Ole Miss and James Meredith

On the first day of October 1962, James Meredith enrolled as the first black student at the University of Mississippi in Oxford – Ole Miss. He had been rebuffed 3 times earlier that year. This time he succeeded with the help of 400 Federal marshals and eventually 16,000 U.S. soldiers including units from the 101st Airborne Division.[1]

Growing Up – the Sixties in Mississippi

The beginning years of the 1960s marked the end of my childhood and disclosed an outside world looming with conflict. I really didn’t want to face that world directly during my teen years.