Laura’s Post. Biked 65 miles.
This is is an Ode to Mississippi. You have made us feel so welcome! This Southern Hospitality permeates this place. From an impromptu introduction to Hezekiah Watkins in the Jackson Civil Rights Museum, to local BBQ secrets like Bully’s. We’d heard about Bully’s through a little word of mouth, but apparently it is a famous local spot. It’s unassuming, far down a street surrounded by abandoned industry and overgrown weeds. Hard to even see the front sign well. Inside are old paintings of Malcom X, Dr. King and Medgar Evers intermixed with family photos. We walk through the doors and we are swept up in this awesome family business, where we are pampered and fawned over while being served up a heaping plate of fried chicken, fried ocra and collard greens. And I look up on the wall and I see “James Beard Award 2016.” (One of the most prestigious food awards in the US). I’ll be damned. The love of this place is evident even in those Civil Rights leaders who suffered so greatly at the hands of its unjust laws. It seems like Medgar Evers knew the end was coming in 1963 due to growing threats, but he refused to leave. He loved Mississippi, and he was determined to leave it a better place for his children. He stated, “I may be going to Heaven or Hell, but I’ll be going from Jackson.”
Today we ditch the car and we are back on the road. Four days along the Natchez-Trace Parkway, weaving through land that was originally Choctaw, Chickasaws and Creek territory, before settlers wrested it away following the Indian Removal Act signed by President Andrew Jackson in 1830. Now this is a preserved parkway that goes through Natchez, MS to Nashville, TN. Almost not a car and certainly no services for 65 miles of unbelievable beauty, with winds and critters making noises around us under bluebird skies. We were BEAT by the time we finished. 7 hours is in the sun and humidity without real places to replenish us was a thing. And the swamps didn’t look like an ideal place to try out my new water filtration system. (Lots of SNAKES here Joe!).
Since we’re pedaling right near Winona, MS, I’d be remiss not to mention one of my favorite lesser known heroes of the Mississippi Civil Rights movement. Fannie Lou Hamer was born the 20th child of a poor sharecropping family deep in the Mississippi Delta. She did learn to read and write and had an affinity for poetry, though had to drop out of school early to take care of her aging parents. She too married eventually and moved to work another plantation farm as a sharecropper. But literacy helped to awaken her to the budding Civil Rights movement around her, and in 1962 she led a group to register to vote. This got her fired and evicted from her property. Not long after, she tried to integrate a lunch counter at the bus station in Winona, and was beaten nearly to death. But this woman wasn’t stopping. After engaging in the Freedom Summer of 1964, a summer that would be marked as one of the deadliest with regard to murders and bombings in a state that was already the lynching capitol of the country, she took on the political infrastructure. When Black people were denied access to the local Democratic primaries, she and others developed their own caucus (the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party), hosted a mock election which drew 60,000 black votes. She used this power to eventually get herself a seat at the bargaining table. See her testify. And sing!
“If I fall, I’ll fall 5 feet, 4 inches forward in the fight for freedom. I’m not backing off.” - Fannie Lou Hamer
At 6 PM we dragged our weary sweaty bodies into the town of Kosciusko, MS, a town originally founded by a Choctaw woman and her trader husband. We’re staying in an antebellum era B&B that almost has the civil war portraits on the mantel. Our real grand finale of the night was walking into Jason’s Southern Table on a rocking Saturday night. A wedding reception was happening in one room, the bar on the second floor was bumping, and we just got to watch the whole scene play out from the main dining room. Country music blasting, sequin tassels and cowboy boots on full display, large chain crosses adorning all the necks. The owner even came and sat with us for a few minutes. We are sampling from all the flavors of Mississippi now!
Ok, one more amazing Mississippi Civil rights hero who was born right here in Kosciusko, (besides Oprah! Truth!). James Meredith was the first student (Law student) to integrate Ole’ Miss (aka: University of Mississippi in Oxford). Though the courts demanded it happen the Governor of Mississippi himself showed up to try and block the door to prevent him from registering. He persisted. Years later he decided to march from Memphis to Jackson, through the Delta, (and we thought we were adventurous for trying to bike it!), in his “March Against Fear” to protest segregation and promote voting. He was shot in the legs on the second day and hospitalized. Other Civil Rights leaders including Dr. King picked up his march and he was able to complete it with them.
PODCASTS:
- Mississippi Civil Rights: Champions in the Fight for Voting Rights - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mississippi-champions-in-the-fight-for-voting-rights/id1603645728?i=1000549778680
- Mississippi Civil Rights: All Eyes on Mississippi - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/mississippi-all-eyes-on-mississippi/id1603645728?i=1000549777644
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