| Mendenhall, Mississippi | |
| Settlement Type: | City |
| Mapsize: | 250px |
| Pushpin Map: | USA |
| Pushpin Map Caption: | Location in the United States |
| Subdivision Type: | Country |
| Subdivision Name: | United States |
| Subdivision Type1: | State |
| Subdivision Name1: | Mississippi |
| Subdivision Type2: | County |
| Subdivision Name2: | Simpson |
| Government Type: | Mayor-Council |
| Leader Title: | Mayor |
| Leader Name: | Todd Booth |
| Leader Title1: | Board of Aldermen |
| Leader Name1: | Donnie Thomas Robert Mangum Jana Miller Sandra Weeks Tim Gray |
| Unit Pref: | Imperial |
| Area Footnotes: | [1] |
| Area Total Km2: | 13.89 |
| Area Land Km2: | 13.85 |
| Area Water Km2: | 0.03 |
| Area Total Sq Mi: | 5.36 |
| Area Land Sq Mi: | 5.35 |
| Area Water Sq Mi: | 0.01 |
| Population As Of: | 2020 |
| Population Total: | 2199 |
| Population Density Km2: | 158.74 |
| Population Density Sq Mi: | 411.18 |
| Timezone: | Central (CST) |
| Utc Offset: | -6 |
| Timezone Dst: | CDT |
| Utc Offset Dst: | -5 |
| Elevation M: | 102 |
| Elevation Ft: | 335 |
| Coordinates: | 31.9611°N -89.8675°W |
| Postal Code Type: | ZIP code |
| Postal Code: | 39114 |
| Area Code: | 601 |
| Blank Name: | FIPS code |
| Blank Info: | 28-46600 |
| Blank1 Name: | GNIS feature ID |
| Blank1 Info: | 0673476 |
| Flag Size: | 111px |
Mendenhall is a city in Simpson County, Mississippi, United States. The population was 2,504 at the 2010 census. It is the county seat of Simpson County.[2] Mendenhall is part of the Jackson Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Mendenhall was originally called Edna, to honor the wife of developer Phillip Didlake. After learning that a town with that name already existed in Mississippi, the city had its name changed to Mendenhall to honor Thomas Mendenhall, a citizen and lawyer from Westville, Mississippi (which has become a ghost town).[3]
Mendenhall is the county seat of Simpson County. The county courthouse was built in 1907[4] by architect Andrew J. Byron.[4]
Weathersby, named for one of its founding families, was an unincorporated census-designated community 2.7miles southeast of Mendenhall, and 7.4miles northeast of Magee. According to Charles Baldwin, Simpson County Tax Collector, Mendenhall annexed Weathersby in the 1980s.[5]
According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 5.3sqmi, of which 5.3sqmi is land and 0.04sqmi (0.37%) is water.
| White (non-Hispanic) | 1,348 | 61.3% | |
| Black or African American (non-Hispanic) | 743 | 33.79% | |
| Native American | 2 | 0.09% | |
| Asian | 3 | 0.14% | |
| Other/Mixed | 74 | 3.37% | |
| Hispanic or Latino | 29 | 1.32% |
Mendenhall had a movie theatre called the Star Theatre,[7] built by Edgar French, Ben Slay and Lonnie Burnham. Located on Main Street, the building boasted a one-screen auditorium with a balcony. It also featured a pool hall and three offices upstairs, one of which housed the city's Chamber of Commerce. The theatre opened for business on November 9, 1938 with the western Born to the West. The price of admission was 11 cents and a box of popcorn was a dime. A man from Prentiss was initially hired to run the theatre, but he was soon "sent packing" and Edgar French told his son, George Lewis French, "You're taking over that picture show".
Lewis French, who had worked in his father's ice plant growing up and was trained as a bookkeeper at Clarks Commercial College in Jackson, had no experience in running a movie theatre. He went to New Orleans to learn how to book movies and run the projection equipment. Aside from time spent serving in Europe as a radio man during World War II, French continued to operate the Star Theatre until he decided to close it in 1971.[8]
During the late 1960s, the Star Theatre had problems with vandalism and growing racial tensions among its young patrons who objected to maintaining segregation. Under Jim Crow customs, black customers were required to sit in the segregated balcony and this only changed after new U.S. legislation was enacted and ended such practices.
In October 1979, a newly remodeled and fully integrated Star Theatre reopened under the ownership of Danny Collins, a young local entrepreneur. Its first movie was the Chuck Norris film A Force of One. The theatre enjoyed revived popularity until competition from video arcades and cable TV forced Collins to close some three years later.
The theatre was repainted when used as a location for the film My Dog Skip. Heavy rains caused the roof to collapse in April 2008. The theatre burned down in 2016.