People, Locations, Episodes

Tue, 07.12.1887

Mound Bayou, Mississippi, An Incorporated American Black Town

This date from 1887 celebrates Mound Bayou, Mississippi, one of the first incorporated Black Towns in the United States.

The town is of national historical significance because it is representative of the many towns established by Blacks who migrated from the south to northern and western communities after slavery.  It was located in Bolivar County in the Mississippi Delta and was established by two former slaves, Isaiah T. Montgomery and his cousin Benjamin Green. It started partly as a defense from whites of bayou country in the area.  They created a refuge for Blacks from the many white-controlled cotton plantations at a time known for deadly racial violence. Montgomery, Green, and the other early black pioneers built the town in the uninhabited wilderness, creating a thriving, important historic community.

In 1900, 287 people, including over 1,500 Black farmers, lived nearby. Booker T. Washington participated in some of its economic development, which included the nation’s only Black-owned cottonseed mill. Mound Bayou also had a railroad station (where the "colored" waiting room was larger than the "white" waiting room), a newspaper, churches, schools, a bank, a telephone exchange, and other Black-owned businesses and industries.

Nearly everyone in and around Mound Bayou could read, a remarkable status for anyone in Mississippi in the late 19th century.  Around 1900, President Theodore Roosevelt called Mound Bayou “the Jewel of the Delta.” Recently, the people of Mound Bayou, wanting to share their rich history, hosted a public dig at the University of Southern Mississippi. The site they dug was the location of Mound Bayou's first city hall and mayor's office. Together, they unearthed interesting artifacts with the help of many young Blacks in the Mound Bayou area.

As of the 2010 United States Census, 1,533 people lived in the city. The city's racial makeup was 98.0% Black, 0.9% White, 0.1% Asian, and 0.1% from two or more races. 0.9% were Hispanic or Latino of any race.  On July 1, 2014, the North Bolivar School District consolidated with the Mound Bayou Public School District to form the North Bolivar Consolidated School District.