Lamar County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 64,222. Its county seat is Purvis. Named for Confederate Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar, the county was carved out of Marion County to the west in 1904.
Forrest County is located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 78,158. Its county seat and largest city is Hattiesburg. The county was created from Perry County in 1908 and named in honor of Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Confederate general in the American Civil War and the first Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan. Forrest County is part of the Hattiesburg, MS Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Eatonville is a town in Orange County, Florida, United States, six miles north of Orlando. It is part of Greater Orlando. Incorporated on August 15, 1887, it was one of the first self-governing all-black municipalities in the United States. The Eatonville Historic District and Moseley House Museum are in Eatonville. Author Zora Neale Hurston grew up in Eatonville and the area features in many of her stories.
Ruleville is a city in Sunflower County, Mississippi, United States, in the Mississippi Delta region. The population was 3,007 at the 2010 census. It is the second-largest community in the rural county.
Hattiesburg is a city in the U.S. state of Mississippi, located primarily in Forrest County and extending west into Lamar County. The city population was 45,989 at the 2010 census, with the population now being 48,730 in 2020. Hattiesburg is the principal city of the Hattiesburg Metropolitan Statistical Area, which encompasses Covington, Forrest, Lamar, and Perry counties. The city is located in the Pine Belt region.
Pearl River Community College is a public community college in Poplarville, Mississippi. It was founded as Pearl River County Agricultural High School in 1909 and became the first junior college in Mississippi in 1921.
Clyde Kennard was an American Korean War veteran and civil rights leader from Hattiesburg, Mississippi. In the 1950s, he attempted several times to enroll at the all-white Mississippi Southern College to complete his undergraduate degree started at the University of Chicago. Although the United States Supreme Court had ruled in 1954 that segregation of public schools was unconstitutional, the college rejected him. Kennard was among the thousands of local activists in the 1940s and 1950s who pressed for their rights.
Fruitland Park is a small unincorporated community in southern Forrest County, Mississippi. It is part of the Hattiesburg, Mississippi Metropolitan Statistical Area. Camp Tiak, a Boy Scouts of America camp with a one-mile educational forest trail, is located in Fruitland Park.
The University of Southern Mississippi is a public research university with its main campus located in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. It is accredited by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools to award bachelor's, master's, specialist, and doctoral degrees. The university is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity".
Oak Grove High School is a 6A high school located outside of Hattiesburg, Mississippi, United States, in Oak Grove. The principal is Helen Price. It is part of the Lamar County School District and serves students from grades 9-12.
The Southern Miss Golden Eagles football program represents the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. They play college football in the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision. The Eagles are currently members of the Sun Belt Conference and play their home games at M. M. Roberts Stadium in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.
The Pine Belt, also known as the Piney Woods, is a region in Southeast Mississippi. The region gets its name from the longleaf pine trees that are abundant in the region. The Pine Belt includes 9 counties: Covington, Forrest, Greene, Jefferson Davis, Jones, Lamar, Marion, Perry, and Wayne.
Vernon Ferdinand Dahmer Sr. was an American civil rights movement leader and president of the Forrest County chapter of the NAACP in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. He was murdered by the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan for his work on recruiting Black Americans to vote.
The Forrest County School District is a public school district with its headquarters in Hattiesburg, Mississippi (USA)
Forrest County Agricultural High School(FCAHS) is a public, secondary school in Brooklyn, in unincorporated Forrest County, Mississippi (United States). The school provides education to grades 9–12.
Raylawni Branch is a black Mississippi pioneer of the Civil Rights Movement, a professional nursing educator and US Air Force Reserve officer. She is best known for her leading role in the integration of the University of Southern Mississippi (Hattiesburg) in 1965, which was peaceful as opposed to the violent riot triggered by white racism after the enrollment of James Meredith at the University of Mississippi (Oxford) in 1962.
On Sunday, February 10, 2013, a large EF4 multiple-vortex wedge tornado devastated the cities of West Hattiesburg, Hattiesburg, and Petal, Mississippi. The tornado was one of eight that touched down in southern Mississippi and southwestern Alabama that day. It reached a maximum path width of 0.75 miles (1.21 km) in its path through the Hattiesburg area and reached estimated maximum sustained winds of 170 mph (270 km/h) in Oak Grove neighborhood of West Hattiesburg. It destroyed many structures and impacted University of Southern Mississippi and two high schools. Mississippi was declared a federal disaster area by President Barack Obama, and a state of emergency was issued by Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant.
Harold Ray Watson is a retired missionary and pioneer in the field of agronomy. He is world recognized for developing a method of cultivating denuded mountain slopes, and for encouraging utilization of the method to help the poorest, small scale, tropical farmers, specifically in the Philippines. He was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 1985.
The 2015 Southern Miss Golden Eagles football team represented the University of Southern Mississippi in the 2015 NCAA Division I FBS football season as members of the West Division of Conference USA. They were led by third-year head coach Todd Monken and played their home games at M. M. Roberts Stadium in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. They finished the season 9–5, 7–1 in C-USA play to be champions of the West Division. They represented the West Division in the Conference USA Football Championship Game where they lost to Western Kentucky. They were invited to the Heart of Dallas Bowl, where they were defeated by Washington.
