MOUND BAYOU, Miss. — In the center of this historically Black city, once deemed “the jewel of the Delta” by President Theodore Roosevelt, dreams to revitalize an abandoned hospital building have all but dried up. This story also ran on .
It can be . An art deco sign still marks the main entrance, but the front doors are locked, and the parking lot is empty. These days, a convenience store across North Edwards Avenue is far busier than the old Taborian Hospital, which first shut down more than 40 years ago.
Myrna Smith-Thompson, who serves as executive director of the civic group that owns the property, lives 100 miles away in Memphis, Tennessee, and doesn’t know what’s to become of the deteriorating building. “I am open to suggestions,” said Smith-Thompson, whose grandfather led a Black fraternal organization now called the Knights and Daughters of Tabor. In 1942, that group established Taborian Hospital, a place staffed by Black doctors and nurses that exclusively admitted Black patients, during a time when Jim Crow laws barred them from accessing the same health care facilities as white patients.
“This is a very painful conversation,” said Smith-Thompson, who was born at Taborian Hospital in 1949. “It’s a part of my being.” A similar scenario has played out in hundreds of other rural communities across the United States, where over the past 40 years.
In that regard, the story of Mound Bayou’s hospital isn’t unique. But there’s more to this hosp.
