19_EversHome
Medgar Evers, prominent civil rights activist and organizer, was assassinated at his home in 1963. This private home – now a National Historic Landmark – has been turned into a museum and restored to look as it did when the Evers family lived there. Following the Supreme Court ruling in Brown v. Board of Education, Evers worked hard to gain admission for black students to the University of Mississippi, a public university in Oxford. The first NAACP field secretary for Mississippi, Evers also helped organize boycotts and led voter registration drives. Because he thought Mississippi was “too racist and violent” for lunch counter sit-ins, “The Tougaloo Nine” chose the Jackson Public Library for their famous sit-in. Evers was assassinated by a Ku Klux Klan member in 1963, the same day President John F. Kennedy delivered his civil rights address. The city of Jackson erected a statue in honor of Evers in 1992, and his home is a National Historic Landmark.