Jackson MS Landmarks

Farish Street Neighborhood Historic District

The Farish Street Historic District was a dynamic black commerce area years back. Local commerce leaders want to start to redevelop it by restoring a couple of buildings right into bars and dining establishments. The Alamo Theater on historical Farish Street has been refurbished and is area operated. Back in the 1930s and also 40s, Robert Johnson and also Jelly Roll Morton resided in the Farish Street district. Louis Armstrong, Count Basie, and Duke Ellington entertained on Farish Street.

Hawkins Field Airport

The Hawkins Field Airport is owned and also operated by the City of Jackson and is made use of by the armed forces and private citizens. It was opened in 1928, and also paved runways were added in 1936. The U.S. Military used it for flight instruction in World War II and substantially increased it. In 1963, jet airplanes started service to Hawkins Field Airport. Hawkins Field Airport sits on 602 acres and has two runways in operation. 2 WW2 runways have actually been deserted for years.

Jackson State University

A public, predominantly African-America college, Jackson State was established in 1877. The existing campus was initially constructed in 1902 and also currently includes 51 buildings on a 245-acre campus. The athletic program is a member of the NCAA Football Championship Subdivision and also the Southwestern Athletic Conference. Walter Payton is its most renowned alumnus. 75% of Jackson State's students are from Jackson and also the state of Mississippi.

Poindexter Park Historic District

West of uptown Jackson, The Poindexter Park Historic District is going through a renaissance. Habitat for Humanity as well as Operation Weed and Seed work hard to restore the area. Poindexter Park has various recovered homes on the National Register of Historic Places. One of the old mansions was owned by Mississippi's second governor, George Poindexter. He was a delegate, representative, as well as senator who was born in 1779.

Buddy Butts Park

The Mississippi River Basin Model Waterways Experiment Station at Buddy Butts Park was made use of to model possible floods in the Mississippi River basin from 1949 up until 1973 and sits on 200 acres. It was constructed from 1943 to 1966 by the USA Army Corps of Engineers. Its function was to offer the Army Crops needed information to mitigate flooding along the Mississippi River. The location around the Missouri River was completed by 1952 and also modeled the spring floods of that year. It was functional to Memphis by 1959 and was completed in 1966. Nonetheless, operational expenses and also computer modeling made the model obsolete by 1973. As of 2013, the model is overgrown and abandoned, but open to the general public.

Jackson Police Department

Starting in 1822, the Jackson Police Department has been of service to the people of Jackson MS. They started putting on uniforms in 1873, with detectives selected in 1878. A whole lot occurred in 1909 with the inclusion of policemen on horseback, and also plain-clothes detectives. Early on, policemen made use of telephone call boxes on light poles to respond to one-way radio transmissions. The current headquarters structure opened up in 1952 at 327 East Pascagoula Street and also it has both the municipal court and also prison. There are now four precincts.

Jackson is the capital of Mississippi and also is one of 2 county seats of Hinds County. Named after General Andrew Jackson, it was developed in 1821 to be the state capital. After the Battle of Vicksburg in 1863, General William Tecumseh Sherman's Union troops captured Jackson and destroyed it. There was a gas boom in the 1920s, and it's nicknamed "The City with Soul."

The Jackson area has a population of 579,332. It was part of the Choctaw Indians in the day. Mississippi Choctaw are currently part of the Mississippi Band of Choctaw Indians and also reside in a number of Native-American communities in the state.

The very first European settler was Louis LeFleur, and also Jackson was originally called LeFleur's Bluff. In 1821, a state-commissioned report claimed LeFleur's Bluff was a beautiful location and had plenty of water and also trees and also accessibility to the Natchez Trail. The area then came to be the seat of state government. It was mapped in 1822 in a grid pattern, and also city blocks include numerous parks. The railway went through Jackson in 1840, which sparked growth after the War Between the States.

Jackson was a production facility for the Confederacy during the Civil War, making it a target of Union troops in 1863. Considering that the city was ruined, few antebellum buildings have actually made it through. However, the Governor's Mansion, the Old Capitol building, and the Jackson City Hall continue to be.

After the Civil War, economic recovery was sluggish. Mule-drawn streetcars ended up being electric in 1899. A brand-new capitol was built in 1903.

Born in Jackson in 1909, author Eudora Welty won the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for, "The Optimist's Daughter." The Jackson Public Library was named after her, and her house is a National Historic Site. Jackson experienced a growth explosion in the very early 20th century, and a new Union Station was constructed. The King Edward Hotel opened up in 1923 and was a center for distinguished events. The 1919 Standard Life Building established the record for the largest reinforced concrete structure at the time.

Natural gas fields were found in 1930 resulting in an additional boom that reduced the results of the Great Depression. This sector trailed off in 1955.

Throughout Mississippi's extensive ban on booze, alcohol consumption and also gaming prospered across the river in Flowood's Gold Coast. Those businesses shut down when Mississippi legalized alcohol in 1966. The state allowed riverboat gaming in 1990, and also many casino sites have actually opened up.

Hawkins Field came to be an important U.S. Army airbase in World War II, housing the Royal Netherlands Military Flying School after Nazi Germany overwhelmed the Netherlands.

Jackson was an important hub of civil liberties protests in the '60s and was the terminus of the James Meredith March. Meredith was the first African American to register at the U of Mississippi. The very first lung transplant occurred at the U of Mississippi Medical Center in 1963. Malaco Records calls Jackson its home base and also is a leader in gospel, blues, and soul. Paul Simon tape-recorded at Malaco in 1973.

Harvey Johnson, Jr. ended up being Jackson's very first African-American mayor in 1997, and also he was a champion for the Convention Center. Jackson was signified as one of the 10 friendliest cities in the United States in 2013.

Jackson is in Hinds County and also some areas of Madison and Rankin counties. The eastern line is the Pearl River. It's bordered on the north by Ridgeland, on the east by Flowood and Richland, the south by Byram and the west by Clinton. It has a total area of 113.2 square miles and is drained by the Big Black and also Pearl Rivers.

Jackson sits on top of an extinct volcano that's 2,900 feet below ground. The buried peak is under the Mississippi Coliseum. Jackson-Evers International Airport has continuous service to 6 cities.