CLARKSDALE, Miss. – Former state lawmaker and civil rights icon Aaron Henry will be honored with a marker on the Mississippi Freedom Trail.
The dedication is Wednesday in Clarksdale at the former site of Henry’s Fourth Street Drug Store, which once was the only black owned drugstore in the area. As a businessman, Henry became involved in local and state political activities and worked to register blacks to vote. It was Henry who established an NAACP branch in Clarksdale. In 1959 he was elected president of the organization in Mississippi. His drugstore was a staging point for civil rights and political planning for more than 30 years.
Henry was also one of the founders of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party and served in the Mississippi house from 1980-96, fighting to improve health care and housing for the poor. He died in 1997 at the age of 74.
The Freedom Trail commemorates the state’s Civil Rights heritage.
