Our history is filled with stories of people leaving everything behind - families and possessions - to reach a new life in another state, across the continent, or even across an ocean. The reasons behind those decisions are myriad. Many chose to move, searching for something better in a new land. Others had no choice, like enslaved Africans captured and relocated to a strange land and bravely asserting their own cultures, or like Native Americans already here, who were often pushed aside by newcomers.

 

Our transportation history is more than boats, buses, cars, wagons, and trucks. The development of transportation technology was largely inspired by the human drive for freedom. The Museum on Main Street exhibition Journey Stories examines the intersection between modes of travel and Americans' desire to feel free to move. The story is diverse and focused on immigration, migration, innovation, and freedom. It is accounts of immigrants coming in search of promise in a new country; stories of individuals and families relocating in search of fortune, their own homestead, or employment; the harrowing journeys of Africans and Native Americans forced to move; and, of course, fun and frolic on the open road.

 

Hopefully these photos, just a sample of the topics covered in the Journey Stories exhibition, will whet your appetite and entice you to come to the exhibit when it opens. In addition to the traveling exhibit, there will be a new local history component unveiled in conjunction with the grand opening.

 

Check back often as we update the site with new information about Journey Stories...

 

Other host locations in Mississippi are Clinton (A.E. Wood Memorial Library & Clinton Visitor Center), Southaven (M.R. Davis Library), Natchez (Institute for Southern Jewish Life & Natchez Historical Foundation), Hazlehurst (Hazelhurst Depot Museum & Copiah County Office of Cultural Affairs) and Long Beach (University of Southern Mississippi - Katrina Research Center).