campus to community_jacksonian_45
Gibbs-Green Timeline May 13, 1970: Students rally on Lynch Street for civil equality; Gov. John Bell Williams commands the state highway patrol to establish order at Jackson State College. May 14: President John A. Peoples Jr. meets with students to listen to their concerns. May 14 (9:30 p.m.): Students hear rumors that Fayette, Miss., Mayor Charles Evers, brother of slain civil rights activist Medgar Evers, is assassinated; students protest; ROTC building set afire; bonfire built; white motorists call police to complain of rockthrowing; about 75 law enforcement officers arrive and cordon off the university; unarmed Guardsmen assemble on the west end of Lynch Street; about 100 students face off with lawmen, some shouting at the officers. May 15 (12:05 a.m.): Police open fire for approximately 30 seconds outside Alexander Hall; Phillip Lafayette Gibbs, 21, and James Earl Green, 17, are mortally wounded; 12 JSC students injured. Alexander Hall after the shooting
June 13: President Richard Nixon forms Commission on Campus Unrest. June 25: Commission meets; Jackson City Council votes to permanently close Lynch Street to through traffic. March 1973: Jackson City Council adds the initials “J.R.” to street signs to denote John R. Lynch, Mississippi’s first black congressman. 1995: Demetrius Gibbs, son of deceased Phillip Gibbs, receives his degree from Jackson State University. Source: Associated Press
Alexander Hall today