Appalachian Community Histories – Kilmichael, Montgomery County: Railroads, B. B. King, and the Fight for Civil Rights
In the hills of Montgomery County, Mississippi, the small town of Kilmichael holds a history that reaches far beyond its quiet streets and surrounding farmland. Located east of Winona, the county seat, Kilmichael developed as an agricultural and railroad community before becoming connected to some of the most important developments in American music and civil rights. Its history includes the childhood of blues legend B. B. King, the early life of gospel musician Roebuck “Pops” Staples, the struggle to desegregate public education, and a municipal election controversy that eventually attracted national attention.
For much of its existence, Kilmichael was a modest Southern town whose residents depended upon farming, local businesses, churches, schools, and the railroad. Cotton fields stretched across the surrounding countryside, while the railway connected the community to larger commercial centers. Like other Mississippi towns, however, Kilmichael was also shaped by racial segregation and the unequal opportunities available to its Black and white residents.
The surviving historical record provides an unusually detailed picture of this community. Railroad correspondence, government surveys, school construction plans, historical newspapers, federal court decisions, and United States Department of Justice records reveal how Kilmichael changed across generations. Together, these sources tell the story of a town whose contributions to American history are considerably greater than its population might suggest.
The Early Development of Kilmichael
Kilmichael’s early development took place during a period of significant political and economic change in Mississippi. Montgomery County was established in 1871 from portions of Carroll and Choctaw Counties, only six years after the conclusion of the Civil War. The region was already agricultural, with families raising livestock and cultivating cotton and grain on farms of varying sizes.
According to the Mississippi Encyclopedia, Montgomery County had 13,348 residents in 1880, divided almost equally between Black and white populations. Agriculture dominated the local economy, although the ownership of land and access to its profits were distributed unequally. By 1900, white farm families were far more likely to own their land than Black farmers, many of whom worked as tenants or sharecroppers.
Kilmichael existed as a recognized community before the railroad reached the area. Postal histories place the establishment of its post office in 1876, indicating that the settlement had developed sufficiently to require regular mail service during the nineteenth century. The precise date of the town’s municipal incorporation remains less certain without examination of its original charter, which is identified in Mississippi incorporation records as Charter Book 2, page 116.
During these early decades, the community’s development was connected to the agricultural economy of Montgomery County. Farmers required places to purchase supplies, receive correspondence, conduct business, and market their products. Communities such as Kilmichael served these needs, gradually developing institutions that connected the surrounding countryside to the wider state.
The arrival of improved transportation would eventually strengthen these connections and give the town a more permanent place in Mississippi’s commercial network.
The Railroad and the Growth of Kilmichael
The development of Kilmichael was closely connected to the railroad that passed through Montgomery County during the late nineteenth century. For communities that depended upon agriculture, a railway provided an important connection to regional markets, allowing goods to move beyond the limitations of local roads and wagon transportation.
The Mississippi Department of Archives and History preserves the records of the Columbus and Greenville Railway Company, whose complicated corporate history reflects the difficulties of railroad construction in the postwar South. The line developed through several predecessor companies before a railroad connecting Columbus and Greenville opened in 1889.
Kilmichael became one of the stations along this route, linking the community with Winona and other settlements across central and northern Mississippi. The line underwent several changes in ownership and operation, passing through the Southern Railway system before becoming associated with the Columbus and Greenville Railroad.
For Kilmichael, the presence of a railroad meant access to a transportation system capable of moving agricultural products, manufactured goods, equipment, and passengers over considerable distances. Businesses could obtain supplies from larger communities, while local producers gained opportunities to ship their products to markets farther away.
The railroad also became an important part of the town’s geography. Depot Avenue, which remains part of Kilmichael’s street system, reflects the community’s historical relationship with railway transportation.
The railroad’s importance can still be traced through the original records preserved by the Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Collection Z/1679 contains financial documents, operational correspondence, maintenance records, expenditure authorizations, and other materials dating from 1906 to 1971. These documents provide opportunities to reconstruct the movement of goods, the operation of railway facilities, and the commercial life of communities along the line.
Historical newspapers offer another connection to this period. The Kilmichael Record, published between 1905 and 1913, served the town during an era when local newspapers documented the activities and concerns of their communities. Mississippi State University Libraries preserves microfilm copies of issues dated August 7, 1908, and September 29, 1911.
Although those individual issues require examination before their contents can be described in detail, their survival provides an important opportunity to recover the voices and experiences of residents who lived in Kilmichael during the early twentieth century.
Cotton Fields, Churches, and Everyday Life
While the railroad connected Kilmichael to the outside world, agriculture continued to shape daily life for much of the twentieth century. The surrounding countryside contained farms where residents cultivated cotton and other crops, raised livestock, and depended upon seasonal agricultural labor.
For many Black families, sharecropping and tenancy created difficult economic circumstances. Agricultural workers often depended upon landowners for employment and access to housing, while their opportunities for purchasing property or obtaining independent financial security remained limited.
The experiences of these families are particularly important to understanding Kilmichael because some of the town’s most famous residents and former residents came from agricultural households.
Religious institutions also occupied a central place in community life. Churches provided spaces for worship, education, musical expression, and social gatherings, while their congregations helped preserve relationships between families across generations.
The Elkhorn Primitive Baptist Church and its associated school became particularly important in the childhood of Riley B. King, who would later become internationally famous as B. B. King. Other congregations, including Pinkney Grove Missionary Baptist Church, maintained connections with families whose histories remain closely tied to the community.
The Mississippi Encyclopedia notes that Baptist and Methodist congregations accounted for more than ninety percent of Montgomery County’s church membership in the 1916 religious census. That religious environment helped shape the musical traditions of the region, where gospel singing, spirituals, and the blues developed alongside one another.
For young people growing up in Kilmichael, churches and schools could provide opportunities for learning and cultural expression even while the larger society restricted their educational and economic opportunities.
B. B. King and His Childhood in Kilmichael
One of Kilmichael’s most important contributions to American cultural history came through a young boy named Riley B. King, who spent much of his childhood in the community before becoming one of the most influential musicians in the history of the blues.
King was born on September 16, 1925, near Berclair in the Mississippi Delta. His parents, Albert and Nora Ella King, were agricultural laborers whose marriage eventually ended in separation. When Riley was approximately four years old, he and his mother moved to Kilmichael, where he lived primarily with his maternal grandmother, Elnora Farr.
According to the Mississippi Blues Trail, Farr worked as a sharecropper on the farm of Edwayne Henderson. Young Riley also labored in the cotton fields, experiencing firsthand the demanding agricultural work that supported many families in rural Mississippi.
His childhood was marked by considerable hardship. His mother died when he was nine years old, and his grandmother died when he was fourteen. Both women were buried in the cemetery associated with Pinkney Grove Missionary Baptist Church, leaving King without two of the most important people in his early life.
Despite these losses, Kilmichael provided the setting in which King’s interest in music began to develop.
He attended the one-room Elkhorn School, operated in connection with the Elkhorn Primitive Baptist Church. His teacher, Luther Henson, became an important influence by encouraging his students to develop confidence, dignity, and an understanding of African American achievement. Henson introduced students to examples of Black accomplishment that challenged the limitations imposed upon them by segregation.
Music was equally important to King’s education outside the classroom. He listened to agricultural workers singing in the fields and heard blues records played at the home of his Aunt Mima, whose collection included recordings by Blind Lemon Jefferson and Lonnie Johnson. These experiences exposed him to different musical traditions before he began developing his own style.
One particularly influential figure was the Reverend Archie Fair, a preacher who performed with a guitar during religious services at Austin Chapel Sanctified Church. King became fascinated by Fair’s playing, and during a visit to the family’s home, the minister allowed Riley to hold his guitar and showed him three basic chords.
That encounter helped open the door to King’s musical future.
King initially performed gospel music rather than the blues. Together with his cousin Birkett Davis, he helped organize the Elkhorn Jubilee Singers, a group whose name reflected the church and school that had shaped his childhood.
After his grandmother’s death, King spent time living with relatives before joining his father in Lexington, Mississippi. He eventually returned to Kilmichael, reportedly traveling approximately sixty miles by bicycle.
Back in the community, he found work and a place to live on the farm of Flake Cartledge, whom King later remembered favorably. Cartledge encouraged him to continue attending school and helped him purchase a red Stella guitar, an instrument that became important to his early musical development.
In 1943, King followed his cousin westward toward Indianola, where he continued performing gospel music before eventually pursuing the blues. His later career brought him international recognition, but the musical foundation upon which that career rested had been established in communities such as Kilmichael.
The Mississippi Blues Commission formally recognized this connection on August 21, 2012, when it unveiled a Mississippi Blues Trail marker titled “Kilmichael: B. B. King’s Roots.”
The marker stands as a reminder that King’s musical beginnings were not confined to the Mississippi Delta. They were also shaped by the churches, classrooms, fields, families, and musicians of Montgomery County.
Pops Staples and Another Musical Legacy
B. B. King was not the only internationally significant musician connected to the Kilmichael area. Roebuck “Pops” Staples, the patriarch of the influential Staple Singers, was born on December 28, 1914, on a cotton plantation near Kilmichael.
Staples came from a large family and spent part of his early childhood in the region before his family relocated to the Mississippi Delta. The Mississippi Blues Trail records that the Staples family lived around Mayfield and Kilmichael before moving westward, where Roebuck encountered the musical traditions that would influence his later career.
His musical education combined the sounds of the church with those of the blues. As a young musician, he was influenced by performers such as Charley Patton and developed a distinctive guitar style that would eventually become one of the defining characteristics of his family’s recordings.
Staples later moved to Chicago, where he worked industrial jobs while continuing his involvement with gospel music. Together with his children, he organized the Staple Singers, a group that gradually developed from a family gospel ensemble into one of the most influential acts in American popular music.
The group’s songs combined religious traditions with messages of dignity, equality, and social change. During the civil rights era, their performances became closely associated with the movement’s broader cultural and political aspirations.
Recordings such as “Respect Yourself” and “I’ll Take You There” brought the group widespread popularity during the 1970s, while preserving elements of the gospel and blues traditions that Pops Staples had encountered in Mississippi.
Although Staples spent most of his later life elsewhere, his birthplace and early family connections provide Kilmichael with another important place in American musical history.
The fact that both B. B. King and Pops Staples emerged from the same small region demonstrates the significance of the religious and musical traditions cultivated within Mississippi’s rural communities.
Iron Ore Mining in the Kilmichael Hills
Agriculture and railroad transportation were not the only economic activities associated with Kilmichael. During the middle of the twentieth century, local residents also attempted to develop the area’s deposits of iron ore.
One of the strongest primary sources for this period is Marshall K. Kern’s An Investigation of Mississippi Iron Ores, published by the Mississippi Geological Survey in 1963.
Kern recorded that citizens of Kilmichael organized a mining company during the late 1940s to extract limonite and carbonate iron ore from deposits in eastern Montgomery County and western Webster County. The enterprise became known as the Kilmichael Mining Corporation and later the Kilmichael Ore Corporation.
At one point, the company controlled leases covering approximately 10,000 acres of land in the surrounding region.
Ore shipments began in late 1950, with the material transported by railroad to industrial furnaces in Birmingham, Alabama. The surviving transportation figures provide unusually specific evidence of the scale of the operation.
According to the geological survey, railroad records documented thirty-seven carloads of ore shipped from Kilmichael and nearby Stewart between 1950 and 1959, amounting to 2,004 long tons. The greatest recorded activity occurred in 1951, when twenty-two carloads carrying 1,174 tons were transported.
Kern’s report also illustrates the financial difficulties facing the company. Receipts for eleven shipments showed that the ore earned an average of $5.93 per long ton at the receiving furnace. Transportation costs averaged $2.43, leaving a comparatively small amount to cover the expenses of mining and preparation.
The operation eventually became inactive in 1959.
The historical investigation itself depended partly upon local residents who preserved the company’s records. Kern acknowledged Elizabeth Flowers of Kilmichael for providing information about the business, which had been organized by her late husband, John Flowers. He also credited the Columbus and Greenville Railway Company for supplying shipment information.
Although the mining enterprise did not develop into a lasting industry, its history demonstrates the efforts of local investors and residents to diversify an economy that had long depended upon agriculture.
It also provides another example of the railroad’s importance, since the ore could be transported to distant industrial markets through the existing railway network.
A Geological Mystery Near Kilmichael
The land surrounding Kilmichael has attracted scientific attention for reasons beyond its mineral deposits. Several miles north of town lies an unusual geological feature known as the Kilmichael structure, a roughly circular area of disturbed rock formations measuring approximately eight to ten kilometers across.
Geologists began investigating the feature during the twentieth century, and its unusual arrangement of uplifted and displaced sedimentary layers led researchers to consider several possible explanations for its origin.
In 1982, P. B. Robertson and Mark D. Butler published research proposing that the feature might have resulted from an ancient meteorite impact. The hypothesis attracted scientific interest because portions of its underground structure resembled formations associated with known impact sites.
Later investigations, however, raised important questions about this interpretation.
A study presented at the 2000 Lunar and Planetary Science Conference examined geological samples from the area and found no definitive evidence of the shock deformation normally used to confirm a meteorite impact. Researchers therefore concluded that the structure’s origin remained unresolved.
Additional geological investigations continued to examine alternative explanations, including fault movements and the deformation of sedimentary materials.
The Kilmichael structure should consequently not be described as a confirmed meteorite crater. Nevertheless, the scientific attention it has received adds another dimension to the region’s history, showing that the landscape surrounding this small Mississippi community has attracted interest from researchers studying the Earth’s distant past.
Segregated Schools and the Struggle for Educational Equality
While Kilmichael’s musical and industrial histories reveal important parts of its development, the town’s schools provide another perspective on the challenges faced by its residents.
For much of the twentieth century, public education in Mississippi operated under racial segregation. Black and white children attended separate schools, and the educational opportunities available to them were shaped by the state’s unequal system of public schooling.
The Mississippi Department of Archives and History preserves original school construction plans that document educational facilities in Kilmichael during this period.
Among these materials are plans dated 1959 for Montgomery County High School in Kilmichael, identified in the original state records using the racial designation “Negro.” Additional plans from 1963 document construction work and proposed additions at Big Black High School, including classrooms and a cafeteria.
Further records identify projects at Montgomery County High School during the middle and late 1960s, including a shop building in 1965, an industrial arts facility in 1966, and a cafeteria in 1968.
These records provide tangible evidence of the facilities that supported local education during the final decades of legally segregated schooling. They also demonstrate how public construction projects continued while federal courts and civil rights organizations challenged the educational system in Mississippi.
The struggle for desegregation eventually reached Kilmichael in a particularly visible way.
In 1967, the United States government initiated federal litigation seeking to desegregate Montgomery County’s public schools. The federal court retained jurisdiction over the case and issued multiple orders concerning the administration of the school system.
A desegregation plan ordered on June 8, 1970, brought additional changes to school assignments and operations.
Although the following school term began relatively quietly, disagreements over school conditions and student discipline produced demonstrations during the early months of 1971.
What began as a dispute involving students and school administrators soon developed into a confrontation involving local government officials, the county sheriff, and the federal judiciary.
The Kilmichael Student Demonstrations of 1971
One of the most revealing episodes in Kilmichael’s civil rights history is preserved in the federal court decision Montgomery County Board of Education v. Shelton, decided on May 17, 1971.
The case arose after Black students at Kilmichael High School began protesting conditions within the school system. According to the court’s findings, the demonstrations were partly motivated by the suspension of two female student leaders whom the court described as excellent students. Both were eventually reinstated by federal order.
The conflict expanded during February and March 1971 as students challenged school policies and organized demonstrations.
On March 9, a federal judge issued restrictions preventing demonstrations near school buildings during school hours while preserving the students’ ability to conduct peaceful protests elsewhere in Montgomery County.
The students subsequently moved their demonstrations into downtown Kilmichael, where they marched along public streets and picketed businesses associated with individuals involved in local government and school administration.
Their activities brought them into direct confrontation with municipal officials.
The town’s mayor, identified in the court opinion as Mayor Howell, operated a drugstore in the downtown area. Another important figure was Dr. Henson, a physician and school board member whose medical office stood near the town hospital.
The students focused some of their protests upon these locations, seeking to draw attention to the school policies they opposed.
The federal court found that the demonstrations generally remained peaceful, with students carrying signs and marching without violence or threatening conduct. The opinion also acknowledged that some protesters had crowded business entrances and temporarily interfered with access to certain establishments.
The confrontation became more serious when Dr. Henson released a chemical spray toward student demonstrators outside his medical office, an incident that the court reported had angered members of the Black community.
On March 15, town officials obtained an injunction from the Montgomery County Chancery Court restricting demonstrations in Kilmichael. The order placed detailed limitations upon marching and picketing, including restrictions near the hospital.
The following days brought additional legal conflict.
On March 20, sixteen student demonstrators were arrested by the Montgomery County sheriff for breach of the peace. The next day, the chancery court found the students in contempt of its injunction and sentenced each to a fifty-dollar fine and five days in jail, although those penalties were suspended on the condition that the students refrain from further violations.
The students challenged the restrictions in federal court, arguing that their rights to peaceful assembly and expression had been violated.
Chief Judge William C. Keady examined the circumstances surrounding the demonstrations and concluded that the state court’s restrictions had gone too far.
In his May 17 opinion, Keady determined that the injunction improperly limited the students’ First Amendment rights and interfered with the federal court’s existing jurisdiction over the desegregation dispute. The court also recognized the town’s legitimate authority to impose reasonable regulations protecting public safety and access to businesses.
The resulting decision prevented enforcement of the unconstitutional state injunction while allowing more appropriately limited regulation of demonstrations.
For Kilmichael, the case was a significant confrontation over civil rights and local authority. Young people protesting conditions in their schools had challenged restrictions imposed by public officials and secured federal judicial protection for their constitutional rights.
The case remains especially important because the original federal opinion preserves the chronology of the demonstrations, the arguments made by local officials, and the experiences of the students who participated.
Fannie Lou Hamer and Kilmichael’s Civil Rights Connections
Kilmichael also maintains an important historical connection to Fannie Lou Hamer, one of the most influential civil rights activists of the twentieth century.
Hamer became nationally prominent through her work for voting rights, political representation, and economic justice in Mississippi. Her involvement with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party placed her at the center of efforts to challenge racial discrimination during the 1960s.
Her connection to Montgomery County includes the violent events of June 1963, when she and other civil rights activists were arrested in Winona while traveling through the region. During her imprisonment, Hamer was severely beaten, suffering injuries that affected her for the remainder of her life.
Kilmichael’s connection to Hamer has also attracted attention because of uncertainty surrounding her birthplace.
A Mississippi historical marker in the town identifies Kilmichael as her birthplace. However, the historical record is more complicated than that inscription suggests.
Hamer sometimes identified Montgomery County as the place where she was born, but during federal court testimony in December 1963, she stated that she had been born in Tomnolen, a community in neighboring Webster County.
This discrepancy has been acknowledged by historians and by the Fannie Lou Hamer’s America research project, which has examined her family background and the connections between the two communities.
A more firmly documented connection is through her husband, Perry “Pap” Hamer, who was born and raised in Kilmichael.
On April 22, 2023, a historical marker honoring Fannie Lou Hamer was formally dedicated in downtown Kilmichael. The dedication recognized her importance to American civil rights history and the community’s connection to her family.
The marker provides a place for residents and visitors to remember Hamer’s legacy, although the conflicting historical evidence means that Kilmichael should not be presented as her undisputed birthplace.
Her association with the community nevertheless adds to Montgomery County’s larger civil rights history, connecting the region to the struggle for voting rights and political equality that transformed Mississippi during the twentieth century.
The Cancelled Municipal Election of 2001
Three decades after the student demonstrations of 1971, Kilmichael again became the focus of a major civil rights controversy, this time involving the right of residents to participate in municipal elections.
The controversy began during preparations for the town’s scheduled June 5, 2001, general election.
According to the 2000 United States Census, Kilmichael had 830 residents, of whom approximately 52.4 percent were Black. African Americans had also become a majority of the town’s registered voters, marking an important demographic and political change.
Despite these developments, the town’s mayor and all five members of its Board of Aldermen were white.
The upcoming election presented an opportunity for Black residents to gain representation in municipal government. Four Black candidates qualified for the five available alderman positions, while an African American candidate also entered the mayoral race.
The possibility of a substantial change in local political leadership was therefore considerable.
However, on May 15, 2001, approximately three weeks before the scheduled election, the Board of Aldermen voted unanimously to cancel it.
The decision was made without advance notice to the community, according to the United States Department of Justice.
Town officials explained that the cancellation was intended to allow consideration of a new electoral system in which aldermen would be elected from individual wards rather than through the existing townwide voting arrangement.
The town obtained approval from its election commission and a state circuit court, but the proposed cancellation remained subject to federal review under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
At that time, Section 5 required covered jurisdictions to obtain federal approval before implementing certain changes to voting procedures.
The United States Department of Justice reviewed the town’s decision and examined the circumstances surrounding the cancellation.
On December 11, 2001, Assistant Attorney General Ralph F. Boyd Jr. issued an official objection to the proposed change.
The Department concluded that Kilmichael had failed to demonstrate that its decision was free from a prohibited discriminatory purpose or effect. Federal officials noted that the cancellation occurred after Black residents had become a majority of registered voters and after several African American candidates had qualified for election.
The Department also questioned the timing of the town’s stated interest in changing its electoral system.
The objection prevented the cancellation from receiving the federal approval required for implementation.
The dispute did not immediately result in a new election. Congressional records later documented that Kilmichael resisted rescheduling the contest until federal intervention resulted in an election in 2003.
When residents finally went to the polls, the town elected its first African American mayor and three African American members of the Board of Aldermen.
The outcome represented a historic change in Kilmichael’s municipal government.
The controversy subsequently received national attention during congressional discussions over the renewal of the Voting Rights Act. In 2006, members of Congress cited Kilmichael as an example of the continuing importance of federal oversight in protecting minority voting rights.
The original Justice Department correspondence and subsequent congressional proceedings preserve the dispute in considerable detail, making the Kilmichael election one of the town’s most thoroughly documented episodes of recent history.
Preserving the History of Kilmichael
Kilmichael’s history survives through a combination of local memory, government records, historical landmarks, and archival collections.
The Mississippi Department of Archives and History preserves records of the railroad, school facilities, county administration, and other institutions that shaped the town’s development. Its historical map collections include twentieth-century maps of Kilmichael, allowing researchers to examine changes in the community’s streets and physical layout.
The Works Progress Administration’s Historical Research Project, conducted between 1935 and 1942, provides another valuable resource. The surviving Montgomery County materials contain historical investigations and local research that can help historians reconstruct earlier community life, although individual accounts must be checked against contemporary evidence whenever possible.
Historical photographs are equally important. State archival catalogs identify photographs of Kilmichael school buildings taken on February 18, 1939, providing documentary evidence of the community’s educational landscape before the major desegregation struggles of the following decades.
Cemetery records also preserve evidence of the families who lived in and around the town. Burial inscriptions, church records, and family histories can reveal relationships that are not always visible in government reports or newspaper articles.
The community’s population has changed considerably over time. The 2000 census recorded 830 residents, while the 2020 census recorded 639. Although these figures demonstrate a decline in the incorporated town’s population, they do not diminish the historical significance of the individuals and institutions associated with Kilmichael.
Modern historical markers have helped bring portions of this history into public view. The Mississippi Blues Trail recognizes the town’s connection to B. B. King, while the marker honoring Fannie Lou Hamer draws attention to the community’s associations with the struggle for civil rights.
Yet these markers represent only part of Kilmichael’s past.
The railroad workers who maintained transportation connections, the agricultural families who depended upon the surrounding land, the teachers who educated generations of children, and the students who challenged unequal treatment all contributed to the community’s development.
Their experiences remain essential to understanding how a small Mississippi town became connected to broader changes in American society.
Why Kilmichael’s History Matters
Kilmichael demonstrates how the history of a small Southern community can intersect with national developments in unexpected ways. Its railroad connected local agriculture and industry to distant markets, while its churches and schools helped shape musicians whose work would eventually reach audiences around the world.
The childhood of B. B. King reveals the importance of local teachers, religious leaders, and family members in nurturing talents that might otherwise have remained unrecognized. The early life of Pops Staples provides another example of how Mississippi’s rural musical traditions influenced American gospel, soul, and popular music.
At the same time, the town’s history cannot be separated from the struggle over racial equality. The student demonstrations of 1971 and the municipal election controversy of 2001 show how questions of education, political representation, and constitutional rights reached directly into the daily life of Kilmichael’s residents.
These events were not merely local disputes. Both became part of the documentary history of federal civil rights enforcement, preserving evidence of the challenges faced by African Americans seeking equal treatment and political participation.
Today, the historical significance of Kilmichael can be found in its surviving buildings, roads, churches, cemetery records, and archival documents, as well as in the national legacies of the individuals who lived there.
The town’s story is ultimately one of ordinary people whose lives became connected to extraordinary events. From the cotton fields that shaped a young musician’s childhood to the downtown streets where students asserted their constitutional rights, Kilmichael offers an important reminder that American history is not made only in great cities or state capitals.
It is also made in places like this small town in Montgomery County, where local experiences helped shape the music, politics, and civil rights history of the nation.
Sources & Further Reading
Kilmichael Record. Kilmichael, MS, August 7, 1908, and September 29, 1911. Microfilm, Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/miss/newspapers
The Winona Times. Winona, MS. Historical issues beginning March 14, 1884. Microfilm, Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/miss/newspapers
The Winona Advance. Winona, MS, 1881–1890. Microfilm, Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/miss/newspapers
The Winona Democrat. Winona, MS, 1902–1903. Microfilm, Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/miss/newspapers
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Columbus and Greenville Railway Company Records, 1906–1971. Collection Z/1679. Jackson, MS. https://finding.mdah.ms.gov/manuscripts/z1679000
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Montgomery County Records. Series 2050. Government Records Finding Aids. Jackson, MS. https://finding.mdah.ms.gov/government-records/mont
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. School Building Project Specifications and Plans, 1929–2002. Series 1660. Includes school construction and expansion records for Kilmichael. https://finding.mdah.ms.gov/government-records/166-1
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Historical Research Project Source Material, 1935–1942. Series 447. Works Progress Administration, Montgomery County, Volume 49. https://finding.mdah.ms.gov/index.php/government-records/series-447
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. Kilmichael Historical City and Town Maps. Series 0157. Mississippi Department of Transportation Map Collection. https://da.mdah.ms.gov/series/s0157/mdot/s0157-kilmichael
Mississippi Department of Archives and History. County Health Department Facility Photograph Scrapbooks, 1951 and 1976. Series 1692. https://finding.mdah.ms.gov/government-records/169-1
Mississippi State University Libraries. Mississippi Maps. Special Collections, including historical transportation and highway maps. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/miss/maps
Mississippi State University Libraries. Mississippi Genealogy by County: Montgomery County. Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/genealogy/ms
History of Montgomery County, Mississippi. 1993. Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections, F347 .M75 H57 1993. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/genealogy/ms
Crouch, Evelyn Bell. Montgomery County, Mississippi Cemetery Records. 1996. Mississippi State University Libraries, Special Collections. https://www.library.msstate.edu/specialcollections/collections/genealogy/ms
Priddy, Richard Randall. Montgomery County Mineral Resources. Bulletin 51. University, MS: Mississippi State Geological Survey, 1943. https://geology.deq.ms.gov/Publications/Bulletins/Bulletin0051/MGS_BU0051.pdf
Kern, Marshall K. An Investigation of Mississippi Iron Ores. Bulletin 101. Jackson: Mississippi Geological, Economic and Topographical Survey, 1963. https://geology.deq.ms.gov/Publications/Bulletins/Bulletin0101/MGS_BU0101.pdf
Koeberl, Christian, Wolf Uwe Reimold, David T. King Jr., and Stephen L. Ingram Sr. “The Kilmichael Structure, Mississippi: No Evidence for an Impact Origin from a Preliminary Petrographic Study.” Lunar and Planetary Science XXXI (2000). https://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2000/pdf/1602.pdf
Montgomery County Board of Education v. Shelton, 327 F. Supp. 811 (N.D. Miss. 1971). United States District Court for the Northern District of Mississippi. May 17, 1971. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/FSupp/327/811/1449614/
Brantley v. Surles, 718 F.2d 1354 (5th Cir. 1983). United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. November 10, 1983. https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F2/718/1354/416607/
United States Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division. “Voting Determination Letter: Town of Kilmichael, Mississippi.” December 11, 2001. https://www.justice.gov/crt/voting-determination-letter-141
United States Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division. “Notice of Preclearance Activity under the Voting Rights Act of 1965, as Amended.” December 14, 2001. https://www.justice.gov/crt/notice-preclearance-activity-under-voting-rights-act-1965-amended-22
United States Congress. Senate. Committee on the Judiciary. Modern Enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. Hearing before the Committee on the Judiciary, 109th Cong., 2nd sess., May 10, 2006. S. Hrg. 109-562. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 2006. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-109shrg28342/html/CHRG-109shrg28342.htm
United States Congress. Congressional Record. 109th Cong., 2nd sess., July 20, 2006. Vol. 152, no. 96, S7949–S8012. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CREC-2006-07-20/html/CREC-2006-07-20-pt1-PgS7949-6.htm
Hamer, Fannie Lou. “Fannie Lou Hamer Interview Concerning Winona, Mississippi.” Interview concerning events of June 1963, transcribed March 17, 1964. Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Digital Gateway. https://snccdigital.org/wp-content/uploads/digitalcollections/63_flh_winona.pdf
Fannie Lou Hamer’s America. “Mississippi State Historical Marker: Kilmichael, Mississippi.” April 22, 2023. https://www.fannielouhamersamerica.com/state-historical?itemId=v4pg8o7c45l0mcngmw3nv8u3asifsz
Fannie Lou Hamer’s America. “Tomnolen, Mississippi.” Historical Research and Driving Tour. https://www.fannielouhamersamerica.com/driving-tour/tomnolen-mississippi
Mississippi Today. “Marker Honoring Fannie Lou Hamer Set for Unveiling in Husband’s Hometown.” April 18, 2023. https://mississippitoday.org/2023/04/18/fannie-lou-hamer-marker-kilmichael/
Mississippi Blues Commission. “Kilmichael: B. B. King’s Roots.” Mississippi Blues Trail. https://msbluestrail.org/blues-trail-markers/kilmichael-b-b-kings-roots
Mississippi Blues Commission. “B. B. King Birthplace.” Mississippi Blues Trail. https://msbluestrail.org/blues-trail-markers/b-b-king-birthplace
Mississippi Blues Commission. “Pops Staples.” Mississippi Blues Trail. https://msbluestrail.org/blues-trail-markers/pops-staples
National Park Service. “Riley B. ‘B. B.’ King.” Lower Mississippi Delta Region. https://www.nps.gov/locations/lowermsdeltaregion/b-b-king.htm
Kernfeld, Barry. “King, B. B. (16 September 1925–14 May 2015), Blues Singer and Guitarist.” American National Biography. Oxford University Press, February 15, 2018. https://academic.oup.com/american-national-biography/reference/63042/reference-article-abstract/570441533
Mississippi Encyclopedia. “B. B. King (Riley B. King).” Center for the Study of Southern Culture, University of Mississippi. https://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/bb-king/
Mississippi Encyclopedia. “Pops Staples and the Staples Singers.” Center for the Study of Southern Culture, University of Mississippi. https://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/pops-staples-and-the-staples-singers/
Mississippi Encyclopedia. “Montgomery County.” Center for the Study of Southern Culture, University of Mississippi. https://mississippiencyclopedia.org/entries/montgomery-county/
Howe, Tony. “Kilmichael, Mississippi.” Mississippi Rails. https://www.msrailroads.com/Towns/Kilmichael.htm
United States Geological Survey. topoView: Historical Topographic Map Collection. U.S. Department of the Interior. https://www.usgs.gov/tools/topoview
Appalachian Regional Commission. “Appalachian Counties Served by ARC.” https://www.arc.gov/appalachian-counties-served-by-arc/
Author Note: Kilmichael’s history demonstrates how a small Mississippi community became connected to nationally important developments in American music, education, and civil rights. I hope this article encourages readers to appreciate the people and institutions that shaped the town while helping preserve a history that deserves greater recognition.