On June 7, 2023 Reena Evers-Everette, T. Dionne Bailey, Bobby J. Smith II, and Pamela N. Walker presented “The Evers Archive: Voices, Justice, Legacies” as part of the History Is Lunch series.
In 1954, Medgar Evers became the NAACP’s first field secretary for Mississippi, a position he held until his death by an assassin’s bullet in the driveway of his family home on June 12, 1963.
“My father Medgar Evers dedicated his life to fighting for the civil and human rights of Mississippians and all Americans,” said Reena Evers-Everette. “His commitment to ending segregation, eradicating Jim Crow laws, investigating civil rights murders, and securing voting rights for all will be highlighted as we commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of his death.”
Evers-Everette will speak with three former recipients of the Medgar and Myrlie Evers Research Fellowship, each of whom worked in the Evers Collection at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. 2017 Evers Fellow Bobby J. Smith II explored the relationship between the politics of food, race, and activism. T. Dionne Bailey, the 2018 Evers Fellow, examined the often overlooked history of the imprisonment of African American women in Mississippi between 1890 and 1980. 2019 Evers Fellow Pamela N. Walker researched the relationship between motherhood, race, and epistolary connections among Black and whites families during the civil rights movement.
“I’m so proud of this work,” said Evers-Everette. “It is our family’s hope that the collection housed at MDAH will continue to be a resource that informs new research and helps bring positive change to society.”
Reena Evers-Everette is the executive director of the Medgar and Myrlie Evers Institute in Jackson, Mississippi. She earned her BS in business merchandising from the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York. Evers-Everette is a W.K. Kellogg Foundation Global Fellow and chair of the Sojourn Project, a moving classroom immersion program. She is the former chair of the board of directors of the Claremont Chapter of the American Red Cross and City of Claremont’s Committees on Dialogue and Human Relations.
T. Dionne Bailey is assistant professor of history at Colgate University. She earned her BA from Reinhardt University in Waleska, Georgia and her MA and PhD in U.S. history from the University of Mississippi.
Bobby J. Smith II is assistant professor in the department of African American Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, currently on research leave as a fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities. He earned his BS in agriculture from Prairie View A&M University and his MS in agricultural economics and PHD in developmental sociology, both from Cornell University.
Pamela N. Walker is assistant professor of African American History at the University of Vermont. She earned her BA from the University of Tennessee–Knoxville, her MA in history from the University of New Orleans, and her PhD in African American and Women’s History from Rutgers University–New Brunswick.
History Is Lunch is sponsored by the John and Lucy Shackelford Charitable Fund of the Community Foundation for Mississippi. The weekly lecture series of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History explores different aspects of the state's past. The hour-long programs are held in the Craig H. Neilsen Auditorium of the Museum of Mississippi History and Mississippi Civil Rights Museum building at 222 North Street in Jackson and livestreamed on YouTube and Facebook.
