The Mississippi Humanities Council (MHC) is partnering with the Mississippi Film Office and the Mississippi Department of Archives and History to bring free, high-quality documentary film screenings to public audiences each month for the next year.
Up first will be Promised Land: The Story of Mound Bayou, a documentary film about a small town deep in the Mississippi Delta that holds a story unlike any other. Mound Bayou was founded in 1887 by formerly enslaved people who were on a mission unheard of at that time. The fertile, flat ground was the promised land that would show black Mississippians what the future could be. Here, they found independence, empowerment, and possibility. Promised Land: The Story of Mound Bayou will be screened Sunday, July 2, at 2 P.M. in the Neilsen Auditorium at the Two Mississippi Museums in Jackson, accompanied by a presentation on Isaiah T. Montgomery, founder of Mound Bayou, by political scientist and Mound Bayou native Dr. Matthew Holden.