Latest news with #FreedomSummerof1964
Yahoo
05-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Not a fan of football? Here are 5 things you can do in Hattiesburg on Super Bowl Sunday
While many football fans will gather all afternoon and well into the evening on Sunday to watch Super Bowl LIX, others may find themselves wondering what to do when most eyes will be glued to a TV. We compiled a list of things to do in Hattiesburg on Sunday if you're not up for taking in the game. Note that some of the activities end Sunday afternoon. Stroll along Main Street or visit some of the area's popular features like the Pocket Museum in the alley next to the historic Saenger Theater. Wander down to Mobile Street (via Front Street if you're looking for lunch or dinner) and stop in The Lucky Rabbit in the afternoon for a look at some vintage and novelty items you might want to add to your collection. Across the street from The Lucky Rabbit you can get refreshed in the afternoon at Southern Prohibition Brewing Co., which is a family-friendly brewery and restaurant. Pokémon GO fans often are spotted meandering downtown to hunt for virtual critters that might be lurking in the area. Find more things to do downtown at If you're interested in civil rights history, Hattiesburg played an important role in the Freedom Summer of 1964 — a time when Black Americans in the South were struggling for equality, voting rights and the dismantling of Jim Crow. Visit some or all of the 16 trail markers from your car and listen to the audio recordings that tell visitors about the locations along the way. A detailed guide with audio recordings, a downloadable brochure and more can be found at The weather forecast is sunny and 82 degrees Sunday in Hattiesburg. Why not take an afternoon tour of the city's zoo? Visitors can see a variety of animals from around the world, from giraffes and zebras to alpacas and alligators. The facility offers other amenities, including electric train and carousel rides, high ropes adventure and the bug hub playground. For more information, visit Have you tried an escape room yet? It's a challenging activity and some escape rooms are more challenging than others, but it's a fun way to exercise your brain and practice being a team player. Time Will Tell Escape Rooms in Hattiesburg has several options to choose from with themes that include the legendary Mississippi crossroads, steampunk, a western saloon and more. Difficulty ranges from medium to extra hard. There is a minimum of two players for each game, with only members from your party participating. Reservations are required. For more information or to make a reservation, visit Dust off the old bike that's been hanging in your garage for the past couple years and roll on down the road to the Longleaf Trace and ride the trail anywhere from Hattiesburg to Prentiss. Bike rentals are offered at the USM station, but on Sundays the office is closed, so you'll have to bring your own. Don't have a bike? No problem. Pedestrians also are allowed on the Trace, so go for a nice long walk instead. For more information, visit Lici Beveridge is a reporter for the Hattiesburg American and Clarion Ledger. Contact her at lbeveridge@ Follow her on X @licibev or Facebook at This article originally appeared on Hattiesburg American: Super Bowl Sunday: 5 non-football things to do in Hattiesburg MS
Yahoo
30-01-2025
- Yahoo
Graduate student who went to public schools in NWLA can't read cursive
SHREVEPORT, La. (KTAL/KMSS) – LSU Shreveport graduate student Mik Barnes has a problem that many young college students in the United States are experiencing, too: he can't read cursive. 'I'm a history major,' said Barnes. 'One of the times it really got to me was when I was looking through an old arrest report book. We were trying to find when Wyatt Walker and Harry Blake were arrested in Shreveport during the civil rights movement, and the process of trying to read the cursive was really frustrating.' Barnes is a member of the Caddo Parish Civil Rights Heritage Trail team with KTAL, LSU Shreveport, and Red River Radio. He has researched and written peer-reviewed papers and articles for the project that include: Shreveport's David Dennis was architect of Freedom Summer of 1964 LSUS researcher finds links to the Confederacy while tracking family lineage Hidden history: Clarence A. Laws and civil rights in the Deep South Some Christians in Shreveport became non-violent during the Civil Rights Movement Man survives Shreveport lynching attempt in 1915 and becomes international icon Barnes graduated from high school in Northwest Louisiana, where he learned enough cursive in the public school system to write his name. American public schools were deeply influenced in 2011 when the U.S. Department of Education's Common Core State Standards for English initiative did not include cursive in the curriculum. And many public school students who were initially impacted by the lack of cursive in the curriculum are now in college. Mik said he knew something was wrong when he was around 12 or 13 years old. 'One of my great aunts had just passed,' Barnes said. 'We were looking through some of her old writings in a book, and I didn't know what it said.' Barnes took three foreign language classes to satisfy his undergraduate degree, and he says cursive is like a foreign language to him. 'I can usually tell that it's English by the uppercase letters,' said Barnes, who also said it's embarrassing. 'It makes research harder and take longer, because sometimes I have to go and look up the cursive alphabet, lowercase and uppercase, and try to figure out what I'm looking at. If you just handed me something in cursive and asked me to read it, I'd need a second.' Barnes is Dr. Gary Joiner's research assistant at LSU Shreveport, and Joiner said that learning to read cursive is similar to deciphering ancient Roman texts. 'When I was taking Roman history, and looking at documents and buildings, I was deciphering what the Romans were talking about on their monuments,' admitted Joiner. 'It is frustrating as it can be, because you're asking yourself, 'Why can I not do this?'' Joiner said that reading historic documents that are written in cursive can be tricky for people who do know how to read and write modern cursive. During the mid-1800s, English was getting away from an s that looked like an f. And reading artistic styles of handwriting can complicate a researcher's experience with historic documents just as much as poor penmanship. 'It's practicing, practicing, practicing, and getting it into your mind as sort of another reality,' said Joiner of reading historical documents written in cursive. Joiner said he's astonished by the number of his students that can't read cursive by the time they reach college. 'It's as if people have some sort of cognitive impairment. But it's not–it's a form of illiteracy.' Joiner said that cursive matters. 'Think of someone at the clerk-of-court, researching a handwritten will from a family member. Or somebody on the police force who is looking at old handwritten notes that could be used as evidence.' 5 key moments in Northwest Louisiana's civil rights history Joiner believes that a generation's inability to read cursive will affect a fairly large segment of the population. 'It's anti-societal,' said Joiner. 'Young students not being taught cursive erases history and culture. You're creating voids in someone's education.' 'Teach your kids cursive while they're reading,' said Barnes. 'Please. Some of the letters do look the same. An i sometimes looks like an e, depending on who writes it.' 'Teach them cursive and teach them how to form letters properly,' Dr. Joiner recommends. 'When we were looking at the Citizens Workbook, we read that a man was happy because he learned how to write his name and didn't have to use the x anymore.' This workbook changed the Civil Rights Movement 'The only thing I could write in cursive was my name,' said Barnes. 'I think it's for times' sake to prepare students to take standardized tests,' said Barnes. Joiner added that it all comes down to teaching to the test. 'We're leaving people in the dust,' said Joiner. 'You're not taught to think critically. You're taught to get past this test to the next one. We're creating a society of parrots–I'm gonna tell you some stuff, and you'll tell it back to me in the exact form I want you to do. But that's not learning. That's not critical thinking. That's just remembering.' In 2017, Louisiana passed a new law requiring cursive to be part of public school curriculums. Pro-cursive laws are also in place in Alabama, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, and Virginia. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. 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