40 years ago, deputy marshals safeguarded a man's education goal and carried out a president's orders. Ole Miss was historically tied to the U.S. Marshals and the Integration of the University of Mississippi. It all began 40 years ago when James Meredith became the first black person to attend the University of Mississippi. Initially, he was denied admission because he was black, but in 1962, a federal court ordered the school., nicknamed "Ole Miss," to admit Meredith. President Kennedy sent deputy marshals to assist Meredith attend the university safely.

On September 30, 1962, the Ole Miss roil erupts as James Meredith prepares to attend his first class. Some three thousand individuals, including students, local citizens, and Klan groups from Florida to Texas, encouraged by previous remarks made by Governor Ross Barnett against desegregation, fought against U.S. Marshals with bricks, sticks, bottles, and homemade bombs. After doing all he could to avoid it, President Kennedy finally ordered more than twenty thousand U.S. Army soldiers, headquartered in nearby Memphis, to restore order on the campus. When it ended, two people were dead and sixty marshals had been injured. After graduating in 1963, he spent a year studying in Nigeria, then returned to the United States to obtain a law degree from Columbia University.

In 1966, while still a law student, he began a "march against fear" from Tennessee to Mississippi to bring publicity for a voter registration drive. A sniper wounded him on the second day of his march. The march was later continued under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr., of SCLC, Floyd McKissick of CORE and Stokely Carmichael of SNCC. The same year, Meredith published an autobiographical account entitled Three Years in Mississippi. After graduating, he became a businessman in New York City and maintained his involvement in the civil rights movement. From 1989 to 1991, Meredith served as a policy advisor to conservative Republican Senator Jesse Helms, who only ten years earlier had opposed the establishment of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.