Military
The Education of Jesse Leroy Brown
Jesse Leroy Brown, the third son of John “Papa” Brown, came of age during the Jim Crow Era. Racism clung to Jesse’s childhood experiences like the oppressive humidity of a Mississippi summer afternoon. Despite many obstacles, Brown eventually attended Ohio State University. He became the first African American to complete the U.S. Navy’s basic flight training. In the closing months of 1950, Ensign Jesse Brown participated in twenty “strike missions” during the early stages of the Korean War.
A Brief History of Camp Shelby
Introduction
When the United States entered World War I in 1917, it was poorly prepared for the challenges ahead. Training a large army required military camps with adequate housing and supplies. To address this need, President Woodrow Wilson commissioned Army General John J. Pershing, Commander of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF), to construct thirty training camps and cantonments across the country, including Camp Shelby.
A Brief History of Camp Shelby
Camp Shelby is a 134,000-acre camp near Hattiesburg that annually trains an estimated 100,000 National Guard personnel and reservists from across the nation.
Okolona Industrial School
Founded in 1902 by Wallace Battle, the Okolona Industrial School offered industrial and teacher training for generations of Black men and women in northeastern Mississippi. The institution was one of the most successful industrial schools in the state, having a plant of 380 acres in Chickasaw County and a valuation of nearly a quarter million dollars by the 1920s.
Marcus Shook: A Mississippi Hero
For more than seventy-two years, the ten-man crew of a particular World War II United States Army Air Forces B-17 has held a special place in the hearts of the citizens of Lomianki, Poland. The airmen named their Flying Fortress “I’ll Be Seeing You” after the song that was made so popular during the war by the renowned singer Bing Crosby that it became an anthem for American and British servicemen who were stationed away from their loved ones. Sgt.
Iuka: A Strange Civil War Battle in Northeast Mississippi
The small town of Iuka, Mississippi, located in the state’s northeast corner, experienced its one and only American Civil War battle on September 19, 1862. The battle resulted from unique circumstances.
Fox Conner: A General’s General
Major General Fox Conner, inducted into the Mississippi Hall of Fame in 1987, never achieved fame outside his chosen profession. He lived quietly and unobtrusively, he never sought publicity, and he died in relative obscurity. Yet in the minds of his fellow soldiers and in the judgment of military historians, Fox Conner was perhaps the most influential officer in the United States Army between World War I and World War II. He was General John J. Pershing’s right-hand man in building the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) in World War I.