Mississippi State highways 6 and 3 intersect the center of the county in Marks, the county seat. Quitman County History
Quitman County has a highly significant Native American history with archaeological sites representing most of the pre-historic cultures. Quitman County has no historic building or sites listed on the National Register other than four Native American Mounds. The Denton site is h
ighly significant as it dates to Archaic period, approximately 4000 B.C. and appears to have been a “node of interaction” for cultural activity throughout the region. The first known settler to the site of Marks, MS was a woodsman and trapper named Moore who built a small cabin on the banks of the Coldwater River. Hill bought a large tract of land from the State including Moore’s site and cleared a large plantation of over 5,000 acres. He built a fine brick home overlooking the Coldwater River. At this time steamboats traveled up the Yazoo, the Tallahatchie, the Coldwater and the Moore Bayou. The site became known as “Hill’s Landing.”
In the 1860s a Jewish immigrant from Germany, Leopold Marks, migrated to Mississippi and sold dry goods as a foot peddler in the thinly settled area between Marks and Friars Point on the Mississippi River. His financial success was remarkable allowing him to purchase the Thomas B. Leopold Marks was elected as a state legislator from Tunica County. In 1877 he introduced the bill that carved out Quitman County from portions of Tunica, Coahoma, Panola, and Tallahatchie Counties. The name Quitman was given in honor of General John A. The area of Hill’s Landing was selected to be the county seat and was renamed “Belen” in commemoration of the battle at Belen Gates, Mexico. In that battle General Quitman bravely climbed the fortifications and replaced the United States flag over Belen Gates after it had been shot down by the enemy. Marks was founded after the Civil War in 1877. However, during the Civil War, the Coldwater River was used by Grant for his Yazoo Expedition to flank Vicksburg. A flotilla carrying some 7,000 troops accompanied by two ironclads passed through what is now Marks. Some skirmishes occurred along the river but all of Quitman County was considered “wilderness” at the time. There were no towns of significant size. WPA records describe a steamboat that sank just below Marks which could be seen at low water. Owens’ Steamboats and the Cotton Economy records the Tallahatchie wrecked at Cassidy Bayou in 1890. Cassidy Bayou Landing and Jamison Landing, both located in Marks vicinity, handled steamboat traffic and a ferry until the expansion of the railroad. According to WPA records, African American church history began just after the Civil War with the organization of Shady Grove Missionary Baptist Church in 1865 and Belmont Baptist Church in 1867. These churches are known to pre-date white churches by approximately 40 years in the WPA records. The Belen site was near the geographical center of the county, but in 1880, because of a land dispute, the supervisors moved the county nine miles west to become the present day Belen. The old site was then called “Old Belen.” Leopold Marks established a small mercantile business in “Old Belen,” established a post office, and changed the site’s name to Marks.
1906, Leopold Marks laid out a town site and sold lots. The town was incorporated in 1907 with a population of 350. In 1910, an election of the voters of the county caused the county seat to be moved back to Marks from Belen. Fire had destroyed to court house in Belen in 1908. Leopold donated 10 acres for the construction of a new court house in Marks which was completed in 1911. Marks was originally named Riverside and then changed to Marks in 1907 when the town was founded and the county seat moved here owing to Leopold Marks’ donation of land for the train station. The settlement grew with the help of Yazoo & Mississippi Valley Railroad which built a line to connect Lake Cormorant, in Desoto County, with Tutwiler, in Tallahatchie County. The “Yellow Dog,” as it was called, carried slow freights until 1905 when it began operating passenger trains. Other towns grew in the county as lands were cleared and the county became productive. Sledge, Darling, Lambert, Belen and Crowder are among the larger of these inland towns. In 1941, PMB Self founded the Riverside Oil Mill in Marks. In the 1960s it became one of the first crushers of soybeans in the South. Crushing 60,000 bushels a day made it one of the largest crushers in the world. The train had the biggest impact on the development of Marks. Bunge (former Riverside Oil Mill) was the primary user of the train in Quitman, and Kentucky-Tennessee Clay Company is second largest with its clay mining and refining business. The Savory Hotel (later named the Marks Hotel) is a building that reflects the heyday of train traffic in Marks as well as the Junction Building and Mexican Restaurant (the former depot). Marks has been in the middle of great floods – 1927, 1937, 1950, 1973, 1979, 1991 – but has never been completely under water. After 1991 the city, with help from the federal government built a ring levee and pumps to prevent future flood damage. The earthquake of 1812 may have had an impact on this area as well. Speculation exists that the Devil’s Racetrack near Lambert (an unusual geologic formation that has become part of the folklore of the region) was caused by this earthquake. Other significant events include the creation of the Quitman County history by the WPA in 1936. According to WPA records, there was also a Rosenwald School established (a school for African American youth created by the Sears founder Julius Rosenwald’s Foundation). The WPA worked on the Negro High School putting a new roof and foundation. The building still exists and is in use. In 1968, Marks was the starting point of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s “Poor People's Campaign” which was the second phase of the civil rights movement. One of nine “caravans” traveling to Washington, DC, the Marks caravan was named “The Mule Train.”
The city of Marks has always been a city of racial diversity – Jewish Americans, African Americans, Chinese Americans, German Americans, English Americans and Hispanic Americans – all sharing in the rich Delta traditions of the South. Famous citizens include the musician, Charlie Pride, Auburn University president, Clyde Muse, and CEO and organizer of Federal Express, Fred Smith. This information is adapted from a paper called “The Early History of Quitman County,” by the late W.A. Cox, the first mayor of Marks, MS., 1907-1909, and an oral history presented in 2007, author unknown.) Freeman chronicles this historic event in his The Mule Train: A Journey of Hope Remembered, (Rutledge Hill Press). Grady Hillman, Cultural Plan Consultant (2006) Schools Greenwood Leflore Inc., the Quitman County Board of Supervisors, and the Mississippi Humanities Council.
