JIT Stock

Washington County, located on the Mississippi River in the heart of the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta, is the culture that cotton built.

Founded by hearty pioneers willing to risk even their lives for the unexcelled wealth that the ""white gold"" of cotton promised, the county was literally carved out of a swampy, cane-covered wilderness where the brave were as likely to reap an early grave as elaborate grandeur. This collection of more than two hundred photographs from the late nineteenth century through the mid-twentieth depicts the unique and pervasive dichotomies that the struggle to weave the ""Cotton Kingdom"" produced, especially the twin threads of prosperity and poverty. Here men struck it rich in an unprecedented short time, but here they lost it just as quickly. While high cotton bought white men opulent homes and the leisure to produce literary classics, simultaneously it bought the black man little more than a shotgun shack and the pain that birthed the blues. Witness the challenges presented to the mule by the machine and to the isolation of the county's way of life by international war and the infusion of industry. Despite the divisions, this collection also illustrates the common, commendable effort by the citizens of one American county in the South to clear their land, cultivate their fields, build their homes, pave their streets, construct their highways, lay their railroads, and protect it all from flood, fever, and fire with an unfaltering faith in the future.

A ghastly murder, Jim Crow justice, and the gallows tree.

When two federal marshals rode up to Will Mathis’ rural house outside of Oxford, Mississippi, in 1901 to arrest him for counterfeiting and distilling, they had no idea what was waiting for them. Mathis and African American servant Orlando Lester shot the marshals, chopped up their bodies, and burned Mathis’ house to the ground with the bodies inside. Mathis and Lester were sentenced to hang. Nationwide media coverage of the grisly case led more than 7,000 people to descend on Oxford to witness the hanging of a black man and a white man side by side. Briskly paced and meticulously researched, this tale that captured the public imagination is brought back to life in riveting detail.

Authors Ryan Starrett and Josh Foreman uncover all-but-forgotten elements of Vicksburg history.

Vicksburg had an especially inauspicious start when its inhabitants were massacred by locals. The generation of the city’s official founding beheld vigilantes, duelists and an early incel roaming its streets. Citizens experienced the horrors of war: hunger, diarrhea and death. About 150 years later, their descendants hid in fear from a deranged killer on the loose. In between, the city overloaded a steamboat with recently released POWs and contributed to the greatest maritime disaster in U.S. history. In the midst of war and suffering, an intrepid group of religious sisters worked to educate and nurse their fellow people. An immigrant family from Germany established a bottling empire that made them the embodiment of the American dream. Join authors Josh Foreman and Ryan Starrett as they explore the land and people who make Vicksburg one of the South’s most visited and recognizable cities.

Join author Richelle Putnam as she recounts how Mississippian’s resolve and fortitude brought the state through one of the hardest economic times in American history.

When the Great Depression erupted, Mississippi had not yet recovered from the boll weevil or the Flood of 1927. Its land suffered from depleted forests and soil. Plus, the state had yet to confront the racial caste systems imprisoning poor whites, African Americans and other minorities. Nevertheless, innovative Mississippians managed to keep their businesses and services open. Meanwhile, President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs fostered economic stimulation within the state. Author Richelle Putnam also highlights the state's spiritual and cultural giants, who rose from the nation's poorest state to create a lasting footprint of determination, pride and hope during the Depression era.

Capturing townspeople and lifestyles that have long since disappeared, this remarkable review of Marshall County's history features dozens of images which have never before been published. Antebellum mansions and Victorian cottages look new again; cotton gins and wagons lining the courthouse square mirror an agrarian economy, which has all but vanished from the area. From the desperate poverty of turn-of-the-century sharecroppers to the revelry of a 1950s homecoming parade, all aspects and segments of Holly Springs life are included. Marshall County natives will recognize old friends and familiar businesses in these images. Those just discovering this fascinating corner of Mississippi will see its history graphically illustrated through the lens of Mrs. Smith's camera.

Inside are thirteen little-known tales from the Gulf Coast from Lake Borgne to Mobile.

Sail into the Mississippi Sound with Bienville, the Frenchman covered in serpentine tattoos. Meet the heroes of the Sound: fearless Father LeDuc, who faced down Yankee pillagers; the wild woman of Horn Island, who could shoot as well as any man; and Ray Nosaka, who fed his body to the dogs of war, all in service of his country. Glimpse a school of the Sound’s own patron fish, the striped mullet, Biloxi’s bacon. But don't get too comfortable on the beach - a hurricane is always on the horizon. Join authors Josh Foreman and Ryan Starrett on this journey into the hidden history of the Mississippi Sound.