Page 137 - South Mississippi Living - October, 2023

Clemon Jimerson.
These rallies were not simple acts of beach leisure but signified group disharmony. At the time, Biloxi’s 26-mile-long manmade beach was segregated but funded and maintained by taxpayer coffers.
On Easter Sunday, April 24, 1960, Mason led about 125 volunteers in a peaceful wade-in on three separate areas of the segregated Biloxi Beach. The protesters were trained in non-violent passive resistance and Mason directed participants to relinquish items that could be misconstrued as weapons, even a cardboard nail file in a participant’s purse.
The men, women, and children split into groups, stationed near prominent downtown locales, including a cemetery, lighthouse, and a hospital. Mason shuttled between stations, monitoring proceedings in his vehicle while others watched over from nearby boats.
The beachgoers brought only food, footballs, and umbrellas, and wholeheartedly expected to be arrested. Instead, they were violently attacked by a group of white people armed with pipes and chains as State Troopers stood by, watching and without intervening.
The historic protest was later named “Bloody Sunday” and Clemon Jimerson attended with his family. The Biloxi native was in Mason’s Boy Scout troop and only 14 at the time but that fateful day is still fresh in his mind.
“Most of the groups were women and children because the men were told they couldn’t be down there or they would lose their job,” Jimerson said, adding he was so excited just to go to the beach that he bought a special Elgin watch for the occasion.
“I waited all my life to go to the beach and I finally got a chance,” he said.
Jimerson headed straight for the water with a classmate. His Elgin watch was tucked away in the pockets of his neatly folded clothes, which he had left on the beach.
It wasn’t long before a white mob showed up with an
arsenal of weapons. He ran for his life, scaling the
seawall and threading the traffic on U.S.
90 while being pursued by two teens who broke off from the mob while adults screamed obscenities. He returned to his family afterward unharmed. He and his stepfather returned to the beach to search for his clothes and watch but instead found the protesters’ belongings burning in several fires.
“He told me we needed to go back home,” Jimerson said of his stepfather. “We can get another watch and more clothes, but we can’t get another life.”
The last Biloxi Beach Wade-In protest was in 1963. That beach rally resulted in the local chapter of
the NAACP being founded with Mason installed as president, a title he held for 34 years. Four years later, the federal court of appeals ruled in favor of black residents, opening the beaches to the public and making them accessible to everyone.
Jimerson’s testimony helped make the ruling possible, and years later he watched as his children played in the water of that same beach. His son even proposed to his daughter-in-law near the area where he discovered the fire that burnt his special watch.
Now, more than six decades later, many of those involved in the Biloxi Wade-Ins keep the story alive
by sharing their experiences each year on the anniversary. In 2009, a historical marker was placed near the beach commemorating the 50th anniversary
of the first wade-in. There was also a historical marker remembering the protests at the Biloxi Lighthouse and a section of U.S. 90 was renamed the “Dr. Gilbert Mason Sr. Memorial Highway.” Other memorial markers are planned that include all of the participants’ names.
Mason died in 2006, but his daughter, Angie Juzang,
is continuing his efforts with the Legacy Business League, an organization established in 2013 to provide resources and information to help minorities overcome obstacles unique to them when establishing business and professional connections.
“We are the air traffic controllers,” Juzang said. “We’re ensuring minorities can overcome obstacles to get to where they need to be and fill the legacy that was built upon the backs of people who sacrificed so much for us.”
Angie Juzang.
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