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Mississippi » Yazoo Bluffs Region » Yazoo County » Yazoo City and Vicinity » ST. FRANCIS SCHOOL AND CONVENT

ST. FRANCIS SCHOOL AND CONVENT

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1939–1942; later additions. 735 E. Powell St.

Established by the School Sisters of St. Francis of Milwaukee, this campus served Yazoo City’s black community during segregation. The campus occupies a bluff that had to be reduced by sixty feet before construction could begin. The three front buildings—St. Francis Church, the two-story convent, and the one-story brick school building—all date to 1939–1942. Jackson architect James T. Canizaro gave the church a spare Romanesque style; the other two buildings are probably also his designs. Four buildings to the rear reflect the school’s growth after World War II from its original eighty students to over three hundred in the 1950s. The one-story school building behind the original school was finished around 1946, and the first class graduated in 1947. By 1960, a cafeteria, rectory, and gymnasium had rounded out the campus. In 1986, alumnus Mike Espy became the first African American Mississippian elected to the U.S. Congress since Reconstruction. The school closed in 1970 and now houses a Head Start center and other community groups.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Jennifer V.O. Baughn and Michael W. Fazio with Mary Warren Miller
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Data

What's Nearby

WILSON-GILRUTH HOUSE
ST. STEPHEN UNITED METHODIST CHURCH
YAZOO COUNTY COURTHOUSE
FIRST UNITED METHODIST CHURCH
DOWNTOWN BUILDINGS

Citation

Jennifer V.O. Baughn and Michael W. Fazio with Mary Warren Miller, "ST. FRANCIS SCHOOL AND CONVENT", [Yazoo City, Mississippi], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/MS-02-YB35.

Print Source

Buildings of Mississippi, Jennifer V. O. Baughn and Michael W. Fazio. With Mary Warren Miller. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2021, 89-89.

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