Dr. Felicia King has always had an entrepreneurial and a free spirit about her.
She had not even turned 2 years old when her grandfather, Estel “Ty” King passed away and left her parents multiple rental properties in the Bear’s Den district in Indianola.
The more she learned about her grandfather, and one of those rental houses on Oklahoma Avenue, the more clear things became.
King is currently the sole owner of what was the Indianola Freedom House during the Civil Rights Movement.
For the last 10 years, she has been working any connection she can to assist with the preservation of the small home, which had both roof
and foundation issues when she took ownership in 2014.
“I used to wonder where I got this entrepreneurial spirit from, because I’ve always wanted to be a business owner, even as a young child,” King said. “Later on, I found out through this project, my grandfather was a successful bootlegger. That’s where I get the entrepreneurial spirit from.”
King sat down with The Enterprise-Tocsin for an interview, days after the Mississippi Heritage Trust announced a partnership with the Melon Foundation to fund some much-needed foundation work at the home, as part of the Mississippi Freedom Houses Stabilization Project.
“When I initially called, there were two gaping holes in the roof,” King said. “The foundation needed repairing, and there was some termite activity. I was truly amazed that the house was still standing in 2014.”
The stabilization project might not have been possible had it not been for King’s initial calls to multiple state agencies after inheriting the home.
One of those calls, to the Mississippi Heritage Trust, raised enough interest that the organization eventually established a project to recognize and hopefully preserve the existing Freedom Houses around the state.
“The Mississippi Heritage Trust has created the Mississippi Freedom Houses Project, that started with my phone call,” King said.
The project currently includes five houses statewide.
So far, the Indianola property has received significant roof repairs, but there is much more work to be done in order to bring the house up to standard so that visitors can walk through without fear of falling through a floor.
King said that the house was one of several that was owned by “Ty Kang,” which was how she said many people in the community referred to her grandfather.
“It’s a cultural thing to identify him as Mr. Kang. It put some respect on his name,” King said.
Indianola’s first Freedom House, King said, was owned by Irene McGruder, and it was bombed in the mid-1960s.
“Thankfully, she was ahead of her time, because this Black woman, during the Civil Rights Movement, had (homeowners) insurance, so she was able to get her house rebuilt,” King said.
But the Movement needed to continue undeterred, so the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee approached her grandfather about the Oklahoma Street property.
“I was told that he said without hesitation, ‘sure,’” she said.
King said that another firebombing was attempted on the King home, but someone inside the house was able to throw the apparent cocktail back out of the window before it could explode.
Thanks to the recent funding, King said there is a bright future for Indianola’s Freedom House.
She said that there is currently an effort to come up with an official definition of a Freedom House, and that is being done with input from Civil Rights workers and leaders from the 1960s.
King, who owns a chiropractic practice in the Jackson area, is hoping to incorporate a health theme in the project.
That is still in the works. In the meantime, King is grateful that funding is now available to help keep the house and its bones steady, and she is hoping for a full restoration in the near future.
