MISSISSIPPI CIVIL RIGHTS MUSEUM
222 NORTH STREET
JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI

HOURS
TUESDAY–SATURDAY  9AM–5PM
SUNDAY 11AM–5PM

Explore the Galleries

Explore the movement that changed the nation. Discover stories of Mississippians like Medgar Evers, Fannie Lou Hamer, and Vernon Dahmer, as well as those who traveled many miles to stand beside them, come what may, in the name of equal rights for all.

Explore the Galleries at the Mississippi Civil Rights Museum

Points of Light

The Civil Rights Movement in Mississippi is full of ordinary men and women who refused to sit silently while their brothers and sisters were denied their basic freedoms. A number of these heroes are featured throughout the museum as Points of Light, shining exemplars of dignity, strength, and perseverance in the face of oppression.

Eudora Welty - Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ds-07842

Eudora Welty

Immediately upon learning of the assassination of Medgar Evers, Eudora Welty responded with a powerful story—its title asked, “Where Is the Voice Coming From?” The Jackson native had worked as a WPA junior publicity agent during the Depression, and while traveling for the WPA, she photographed people in her home state. Her fiction captured the culture, including the racial climate, of Natchez, the Delta, and other Mississippi locales. In her story, “The Demonstrators,” she described the murders of two Black people in a Delta town, noting what little impact the deaths had on White people. In “Where Is the Voice Coming From,” Welty wrote from the perspective of the killer (then unknown).

Dr. T.R.M. Howard - Library of Congress Prints & Photographs Division, LC-USZ62-135350

Dr. T.R.M. Howard

A charismatic leader, Dr. T.R.M. Howard came to Mound Bayou in the 1940s to serve as chief surgeon at the Knights and Daughters of Tabor Hospital. He also owned a plantation and the Magnolia Mutual Insurance Company. In 1951, Howard founded the Regional Council of Negro Leadership (RCNL) in Cleveland. Hosting national figures like Thurgood Marshall and Mahalia Jackson, Howard drew thousands to rallies at his plantation. The RCNL called for voter registration and “first class citizenship for Negroes in Mississippi.” Howard spoke out against police brutality and started a boycott of gas stations that did not provide restrooms for Black people.

Explore Mississippi

Many of the homes, colleges, and historic sites discussed in this gallery still exist today. Journey beyond the museum walls and explore the places where history happened.

Bryant's Grocery and Meat Market

Bryan Grocery and Meat MarketLocation where in 1955, Emmett Till allegedly whistled at a white shopkeeper

County Road 518 at County Road 24
Money, Mississippi 

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Alcorn State University

Alcorn State UniversityAlcorn State University is the oldest public historically black land-grant institution in the United States and the second-oldest state-supported institution of higher learning in Mississippi. It was founded in 1871 to educate the descendants of formerly enslaved Mississippians.

1000 Alcorn Avenue
Lorman, Mississippi

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