Martin Luther King was assassinated on this day, April 4, 1968, spurring the passage of the landmark Fair Housing Act of 1968. I repeat two videos I took when we were in Memphis.
Vicksburg is a small town of 20,000 in Mississippi, and a battle site of the Civil War.
- Vicksburg is located at the confluence of the Mississippi and Yazoo Rivers.
- Across the Mississippi River is Louisiana,
- Long occupied by the Natchez Native Americans.
- Built by French colonists in 1719.
- Incorporated as Vicksburg in 1825.
- Jefferson Davis, Confederate president, based his family plantation just south of the city.
- Was a key Confederate river-port, and in July of 1963 surrendered to General Ulysses Grant, marking a turning point in the war.
- In 1876, a flood moved the Mississippi River away from Vicksburg, damaging the local economy, which only returned in 1903 when the U.S. Army Corpos of Engineers built a diversion canal to the city.
- Terrible Black-White problems affected this area from after the Civil War into the 1900s, and continued until Congress passed civil rights legislation in the mid-1960s.
- The first Coca-Cola was bottled in Vicksburg on 12March1894. If you happen to have an original bottle from the 1894-1900 period, it could be worth over $5,000.
- In 1990, the ethnic mix was 40% White and 59% Black.
- In 2020, 31% White and 66% Black.
- Vicksburg is home to three large U.S. Army Corps and Engineers, resulting in this city having the highest percentage of PhDs in the U.S. Well, checked with Google AI, "who" contends that Huntsville, Alabama is #1.
- Has four casinos.
View of Vicksburg from our veranda on the Melody.
Took a bus tour of Vicksburg.
If you were less than thrilled with my posting on Vicksburg, well, Natchez will seem like a repeat.
- Natchez has around 14,500 people, about 2/3rds black and 1/3 white.
- Located across the Mississippi River from Vidalia, Louisiana.
- Located 90 miles southwest of the Mississippi capital of Jackson, and 85 miles north of Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
- Named for the indigenous ancestors who lived there from the 8th century AD through the French colonial period, which began in 1716.
- In 1840, was struck by the second deadliest tornado in U.S. history, killing many more than 317 people, for slaves were not then counted.
- Surrendered without a fight in 1862. Thus antebellum homes have survived to today.
Freed black slaves formed the Natchez U.S. Colored Troops, and they in 1863 destroyed the slave pens of Forks of the Road, the second-largest slave market in the country.- Economy did well until the early 1900s, when steamboat traffic were replaced by railroads.
- Note that the city population was 23,791 in 1960 and is now only around 14,500.
- Home to the Natchez Campus of Alcorn State University.
The view of Natchez from our veranda.
Bus tour of Natchez.
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