Ridgeland was chartered as a village in 1899 and incorporated as a town in 1947. The first town hall was a wooden structure near the Jackson and Maple Streets intersection, and was also used as a school, a church and a place for entertainment. The current city hall, which was dedicated in 2021, is the …
Named for the Choctaw Indian Agency, once located in this area, Old Agency Road is a portion of the original road system that formed the old Natchez Trace. Its sunken roadbed, high earthen banks, and tree canopy are evocative of the narrow road that linked Natchez to Nashville during the early days of our nation–once …
Greenwood Plantation, located off of Old Agency Road, was built in 1854 by Colonel William F. Battley, Sr. (1813 – 1871). Colonel Battley was a wealthy planter who moved to Madison County from North Carolina to establish a cotton plantation. The Battley family owned the property until 1925; the Redmont family then owned it until …
In 1811, the acting Choctaw agent, Silas Dinsmoor, moved the agency to this site. Listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1995, the site encompasses a 3.3-mile segment of the old Natchez Trace and an archaeological site where the government agency for the Choctaw was housed from 1811 to 1823.
In 1896 two investors from Chicago, Edward M. Treakle and Gorton W. Nichols, purchased a large parcel of land from the Yellowley family. In 1900, Nichols, R. H. Thompson and W. H. Shergold formed The Highland Colony Company and began marketing the property to settlers from the Midwestern states.
The Craftsmen’s Guild of Mississippi was organized in 1973. Originally composed of some thirty-five craftsmen, membership has grown to several hundred artists and craftsmen from across the Southeast. Originally housed in a log cabin on the Natchez Trace Parkway, the Mississippi Craft Center was relocated to a state-of-the-art facility on Rice Road in 2007 and …
The Village of Ridgeland, now known as Old Town, was clustered around the Illinois Central Railroad. Before the village was chartered in 1899, there was a train depot and hotel. One of the first industries was the Ridgeland Wagon Works, established in 1901.
During Ridgeland’s early years, several churches were located in the Old Town area. The oldest chartered church was Simon Hill Missionary Baptist Church, built in 1874. The Presbyterian Church was organized in 1899, followed by St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in 1900 and the Methodist Church in 1901. Ridgeland’s Baptist Church was established in 1947.
Once part of the original Yellowley Plantation, this was the burial ground for the Yellowley and Perkins families. The family graves face west, toward the old home site. Named for Jessamine “Jessie” Perkins Yellowley, wife of James Brownlow Yellowley, the cemetery was deeded to Ridgeland by the family in 1927. A number of elected officials …
