The town of Pace is located in the center of Bolivar County, Mississippi, 12 miles east of the Mississippi River. It is in the Delta, an alluvial plain resulting from the deposits of the flooding of the river. This is some of the most fertile soil in the world.
The town developed late in the history of the state. It is named for
one of the men who bought and cleared the land in 1905. Lumbering was followed
by farming, the major crops being cotton, rice and soybeans. Because of
the mechanization of cotton production and the minimum wage law, employment
in the area decreased drastically.
Appproximately
20,000 people have left Bolivar County during the past 20 years, resulting
in the closing of the railroad, high school and many Pace businesses. The
population had decreased to 630 with a high proportion being elders.
Approximately 50 percent of the residents receive some kind of government financial assistance. Seventy percent of all families have an income of less than $5,000 a year. Housing was below standard in Pace. The water system was in need of repair and the town had no sanitation system. Only 5 percent of the residents owned any farmland.
A shift in community leadership occured in 1973 with the election of a black mayor and council. The key to unblocking the future of Pace was in opening up employment opportunities and finding the means of structuring and training the community so that its efforts could be made effective.
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