Brothers gather petition to honor 1939 sharecropper protest

CHARLESTON, Mo. -- It wasn't until college, in Pennsylvania, that Missourian Malcolm Jarrett learned about a monumental historical event that happened practically in his backyard.

The Charleston native was awed to hear about the sharecroppers demonstration of 1939, when more than a thousand sharecroppers protesting their eviction moved their belongings onto U.S. 60 and 61 near Sikeston, Mo. Defying laws of segregation, blacks and whites slept and lived in tents next to the highway, bringing national attention to their plight and setting the stage for the modern civil rights movement.

"I grew up in Charleston and never heard one word about the demonstration that was so important to the area, the state, and even the country," said Jarrett, now a history teacher.

With the help of the Charleston NAACP, he and his brother, the Rev. Willie Jarrett, have gathered more than 800 signatures on a petition they will present to the Mississippi County Commission today. They want the commissioners to create a week of remembrance, place a historical marker and memorialize a section of the highway.

"The event was important for what the future holds. Showing these people getting together and fighting for justice is the same thing we need to do today," Malcolm Jarrett said.

The sharecropper strike stemmed mainly from evictions beginning in the winter of 1938. As cotton prices bottomed out during the Depression, the federal government tried to help out farmers with subsidies through the New Deal. Part of the deal encouraged farmers to take land out of production so supply would decrease and prices would go up. As a result, fewer sharecroppers were needed and many were evicted.

"They went out on the roads in January of 1939 to protest the evictions and to demonstrate the plight of the sharecroppers who, in many cases, were losing their places, not just their jobs," said Dr. Bonnie Stepenoff, a history professor at Southeast Missouri State University.

Stepenoff has extensively studied the demonstration and wrote the book "Thad Snow: A Life of Social Reform in the Missouri Bootheel." Snow was a white landowner who supported the mostly black protesters despite criticism by others.

After five days, state authorities removed the demonstrators from the roadside, and many relocated to camps or refuges. The Rev. Owen Whitfield, who led the demonstration, continued to speak out. A strategy of nonviolence was stressed.

A year later, the government built 600 homes for the workers on land donated by Snow and other property owners. The 10 villages were racially segregated and include Morehouse, East Prairie, North Lilbourn and North Wyatt. Some of the villages have been annexed into larger cities, while others remain today.

"The purpose of the petition is to commemorate these events, put up historical markers and bring notice to the Delmo homes so they can be preserved and recognized for their historical significance," Stepenoff said. Delmo refers to the name of the housing project, which stands for Delta Missouri.

The Delmo Community Center in Homestown, Mo., has been nominated to the National Register of Historic Places, she said.

Malcolm Jarrett said he and others collected the signatures for the petition the old-fashioned way: going door to door. He wants people to understand that common people, not legislation, are the real promoters of "freedom and justice."

lbavolek@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 123

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