Isaiah Thornton Montgomery
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Isaiah Thornton Montgomery (May 21, 1847 – March 5, 1924) was founder of Mound Bayou, Mississippi, an all-black community. A Republican, he was a delegate to the 1890 Mississippi Constitutional Convention and served as mayor of Mound Bayou. He participated in the 1890 Mississippi constitutional convention as a delegate from
Bolivar County Bolivar County ( ) is a County (United States), county located on the western border of the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 30,985. Its county seats are Rosedale, Mississippi, Roseda ...
and voted for the adoption of a state constitution that effectively disfranchised black voters for decades, using
poll tax A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources. Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments fr ...
es and
literacy test A literacy test assesses a person's literacy skills: their ability to read and write have been administered by various governments, particularly to immigrants. In the United States, between the 1850s and 1960s, literacy tests were administered t ...
s to raise barriers to voter registration. Montgomery promoted an accommodationist position for African Americans. The
I. T. Montgomery House The I. T. Montgomery House is a historic house on West Main Street in Mound Bayou, Mississippi, United States. Built in 1910, it was the home of Isaiah Montgomery (1847–1924), a former slave of Jefferson Davis who was instrumental in founding ...
in Mound Bayou is a National Landmark.


Early life and education

Born into slavery, Isaiah was the son of Ben Montgomery, a slave whose owner, Joseph Davis, promoted him to overseer. The younger Montgomery learned to read and write due to his father's influential position on the
Davis Bend Davis Bend, Mississippi (now known as Davis Island), was a peninsula named after planter Joseph Emory Davis, who owned most of the property. There he established the 5,000-acre Hurricane Plantation as a model slave community. Davis Bend was about ...
plantation. Davis wanted to establish a more positive working environment for slaves and encouraged education. Following the end of the American Civil War, Isaiah began a business with his father. It lasted until Ben's death in 1877. His father had long dreamed of establishing an independent black colony; by the time of his death, the Reconstruction era had ended and African Americans struggled to maintain themselves against white supremacists.


Career

After his father's death in 1877, Isaiah Montgomery worked to realize his father's dream. With his cousin Benjamin T. Green, he bought property in the northwest frontier of
Mississippi Delta The Mississippi Delta, also known as the Yazoo–Mississippi Delta, or simply the Delta, is the distinctive northwest section of the U.S. state of Mississippi (and portions of Arkansas and Louisiana) that lies between the Mississippi and Yazoo ...
bottomlands to found Mound Bayou in 1887.
Bolivar County Bolivar County ( ) is a County (United States), county located on the western border of the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, the population was 30,985. Its county seats are Rosedale, Mississippi, Roseda ...
was the largest in area in the Delta. As farmers cleared land, they started cultivating cotton. Montgomery worked to gain freedmen protection of the law, and to keep their work and lives separate from supervision by whites. In what the ''Washington Post'' termed "A Notable Address Delivered by the Colored Statesman," Frederick Douglass gave a speech in October 1890 before the Bethel Literary and Historical Society of Washington, D.C.'s
Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church Metropolitan African Methodist Episcopal Church ("Metropolitan AME Church") is a historic church located at 1518 M Street, N.W., in downtown Washington, D.C. It affiliates with the African Methodist Episcopal Church. History The congregati ...
. He strongly condemned Montgomery's stance regarding suffrage in Mississippi. Douglass had spoken of Montgomery numerous times before and on the occasion cited his position as an act of "treason, to the cause of the colored people, not only of his own state, but of the United States," referring to the effect Montgomery's act would have in other states. He also lamented having heard in Montgomery "a groan of bitter anguish born of oppression and despair" and a voice of a "soul from which all hope had vanished."


Legacy

I. T. Montgomery Elementary School of the North Bolivar Consolidated School District (formerly the
Mound Bayou School District The Mound Bayou Public School District was a public school district with its headquarters in Mound Bayou, Mississippi (USA). In addition to Mound Bayou, the district also served the town of Winstonville. On July 1, 2014 consolidated with the No ...
) is named after Montgomery.


References


External links

* 1847 births 1924 deaths 19th-century American businesspeople African-American mayors in Mississippi Mayors of places in Mississippi Mississippi Republicans People from Mound Bayou, Mississippi {{Mississippi-mayor-stub