A MDAH Publication  |  Volume 43 No. 9  |  September 2001

Old Capitol Museum director Donna Dye presents Lawrence M.. Small, secretary, Smithsonian Institution, with a copy of Mississippi's Old Capitol: Biography of a Building , by Ray Skates, at a reception following ceremonies August 9 establishing the museum as a Smithsonian Affiliate. (Photograph by Chris Goodwin.)

Copper Magnolia Festival Sept. 22

Copper Magnolia Festival Sept. 22 The nineteenth annual Copper Magnolia Festival will be held on Saturday, September 22, on the beautiful grounds of Historic Jefferson College in Washington. The crafts fair will feature baskets, dolls, crocheted items, woodcarvings, and homemade breads, jellies, and jams. Special events will include musical performances and appearances by a clown and a magician. Delicious food will be for sale throughout the festival. The fair is free and open to the public; hours are 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.. Historic Jefferson College is located six miles northeast of Natchez on Highway 61. Craftspeople are invited to register for booths at the Festival. For more information, call 601/442-2901.

Web Site: Civil Rights Veterans

Civil rights workers in the Southern Freedom Movement during the 1960s have established a Web site to facilitate connection among movement veterans. Those who were active in CORE, SCLC, NAACP,or SNCC are invited to visit www.crmvet.org/ and add personal information to the site, which contains resources and links to information about the civil rights movement.

Eudora Welty, 1909-2001

Throughout her life Eudora Welty shared her gifts and her spirit with her home town and with the world. In 1957, with her first contribution of manuscripts and papers, she began an association with the Department of Archives and History that was to enrich the community and the state even further-the Department was honored to become a working repository, to preserve her work and to make materials available to the public for use in remarkable exhibitions, programs, and publications.

More...

Genealogy Help on the Web

• Cyndi's List-one of the Web's best-organized lists of genealogy links
• Family Search.org and Genealogy.com provide online courses in genealogy. A Web research case study is at http://familyhistory.terrashare.com.

For storing and organizing the information you've found, these programs are recommended:

• Personal Ancestral File from Family Search (free download);
• Family Tree Maker ; and
• Generations Family Tree.

7th Annual Bark in the Park

The Seventh Annual Bark in the Park will be held Saturday, September 29, at the Grand Village of the Natchez Indians. The annual fund-raiser for the Natchez Humane Society features canine contests of all sorts. There will be a small admission fee (donation). For more information, call the Natchez Adams County Humane Society at 601/ 442-4001.

Religion in Mississippi Book Signing September 15

Randy J. Sparks, author of the newly published Religion in Mississippi, volume two in the Heritage of Mississippi series, will sign books at the Old Capitol Museum on Saturday, September 15, at 2 p.m. He is the author of On Jordan's Stormy Banks: Evangelical Religion in Mississippi, 1763-1876. The publication of Religion in Mississippi by University Press of Mississippi for the Mississippi Historical Society is supported by a generous grant from the Phil Hardin Foundation of Meridian. Copies are available at the Old Capitol Shop at $40 each, $35 to members of the Mississippi Historical Society, through November. Call 601/359-6921 to order copies.

New Books

In Eyes on Mississippi: A Fifty-Year Chronicle of Change, columnist Bill Minor of Jackson offers a sampling of the best of an estimated 5,000 pieces he has written since his first Mississippi assignment, the August 1947 funeral of U. S. senator Theodore G. Bilbo. The book is edited and published by Joanne Prichard Morris. Copies are available at $20 each.

More New Books...

Obituaries

Carroll Brinson, 1914-2001
Carroll Brinson, author of Jackson: A Special Kind of Place, died July 22. A native of Monticello, he graduated from DePauw University and served in the Navy during World War II. He worked in advertising and served as an active volunteer for the arts in Jackson. After retiring, Brinson launched a second career, the writing and publishing of local and corporate history.

Bob Ferguson, 1928-2001
Robert B. Ferguson, Sr., an award-winning songwriter and Choctaw Indian historian, died July 21. Ferguson wrote and produced Ferlin Husky's "Wings of a Dove"-the best-selling song in popular and country music in 1960-as well as "Carroll County Accident," the Country Music Association's song of the year in 1969. He produced albums for many other country music legends, then left the music business to live on the Choctaw reservation near Philadelphia, where he served as editor of the Choctaw Times, worked part-time as promotional director of the Chucalissa Prehistoric Indian Village in Memphis, and produced films for the Tennessee Game and Fish Commission.

Johnny Russell, 1940-2001
Grand Ole Opry star and Moorhead, Mississippi, native Johnny Russell, whose song "Act Naturally" was recorded by the Beatles and Buck Owens, died July 3. His own biggest recorded hit was the working class anthem "Rednecks, White Socks, and Blue Ribbon Beer," which was a Grammy finalist in 1973. Russell joined the cast of the Grand Ole Opry in 1985 and over the years became the regular closing act of the popular radio show.

Published by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History • Elbert R. Hilliard, director • Chrissy Wilson, editor
Please send correspondence to: MHN, P.O. Box 571, Jackson, MS 39205 or email to pubinfo@mdah.state.ms.us