On October 1, 1962, blood spilled anew on the Mississippi Delta. Some called it the last battle of the Civil War. Thirty thousand American combat troops descended on Oxford, Mississippi, to quell the riots that had erupted when 29-year-old James Meredith became the first black student at the University of Mississippi.
Meredith became famous, a symbol of civil rights reform and all its potential. And Ole Miss became infamous, an embodiment of the segregationist South.
Forty years later, we remember.
Guests:
James Meredith, the first African American graduate of the University of Mississippi
Robert Khayat, chancellor, the University of MIssissippi
Ouida Barnett Atkins, daughter of late Mississippi governor, Ross Barnett
William Doyle, author, “An American Insurrection: The Battle of Oxford, Mississippi, 1962″
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