Remembering Revels: Alcorn Pilgrimage 2013

Remembering Revels: Alcorn Pilgrimage 2013

Alcorn President M. Christopher Brown II honors founding President Hiram Rhodes Revels, journeys to burial site

Alcorn State, Miss. (January 11, 2013) – On Monday, January 14, President M. Christopher Brown II will board the Alcorn bus for Pilgrimage 2013 with students, faculty, staff, and alumni and journey over 500 miles to Holly Springs, Mississippi, to honor the University’s founding President Hiram Rhodes Revels.

A pilgrimage is a journey that individuals make to a sacred place or location “for the purpose of venerating it,” says President Brown. “It is vital to know one’s history and heritage, to make a connection and understand the responsibility to carry the torch of legacy forward.”

President Revels was born to free parents of Scottish, African, and Croatan Indian heritage, he became the first African-American United States Senator who resigned his seat in the Senate to become the first president of Alcorn University serving from 1871-1882.

En route to Revels’ burial site the Alcorn delegation will visit the Emmett Till Memorial site in Money, Mississippi, and converse with Dr. Roy C. Hudson, former interim president of Mississippi Valley State University. He will lecture students on Emmett’s story and how it brought to light the horrors of Jim Crow conditions in the South generating considerable national attention and ultimately serving as one of the early catalysts for the Civil Rights Movement.

The pilgrimage will continue to Rust College in Holly Springs, where the group will meet with College President David Beckley and members of the Rust community. The institutions will proceed to Hill Crest Cemetery where a wreath laying ceremony honoring the legacy of Revels will be held.

“Students are excited and ready to take the trip,” shared Miss Alcorn 2012-13 Airnecia Mills. “It will instill in us a real sense of our roots.”

Student Government Association President 2012-13 Marcus Mercy added, “We look forward to gaining more appreciation of Alcorn’s and our nation’s heritage, and hopefully gain insight into what our purpose is and how to contribute to our heritage. Upon return, we will share our thoughts and impressions with the student body.”

-ALCORN-

Alcorn State University is a premier comprehensive land-grant university that develops diverse students into globally-competitive leaders, and applies scientific research through collaborative partnerships which benefit the surrounding communities, state, nation and world.