In the spring of 1970, college and university students across the country protested against the Vietnam War, racism, gender oppression, and a host of other issues, at times leading to violent and deadly confrontations with police and national guard troops. On May 14th, 1970, students at Jackson State College staged a demonstration condemning racial discrimination in Mississippi and the killing of four students at Kent State University by the Ohio National Guard on May 4th. The demonstration continued into the night. Shortly after midnight on May 15th, police, who claimed they had been shot at, opened fire on students gathered outside Alexander Hall, a campus dormitory. When the shooting stopped, 21-year-old Phillip Gibbs and 17-year-old James Green lay dead. twelve other students were injured.
The 50th anniversary commemoration of the shooting on what is now the campus of Jackson State University will include five major programs. The Student Government Association, Gibbs-Green Commission, and Gibbs-Green Oral History Project developed the programs which will coordinate with Kent State University to link the events on both campuses.
April 3rd:
A photography exhibit about the shooting included with the Creative Arts and Scholarly Engagement Festival. The opening reception will be held in Ayer Hall. Dr. Doris Derby, retired Georgia State University professor of Anthropology and Civil Rights documentary photographer, will speak about the history of the Civil Rights movement, contextualizing the Jackson State shooting both within Civil Rights activism and the wave of protests occurring on college campuses around the country.
The exhibit itself, which will be on display through June 2020, had two components. The first is Derby’s photographs. Derby was working for Margaret Walker at the Jackson State College Institute for the Study of History, Life, and Culture of Black People at the time of the shootings in 1970 and photographed the event. The photos include never-before-exhibited imaged from the immediate aftermath of the shootings on campus and images from James Green’s funeral. These photos will be paired with images from the Phillip Gibbs and James Green Memorial collection in the JSU archives.
