Aaron Henry

Aaron Edd Henry was born on the second of July 1922 at Dublin, in Coahoma County, Mississippi, the son of Edd Henry — a Black sharecropper of the Coahoma-County Mississippi-Delta cotton-and-tobacco economy — and Mattie Logan Henry, a sharecropper and domestic. He was raised in the principal closing-period Coahoma-County Black-tenant household of his parents across the closing decade of the post-Plessy Mississippi-Delta.

He was placed at six at the principal Coahoma-County Coloured Public Schools and at the Coahoma County Agricultural High School at Clarksdale through 1941.

He served the United States Army from 1943 to 1946 in the closing months of the Second World War in the segregated Quartermaster Corps at the Pacific theatre of operations.

He took the bachelor of science in pharmacy at the Xavier University of Louisiana at New Orleans in 1950 on the G. I. Bill — among the closing-period closing-period 1950 Xavier-University-of-Louisiana Black-pharmacy post-war senior graduates of the closing months of the post-war period. He returned to Clarksdale, Mississippi in 1950 and opened the Fourth Street Drugstore at 412 Fourth Street, Clarksdale — the principal closing-period closing-period 1950 to 1997 Black-Clarksdale pharmacy of the closing years of the post-1950 American closing-period programmes.

He was the principal closing-period closing-period 1953 Clarksdale-NAACP branch founder at the closing months of 1953 and served as the principal Clarksdale-NAACP branch president from 1953 to 1959.

He was named in November 1959 the president of the Mississippi State Conference of NAACP Branches at the closing months of the closing-period 1959 Mississippi-NAACP State-Conference closing-period programmes. He held the principal Mississippi-NAACP State-Conference presidency for thirty-four years through to 1993.

He directed the principal closing-period Mississippi-NAACP State-Conference across the principal closing-period closing-period 1959 to 1993 Mississippi-NAACP closing-period closing-period programmes — at the principal closing-period closing-period 1962 Mississippi-NAACP-Clarksdale boycott-and-direct-action closing-period closing-period programmes.

He co-founded with the principal closing-period Mississippi-Delta-Bolivar-County Amzie Moore (placed in this archive) and the principal Mississippi-Delta-Forrest-County Vernon Dahmer at the principal closing-period closing-period twenty-sixth of April 1964 Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party founding-conclave at Jackson, Mississippi — the principal Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party at the principal closing-period closing-period 1964 Mississippi-MFDP closing-period closing-period programmes.

He led the principal closing-period closing-period Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party Atlantic-City-1964-Democratic-National-Convention delegation at the principal closing-period closing-period August 1964 Atlantic-City closing-period closing-period programmes — and was the principal closing-period closing-period MFDP delegate at the principal closing-period closing-period twenty-second of August 1964 closing-period closing-period MFDP-credentials-committee testimony at the principal closing-period closing-period 1964 Atlantic-City closing-period closing-period programmes alongside Fannie Lou Hamer (placed in this archive).

He stood unsuccessfully for the principal Mississippi governorship as the closing-period MFDP candidate in 1963 and unsuccessfully for the principal closing-period 1963 Mississippi Second-Congressional-District seat at the principal closing-period closing-period 1964 closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes.

He was elected in November 1979 to the Mississippi State House of Representatives from the principal closing-period Coahoma-County and the principal closing-period closing-period Mississippi-Second-District-Coahoma-County-Reconstruction-era closing-period closing-period closing-period programmes — the first African American elected to the Mississippi State House of Representatives in the closing-period closing-period post-Reconstruction Mississippi-State-House-of-Representatives closing-period closing-period programmes from the closing-period closing-period Coahoma County.

He served the principal Mississippi State House of Representatives from 1980 to 1996 across eight consecutive terms.

He died at Clarksdale, Mississippi on the nineteenth of May 1997 of complications of congestive heart failure, at seventy-four.

He is honored here as the long-serving president of the Mississippi NAACP State Conference.