The Mt. Zion Memorial Fund
For Blues, Music, and Justice
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Our Mission
To prevent the erasure of cultural resources in African American communities by promoting the responsible practice of public history and heritage tourism.
Our Vision
We envision communities where people reach a consensus about the past, understand its nuance and complexity, and bring their curiosity about history to bear on the world.
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Our work is about saving the soul of Mississippi.
Shannon Evans Vice President
Working with the descendants of blues artists, such as Mary Frances Hurt, the granddaughter of Mississippi John Hurt, our Mississippi non-profit promotes the inclusive and responsible practice of memorialization and historic preservation in African American communities.
Photo: Shannon Evans and Dr. Brian Mitchell, the Director of Research at the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, at St. James MB Church Cemetery in Avalon, MS
Research Blog
Juneteenth in Mississippi
In June, Corey Crowder attended a symposium on race and memorialization organized by the Lafayette County Remembrance Project (LCRP), and this blog post reflects on his experience as well as the importance of remembering Juneteenth.
The Last Picnic of RL Boyce
In October 2023, the Mt. Zion Memorial Fund sponsored the last of the RL Boyce Picnics in Como, Mississippi. Even though we did not know it at the time, it proved the last time that RL Boyce would hold court over the event prior to his passing on November 9.
Roosevelt Graves Memorial Dedication
This blog post details our efforts to memorialize Blind Roosevelt Graves in Mississippi City Cemetery in Gulfport, MS. the dedication will be held on August 10, 2024.
Hollywood Cemetery
Holly Ridge Cemetery
Tutwiler Cemetery
SPONSORS
Beginning with the ratification of the 1890 Mississippi State Constitution, which effectively disfranchised African American men and inspired white Mississippians to embrace more violent forms of racial discrimination, it became increasingly more difficult to preserve historical resources in African American Blues Communities. The formerly enslaved had steadily accumulated more and more land since emancipation and founded hundreds of autonomous settlements across the South. Since the 1890s, the descendants of Blues Communities dispersed, leaving the status and locations of many communities unknown.
The erasure of Blues communities in Mississippi has picked up speed in recent years due to several interconnected and destructive factors. Natural disasters (floods), population loss (migration), urban renewal (gentrification), land dispossession (heir property), and the profound lingering effects of resource hoarding (racial segregation) have prevented Americans from realizing the original goals to the Civil Rights Movement, and the erasure of historic Blues communities has accelerated due to the descendant communities’ need for technical assistance and professional training in historical research methods, which is required to overcome the erasure of African American history in government records.
