Second grade visits museum

Special to The Canton News
The Goodloe Elementary School second-graders took a field trip to the Mississippi Agriculture & Forestry Museum. Students enjoyed learning about farming and forestry in Mississippi. In 1969, Commissioner of Agriculture and Commerce Jim Buck Ross, recognizing a need for the preservation of culture and heritage in a tangible way, began collecting artifacts, organizing scholars, and laying a ground work for a museum. In 1978, the City of Jackson donated a 39-acre site on Lakeland Drive and Interstate 55. This land could only be used for recreational purposes under specified stipulations of the State of Mississippi, which originally had owned the land. Funds from this appropriation were used to complete the structure itself, and another $1.5 million was sought from the private sector by the non-profit Agriculture and Forestry Museum Foundation.