A Florida State University College of Communication and Information professor and his students have created a sign to honor a civil rights activist in his hometown.
Davis Houck, Fannie Lou Hamer Professor of Rhetorical Studies, and his spring 2024 rhetorical criticism class set out on a mission to preserve the legacy of James Meredith, the first Black student admitted to the racially segregated University of Mississippi in 1962.
“I’ve been driving through Mississippi for years; occasionally, I drive through Attala County where Mr. Meredith grew up and specifically the little community of Kosciusko,” Houck said. “I was very surprised that I could find nothing celebrating the fact that Meredith grew up there, and so I started asking some questions, first with friends of Meredith and later with the mayor of Kosciusko, Tim Kyle. Turns out it was true. Save for a mural in the visitors’ center, there’s nothing commemorating Meredith’s life in the community.”
Houck’s 17 students worked in groups to create a sign to commemorate the forgotten activist.
Creating the sign was challenging.. Signs are limited to 14 lines with only 42 characters per line, so students had to be specific and thoughtful about what they commemorated and how they communicated it.
“When working with everyone to combine our ideas into one, we had to use our communication skills to be decisive and creative to ensure we had an encompassing result we were proud of,” student Elle Schumm said.
“The project proved to be more than just an opportunity to test their communication skills. It was a chance to contribute to Meredith’s legacy,” student Annie Blanchard said. “To know that we were helping in some small way to ensure (James Meredith) is forever remembered in his hometown was a humbling experience, and I’m so thankful that Dr. Houck invited our class to take part in this project.”
Houck said their project has received support from James Meredith himself, his family and the Kosciusko community.
“I kept reminding (the students) that they were writing themselves into history, and we had to pause and think about what that meant,” Houck said. “And then I told them that one day when they were grandparents, they could take their grandkids to see the sign and narrate their part in its creation.”
The students involved were Adrian Valdes, Kyle Haniff, Everett Reed, Nick Schwab, Elle Schumm, Haylie Humphrey, Hayden Springer, Alex Webster, Lauren Greenbaum, Annie Blanchard, Alexis Sears, Rebecca Piriz, Grace Cashman, Shana Khan, Emma Borchuck, Sullivan Swink and Jordan Schwartz.
The Mississippi Department of Archives and History approved the class’s submission on July 12 and will begin work to install the sign in Kosciusko.
For more information about the College of Communication and Information, visit cci.fsu.edu.
The sign will read:James H. Meredith
“James H. Meredith was born in Kosciusko
on June 25, 1933, to Roxie and Moses “Cap”
Meredith. Raised on an Attala County farm,
he attended segregated public schools and
served in the Air Force. He was the first
Black student to integrate the University
of Mississippi in 1962. In 1966, he
survived being shot while leading the
March Against Fear to encourage Black
Mississippians to register to vote. A
lifelong proponent of education, Meredith
authored numerous books and was a key
figure in the civil rights movement.”