Ole Miss To Post Sign Saying Slaves Helped Build Campus

JACKSON, MS — The University of Mississippi says it will post a sign acknowledge that slaves help construct some building's on the main campus in Oxford.

Ole Miss, which was founded before the Civil War, made the announcement Thursday. The name of James K. Vardaman, a white supremacist who was Mississippi's governor in the early 1900s, will also be removed from a university building. Vardaman was also a U.S. senator from 1913 to 1919.

The changes are part of an effort to provide historical context on the campus, which was rocked by violence after court-ordered integration in 1962. The administration previously added a plaque to provide information about slavery and the Civil War to a Confederate soldier statue near the Lyceum, the main administrative building on campus. (For more Across America news, click here to sign up for real-time news alerts. If you have an iPhone, click here to get the free Patch iPhone app.)

University leaders have said they're trying to make a diverse student body feel more welcome.

"As an educational institution, it is imperative we foster a learning environment and fulfill our mission by pursuing knowledge and understanding," Chancellor Jeffrey Vitter said in a news release.

A national debate is ongoing about dealing with the public display of symbols and monuments tied to slavery and the Confederacy. New Orleans is among the places that have recently removed Confederate monuments. Harvard University this year acknowledged its ties to colonial-era slavery and Yale University rebranded a residential college that was named for a 19th century U.S. vice president who supported slavery.

All eight of Mississippi's public universities have stopped flying the state flag because it includes the Confederate battle emblem — a red field topped by a blue tilted cross dotted by 13 white stars. Adopted in 1894 and reconfirmed by voters in 2001, it is the last state flag in the nation with the emblem that critics see as racist.

A sign will note that four projects on the Ole Miss campus were built with slave labor. One is a cut through some hills to make a route for railroad tracks. The other three are buildings — the white-columned Lyceum, completed in 1848, the same year the university opened; an astrological observatory that was finished in 1859 and now houses the Center for the Study of Southern Culture; and a Georgian-style brick building dating to 1853, now home to international studies.

A campus committee recommended adding historical context for some campus buildings or monuments, and removing Vardaman's name from a building that used to be a dormitory but is under renovation to house offices. A new name for Vardaman Hall has not been chosen.

The committee wrote that when he was a newspaper editor before taking office, Vardaman used racial slurs to denounce President Theodore Roosevelt for dining with black people.

"As governor of Mississippi, Vardaman used racial hatred and fear to shore up the white vote," the committee wrote, quoting a 1907 campaign speech in which he called for lynching black people to maintain white supremacy. "From the state's highest elected position, Vardaman also argued that education ruined black Mississippians and made the dismantling of African-American education in the state a priority."

By Emily Wagster Pettus, Associated Press

Photos credit: Beth J. Harpaz, Associated Press; Bruce Newman/The Oxford Eagle via AP