AP: Highway could be named for author of civil rights memoir

Special thanks to Rep. Angela Cockerham

By Roscoe Barnes III

Chairman, Anne Moody History Project

Copyright © 2018

#AnneMoody

#AnneMoodyHighway

#AnneMoodyMemorialHighway

Rep. Angela Cockerham, D-Magnolia

I am absolutely excited to report that our work with the Anne Moody History Project (AMHP) is continuing to pay off. We learned yesterday that the Mississippi State House Transportation Committee passed House Bill 1153 to designate a portion of Highway 24 as the “Anne Moody Memorial Highway.” The bill will now go to a second committee, and then to the full House.

Emily Wagster Pettus, reporter for the Associated Press, wrote a brief story about the highway being named in Moody’s honor. You can see it here.

The bill was introduced by Rep. Angela Cockerham, D-Magnolia. It calls for renaming the section of Highway 24 in Wilkinson County, beginning at its intersection with U.S. Highway 61 in Woodville, Miss., and extending east to the Amite County line in Centreville, Miss., Moody’s hometown.

Moody is the author of Coming of Age in Mississippi (1968). She was born and raised in Centreville, in southwest Mississippi. At 17, she moved to Woodville, where she graduated from Johnson High School. She went on to Natchez College and then to Tougaloo College where she became active in the civil rights movement in the early 1960s.

Moody died in 2015 at the age of 74. She was living in Gloster, Miss., at the time of her death.

The idea for the “Anne Moody Memorial Highway” (initially called “Anne Moody Highway”) originated with the AMHP, a community service endeavor of Wilkinson County Correctional Facility, Woodville. AMHP submitted a formal request for the name change to the Wilkinson County Board of Supervisors in June 2017. After giving unanimous approval to the request, the board submitted a formal resolution to Cockerham.

House Bill 1153 for Anne Moody Memorial Highway

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Would you like to know more about Anne Moody?

Visit the Anne Moody page here!

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

For more information:

See the Anne Moody page here.

Questions about the Anne Moody History Project may be directed to Roscoe Barnes III via email at doctorbarnes3@gmail.com or roscoebarnes3@yahoo.com. For updates on Anne Moody history and the on-going work of this community service project, simply follow this blog or follow AMHP on Twitter (@AnneMoodyHP). #ComingOfAgeinMississippi