James Meredith

In 1962, James Meredith was the first black person to study at the University of Mississippi. He enrolled after serving in the U.S. Air Force and met great resistance from students and state officials. Campus riots in protest of his enrollment caused two deaths and necessitated protection from federal troops until he graduated in 1963. In 1966, He wrote the autobiographical Three Years in Mississippi. During the March Against Fear in Mississippi he was shot in Jackson, Miss., in June 1966 but recovered to finish the march. Soon afterward, he withdrew from the civil rights movement to work in business.