Ira B. Harkey Jr. (January 15, 1918 – October 8, 2006) was an American writer, professor of journalism, and editor and publisher of the ''
Pascagoula
The Pascagoula (also Pascoboula, Pacha-Ogoula, Pascagola, Pascaboula, Paskaguna) were an indigenous group living in coastal Mississippi on the Pascagoula River.
The name ''Pascagoula'' is a Mobilian Jargon term meaning "bread people". Choctaw ...
Chronicle-Star'' in Mississippi from 1951 to 1963. Harkey was awarded the
Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing
The Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing is one of the fourteen American Pulitzer Prizes that are annually awarded for Journalism. It has been awarded since 1917 for distinguished editorial writing, the test of excellence being clearness of style ...
in 1963 for his anti-segregation editorials during the civil rights crisis surrounding the admission of
James Meredith
James Howard Meredith (born June 25, 1933) is an American civil rights activist, writer, political adviser, and Air Force veteran who became, in 1962, the first African-American student admitted to the racially segregated University of Missis ...
, a black man, to the
University of Mississippi
The University of Mississippi ( byname Ole Miss) is a public research university that is located adjacent to Oxford, Mississippi, and has a medical center in Jackson. It is Mississippi's oldest public university and its largest by enrollment. ...
at
Oxford, Mississippi
Oxford is a city and college town in the U.S. state of Mississippi. Oxford lies 75 miles (121 km) south-southeast of Memphis, Tennessee, Memphis, Tennessee, and is the county seat of Lafayette County, Mississippi, Lafayette County. Founded i ...
Tulane University
Tulane University, officially the Tulane University of Louisiana, is a private research university in New Orleans, Louisiana. Founded as the Medical College of Louisiana in 1834 by seven young medical doctors, it turned into a comprehensive pu ...
, where he was a brother with the
Delta Kappa Epsilon
Delta Kappa Epsilon (), commonly known as ''DKE'' or ''Deke'', is one of the oldest fraternities in the United States, with fifty-six active chapters and five active colonies across North America. It was founded at Yale College in 1844 by fift ...
fraternity (Tau Lambda chapter), with an undergraduate degree in
journalism
Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree. The word, a noun, applies to the occupation (pro ...
in 1941 and then served aboard the aircraft carrier ''
USS Hancock (CV-19)
USS ''Hancock'' (CV/CVA-19) was one of 24 s built during World War II for the United States Navy. The ship was the fourth US Navy ship to bear the name and was named for Founding Father John Hancock, president of the Second Continental Congre ...
'' in the
Pacific theater
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...
during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...
. After the war, Harkey worked as a reporter for the New Orleans ''
Times-Picayune
''The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate'' is an American newspaper published in New Orleans, Louisiana, since January 25, 1837. The current publication is the result of the 2019 acquisition of ''The Times-Picayune'' (itself a result of th ...
'' newspaper. He later wrote of the existence of “a flat rule that Negroes were not to appear in photographs” at the ''Times-Picayune''; it was a standard practice at the newspaper for African Americans to be airbrushed out of crowd scene images.
Harkey purchased the ''Chronicle-Star'' in 1949. He immediately began making changes to how the paper wrote about the people who lived in
Jackson County, Mississippi
Jackson County is a county located in the U.S. state of Mississippi. As of the 2010 census, the population was 139,668, making it the fifth-most populous county in Mississippi. Its county seat is Pascagoula. The county was named for Andrew Ja ...
. At the time, it was newspaper style convention to refer to white men and women with the "Mr." or "Mrs." honorific but this courtesy was never extended to blacks. Harkey began to add the honorific to black women such as teachers and nurses. He eliminated what was then common practice in Southern newspapers to identify the subjects of an article, if they were black, with the term "colored". Under Harkey's direction, a subject's race was only ever mentioned when it was material to the news, such as a physical description of a fugitive. He published many editorials and the ''Chronicle Star'' became known as the one paper that would publish opinions opposed to
Ross Barnett
Ross Robert Barnett (January 22, 1898November 6, 1987) was the Governor of Mississippi from 1960 to 1964. He was a Southern Democrat who supported racial segregation.
Early life
Background and learning
Born in Standing Pine in Leake County, ...
, then Governor of Mississippi. In December 1962, Harkey published a series of five articles titled "The Oxford Disaster...Price of Defiance" by Pascagoula lawyer and state legislator
Karl Wiesenburg
Otto Karl Wiesenburg (August 1, 1911 – June 18, 1990) was an American legislator, lawyer, and public servant. He was a member of the Mississippi House of Representatives from 1956 to 1964 and held various other roles in public service for Pasc ...
which showed Barnett had no legal basis for his actions.
During the course of his ownership of the ''Chronicle-Star'', Harkey's home was subject to a burning cross on the lawn of his home, and a shot was fired at the ''Chronicle-Star'' office. His autobiographical account of his experience owning the paper, ''The Smell of Burning Crosses'', takes its name from that event.