is one of three sites in Mound Bayou listed on the
National Register of Historic Places. , Mississippi (1907), picture of Hon. John W. Cobb, Ex-Mayor, and the officers and directors of the Bank of Mound Bayou In the aftermath of the
Civil War, Davis Bend became an autonomous free community when
Joseph Emory Davis sold his property to former slave
Benjamin Montgomery, who had run a store and been a prominent leader at Davis Bend. The prolonged agricultural depression, falling cotton prices, flooding by the Mississippi River, and white hostility in the region contributed to the economic failure of Davis Bend. The two main founders of Mound Bayou in 1887 were
Isaiah T. Montgomery, Benjamin's son, and Isaiah's cousin,
Benjamin Titus Green. Montgomery also served as the first mayor. The bottomlands of the
Delta were a relatively undeveloped frontier, and freedmen had a chance to make money by clearing land and using the profits to buy land in such frontier areas. In 1892, the
Mound Bayou Normal Institute, a Black school was founded by the
American Missionary Association. African Americans throughout the United States celebrated the Mound Bayou example. In 1908, President
Theodore Roosevelt ordered his train to make a special stop in the town. From the platform, he proclaimed that he was witnessing “an object lesson full of hope for the colored people and therefore full of hope for the white people, too.” Four years later,
Booker T. Washington, in a speech to a crowd of thousands, hailed Mound Bayou as a “place where a Negro may get inspiration by seeing what other members of his race have accomplished...[and] where he has an opportunity to learn some of the fundamental duties and responsibilities of social and civic life.” The belief of Mound Bayou's citizens in their role as promoting a Black model of freedom and self-government was instrumental in weathering the decline in the two decades after World War I. No person was more effective in keeping the town afloat than Mayor
Benjamin A. Green, a son of
Benjamin Titus Green and the first person born in the community. A Harvard Law School graduate, he won overwhelmingly for mayor in 1919 and served until he died in 1960. Green's diplomatic skills proved critical in navigating around external threats and keeping internal peace. Shortly after a fire destroyed much of the business district, Mound Bayou began to revive in 1942 after the opening of the
Taborian Hospital by the
International Order of Twelve Knights and Daughters of Tabor, a
fraternal organization. For more than two decades, under its Chief Grand Mentor Perry M. Smith, the hospital provided low-cost health care to thousands of Black people in the Mississippi Delta. The chief surgeon was
T.R.M. Howard, who eventually became one of the wealthiest Black men in the state. Howard owned a plantation of more than , a home-construction firm, and a small zoo, and he built the first swimming pool for
black people in Mississippi. In 1952,
Medgar Evers moved to Mound Bayou to sell insurance for Howard's
Magnolia Mutual Life Insurance Company. Howard introduced Evers to civil rights activism through the
Regional Council of Negro Leadership which organized a
boycott against
service stations that refused to provide restrooms for Black people. The RCNL's annual rallies in Mound Bayou between 1952 and 1955 drew crowds of ten thousand or more. During the trial of
Emmett Till's killers, Black reporters and witnesses stayed in Howard's Mound Bayou home, and Howard gave them an armed escort to the courthouse in
Sumner. Author
Michael Premo wrote: "Mound Bayou was an oasis in turbulent times. While the rest of Mississippi was
violently segregated, inside the city there were no racial codes ... At a time when Blacks faced
repercussions as severe as death for registering to vote, Mound Bayou residents were casting ballots in every election. The city has a proud history of
credit unions, insurance companies, a hospital, five newspapers, and a variety of businesses owned, operated, and patronized by Black residents. Mound Bayou is a crowning achievement in the struggle for self-determination and economic empowerment." ==Geography==