by and related to Eudora Welty. A well-known writer and photographer, this exhibit focuses on imagery either of or by Welty, specifically items from the Eudora Welty Digital Archives Photographs. Of the nearly 1,800 photographs within the digital archive, this exhibit features forty photographs that were either produced by Welty or are of Welty.

*Image: Copyright © Eudora Welty, LLC; Courtesy Eudora Welty Collection – Mississippi Department of Archives and History
(Permission to publish required).

Hystercine Rankin was a master Black quilter from the southern Mississippi community of Port Gibson. Taught by her grandmother, Mrs. Rankin originally quilted for utilitarian reasons: clothes, bedding, and other household fabric items. Then, in her later years, she recognized her work for its artistry as well as usefulness. She became known among her community and nationally for her work, passing on her knowledge to students, like Geraldine Nash. The exhibit highlights not only the quilting and needlework capabilities of both quilters, but their artistic expression and talents demonstrated through textiles. Moreover, Rankin and Nash represent an—often overlooked—art and artistic community: Black quilters of the Southern United States.