Скачать или смотреть History Is Lunch: Josh Green, "The 1966 Jackson Country Club Liquor Raid"

On August 19, 2020, Josh Green presented “Axe and Ye Shall Receive: The 1966 Jackson Country Club Liquor Raid” as part of the History Is Lunch series. The program was in conjunction with the new Mississippi Distilled exhibit at the Museum of Mississippi History and Mississippi Civil Rights Museum.

The statutory prohibition of alcohol in Mississippi dates to 1907. A few years after that the state became the first to ratify the Eighteenth Amendment, which prohibited the sale of alcohol across the United States. In 1966 Mississippi became the last state to repeal its prohibition law, but not before some of Mississippi’s social and political elite ran afoul of the law in a very high-profile raid.

Around 7 p.m. on February 4, 1966, Hinds County chief deputy sheriff Tom Shelton, accompanied by three deputies, arrived at the Jackson Country Club with a demand that they be allowed to search the premises for contraband liquor. The annual Carnival Ball, one of the season’s main social events, was always followed by a reception. In 1966, as in years past, the reception would be held at the country club.

“The traditional serving of whiskey and champagne at the event was the city’s worst-kept secret, notwithstanding the illegality of both,” said Green. Shelton, a teetotaler himself, intended to show that the state’s prohibition laws applied to everyone, even the capital city’s elite. “His plan was to get in, seize the contraband liquor, and get out before the guests and press began to arrive for the reception,” said Green. “He succeeded in the first two parts, but the consequences of failing on the third helped drive a nail in the coffin of prohibition in Mississippi.”

Josh Green earned his BA in history and classics from the University of Mississippi, an MA in Southern Studies from the University of Mississippi, and a JD from Tulane University School of Law. His undergraduate honors thesis “’The Last Drinking Drys’: The Repeal of Prohibition in Mississippi” received the Gray Award for outstanding undergraduate paper in the field of Southern Studies. Green is a contributing author to the Mississippi Encyclopedia and author of the section on the 1966 Jackson Country Club liquor raid. Green is a conservation lands coordinator for Ducks Unlimited in Ridgeland, Mississippi.

History Is Lunch is a weekly lecture series of the Mississippi Department of Archives and History that explores different aspects of the state's past. The hour-long programs are held in the Craig H. Neilsen Auditorium of the Museum of Mississippi History and Mississippi Civil Rights Museum building in Jackson. MDAH livestreams videos of the program at noon on Wednesdays on their Facebook page,   / mdahofficial  .