Copiah County, Mississippi

Copiah County
County
US Post Office in Hazlehurst
Location within the U.S. state of Mississippi
Mississippi's location within the U.S.
Coordinates: 31°52′N 90°26′W
Country	United States
State	Mississippi
Founded	1823
Seat	Hazlehurst
Largest city	Crystal Springs
Area
• Total	779 sq mi (2,020 km2)
• Land	777 sq mi (2,010 km2)
• Water	2.2 sq mi (6 km2)  0.36%
Population  (2020)
• Total	28,368
• Density	36/sq mi (14/km2)
Time zone	UTC−6 (Central)
• Summer (DST)	UTC−5 (CDT)
Congressional district	2nd
Website	www.copiahcounty.org

Copiah County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 census, the population was 28,368. The county seat is Hazlehurst.

With an eastern border formed by the Pearl River, Copiah County is part of the Jackson, MS Metropolitan Statistical Area.

History

Copiah, from a Choctaw Indian word meaning calling panther, was organized in 1823 as Mississippi's 18th county. In the year of county organization, Walter Leake served as governor and James Monroe as President of the United States. In 2004 Calling Panther Lake, commemorating this name, was opened up just West and North of Crystal Springs near the Jack and New Zion community.

Soon after the Choctaw Indians relinquished their claims to this land in 1819 and the legislature formed Copiah County in 1823, Elisha Lott, a Methodist minister who had worked among the Indians, brought his family from Hancock County to a location near the present site of Crystal Springs. When the New Orleans, Jackson and Great Northern Railroad built in the area in 1858, a new town was created about a mile and a half west of the old settlement. The new settlement took the name Crystal Springs and the old settlement became Old Crystal Springs.

William J. Willing's home was the first to be built in the new town, and Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy, once made a speech from the front yard. Ozious Osborne owned the first merchandise store on a corner of his residence lot on south Jackson Street. This lot later became the Merchants Grocery Company's site.

The development of cotton agriculture in the county was based on, and the population was before the Civil War.

The first church built was the Methodist in 1860 in Hazelhurst. It was followed by the Baptist in 1861, Presbyterian in 1870. Trinity Episcopal was built in 1882, during a growth in the US Episcopal Church. After the American Civil War, most freedmen withdrew from white churches to establish their own independent congregations, setting up state associations of Baptists by the end of the nineteenth century.

The county expanded its production of commercial vegetable crops, known as truck farming, in the 19th and 20th centuries. Crystal Springs developed as one of the largest tomato shipping centers. Its commercial farming started in 1870 when the first shipment of peaches, grown by James Sturgis, was shipped to New Orleans and Chicago markets. Tomatoes were still known as "love apples" when N. Piazza imported seeds from Italy, and with help from S. H. Stackhouse, began scientific cultivation of tomato plants. With the help of German immigrant Augustus Lotterhos, the industry achieved success. In 1878, Lotterhos pooled the products of a number of tomato growers and shipped the first boxcar load to Denver, Colorado.

In the 1960s, Hazlehurst and Crystal Springs were centers of civil rights activism in the southwest part of the state. In addition to working with the Freedom Democratic Party in 1964 on voter registration and education, they organized to make progress after passage of federal civil rights legislation in 1964 and 1965. With the aid of Deacons for Defense and Justice, to protect protesters working with the NAACP on boycotts of merchants in 1966 and 1967 in order to gain integration of public facilities and implement civil rights legislation. The Deacons for Defense had first been organized in Natchez in 1965 to protect African-American protesters, after considerable earlier violence in the state against protesters.

Geography

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the county has a total area of 779 square miles (2,020 km²), of which 777 square miles (2,010 km²) is land and 2.2 square miles (5.7 km²) (0.3%) is water.

Major highways

• Interstate 55
• U.S. Highway 51
• Mississippi Highway 18
• Mississippi Highway 27
• Mississippi Highway 28
• Mississippi Highway 844

Adjacent counties

• Hinds County (north)
• Simpson County (east)
• Lawrence County (southeast)
• Lincoln County (south)
• Jefferson County (southwest)
• Claiborne County (west)

National protected area

• Homochitto National Forest (part)

Demographics

The mostly rural county has had two periods of marked losses of population during waves of the Great Migration of African Americans out of the rural South: from 1910 to 1920, and from 1940 to 1970. In the first period, most migrants went North, many to St. Louis or Chicago. In the second, they went West, particularly to California where the defense industry had many new jobs and federal policy created opportunities for African Americans in these fields.

Historical population

Census	Pop.	Note	%±
1830	7,001		—
1840	8,954		27.9%
1850	11,794		31.7%
1860	15,398		30.6%
1870	20,608		33.8%
1880	27,552		33.7%
1890	30,233		9.7%
1900	34,395		13.8%
1910	35,914		4.4%
1920	28,672		−20.2%
1930	31,614		10.3%
1940	33,974		7.5%
1950	30,493		−10.2%
1960	27,051		−11.3%
1970	24,749		−8.5%
1980	26,503		7.1%
1990	27,592		4.1%
2000	28,757		4.2%
2010	29,449		2.4%
2020	28,368		−3.7%
2023 (est.)	27,664		−2.5%
U.S. Decennial Census 1790–1960 1900–1990 1990–2000 2010–2013

Copiah County racial composition as of 2020

Race	Num.	Perc.
White (non-Hispanic)	12,171	42.9%
Black or African American (non-Hispanic)	14,264	50.28%
Native American	17	0.06%
Asian	121	0.43%
Pacific Islander	24	0.08%
Other/Mixed	660	2.33%
Hispanic or Latino	1,111	3.92%

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 28,368 people, 9,414 households, and 6,609 families residing in the county.

Tomato Festival

The county is known as a tomato and cabbage producing area, and for many years was called the "Tomato Capital of the World." Specifically, Crystal Springs was known as "The Tomato Capital of the World" because for a few years in the late 1930s it canned and shipped out via rail car more tomatoes than any other locale. Its predominance was disrupted by the onset of World War II but it kept the title.

In June 2000, the town revived celebration of an annual Tomato Festival, held on the last Saturday in June. It includes a tomato growing contest (with prizes for largest tomato, ugliest tomato, prettiest tomato, etc.), tomato tasting, farmers' market, vendor's booths, musical entertainment, 5K run and, of course, the crowning of the new Tomato Queen. The Tomato Festival was originally set up on Front Street.

The Friday night before the Tomato Festival, a Street Dance is held as the kick-off event. It is the night of the crowning of the Tomato Queen. Entertainment includes a live band, games and amusement rides for the kids, and food vendors. During the Street Dance, "BBQ and Blue Jeans" is sponsored by the Junior Auxiliary of Crystal Springs. They sell take-out containers filled with BBQ sandwiches, potato salad, baked beans and a dinner roll. This is the evening when other festival vendors start setting up their booths for the main day events. Vendors come from all over the U.S. to the festival every year to sell their wares, and provide games and amusement rides. A tomato museum at the Chautauqua Park Visitor Center exhibits historical pictures, agricultural relics from the era, and examples of some of the shipping and canning labels.

Education

There are two school districts in the county: Copiah County School District and Hazlehurst City School District.

There is a private school, Copiah Academy.

The county is in the district of Copiah–Lincoln Community College. Additionally, the county is in the district of Hinds Community College.

Communities

Cities

• Crystal Springs
• Hazlehurst (county seat)

Towns

• Georgetown
• Wesson (partly located in Lincoln County)

Village

• Beauregard

Unincorporated communities

• Carpenter
• Conn
• Dentville
• Gallman
• Glancy
• Hopewell
• Martinsville
• Midway
• Rockport
• Ruby
• Sand Hill

Ghost town

• Coars Springs

Politics

United States presidential election results for Copiah County, Mississippi

Year	Republican		Democratic		Third party(ies)
	No.	%	No.	%	No.	%
2024	6,134	52.58%	5,426	46.52%	105	0.90%
2020	6,250	48.51%	6,470	50.22%	163	1.27%
2016	6,103	47.01%	6,741	51.93%	138	1.06%
2012	6,282	44.48%	7,749	54.87%	92	0.65%
2008	6,701	46.21%	7,710	53.17%	91	0.63%
2004	6,374	55.95%	4,961	43.54%	58	0.51%
2000	5,643	53.30%	4,845	45.76%	99	0.94%
1996	4,138	46.23%	4,415	49.33%	397	4.44%
1992	4,600	48.68%	4,397	46.53%	452	4.78%
1988	5,100	54.64%	4,175	44.73%	59	0.63%
1984	5,806	55.74%	4,591	44.08%	19	0.18%
1980	4,461	43.99%	5,517	54.41%	162	1.60%
1976	4,108	47.51%	4,267	49.35%	271	3.13%
1972	5,498	73.11%	1,803	23.98%	219	2.91%
1968	704	8.40%	2,724	32.51%	4,951	59.09%
1964	4,506	94.96%	239	5.04%	0	0.00%
1960	761	21.06%	896	24.79%	1,957	54.15%
1956	387	16.80%	1,270	55.12%	647	28.08%
1952	1,527	42.69%	2,050	57.31%	0	0.00%
1948	19	0.72%	89	3.38%	2,523	95.90%
1944	85	3.41%	2,409	96.59%	0	0.00%
1940	49	2.06%	2,335	97.94%	0	0.00%
1936	45	1.84%	2,397	98.12%	1	0.04%
1932	28	1.17%	2,371	98.67%	4	0.17%
1928	161	5.56%	2,733	94.44%	0	0.00%
1924	43	2.02%	2,087	97.98%	0	0.00%
1920	60	4.37%	1,300	94.61%	14	1.02%
1916	20	1.32%	1,486	98.22%	7	0.46%
1912	10	0.77%	1,234	94.78%	58	4.45%

See also

• National Register of Historic Places listings in Copiah County, Mississippi

External links

• Media related to Copiah County, Mississippi at Wikimedia Commons
• Mississippi Courthouses – Copiah County