The 2014 Meridianite picnic , held in the Queen City , coincided with the 50 th anniversary of Freedon Summer , drawing several thousand people to the event .
The idea for a reunion picnic originated in the 1960s with a group of friends : Lucille Kennedy Jackson , Steve Jackson and Annie B . Kennedy Horton , who lived in Detroit , Michigan , and Curtis Cole , Lessie Hill Cole and Clarice May Thomas , who lived in Cleveland , Ohio . The old friends had come together in Detroit for the funeral of a classmate .
After the service , they met up in a park to catch up on each other ’ s lives , Oatis said . Having not seen each other in years , the friends decided to stay in touch and plan a reunion picnic with the first one taking place in Detroit in 1967 .
“ The ones who had grown up here and worked here in the ‘ 60s had moved kind of all over the United States , but the group who started the Meridianites was people who were living in Detroit and some were living in Cleveland ,” she said .
Oatis said the original reunions were simple affairs , much like an old-fashioned picnic . Meridianites living in other cities were invited to participate , and soon chapters were formed in cities around the country where large groups of Meridian natives were living .
“ It started with people who went to T . J . Harris and then left Meridian and moved to various parts of the country ,”
In this file photo from the 2014 picnic , Dorothy Burks takes a photo of the T . J . Harris class of 1966 .
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Brown said , adding the Midwest chapter was the largest one in the early days because it was made up of Detroit , Cincinnati , Cleveland and the surrounding areas .
“ When people were leaving Meridian … they were either going to the Midwest or they were going to California ,” she said .
Nowadays , the Midwest chapter is not as large since a lot of the younger diaspora has migrated to Texas and another growing group is in the South Carolina area , she said .
The first several picnics alternated between Detroit and Cleveland , but in 1971 Chicago ’ s chapter hosted , making arrangements for everyone to stay in the same hotel , which led to the tradition of a headquarters hotel .
In 1972 , the picnic was held in Cincinnati where the tradition of the hospitality gathering was added . The following year , participants gathered in Los Angeles , where chapter hosts organized an excursion to Las Vegas , introducing the side-trip idea .
The annual picnic was first held in Meridian in 1974 with about 6,000 people attending and the organization was officially named the National Council of Meridianites , according to the chapter ’ s history . It became the tradition for the picnic to be held in
Children have fun with gigantic bubbles at the 2019 picnic .
Meridian every fifth year and travel around the country the other four years according to the host chapter . Meridianite gatherings have taken place in San Francisco ; Atlanta ; Memphis , Tennessee ; New York City ; Washington , D . C .; Birmingham , Alabama ; Milwaukee , Wisconsin , among other cities .
“ We had as many as 17 chapters around the country , and … each region would host and be totally responsible for all of the picnic ,” Brown said . “ But as we contracted … due to time and age and death and things like that , we ’ re down to five regions .”
The regions are located in the South , East , West , Northeast and Midwest .
In 2020 , when the picnic was scheduled to take place in Seattle , Washington , the COVID-19 pandemic struck and canceled the convention for the next two years , Oatis said . The picnic returned in 2022 in Houston .
“ Out of our meetings in 2022 , we made the decision that we would move from annual to biannual ,” Oatis said , adding they voted to come back to Meridian for this year ’ s gathering .
Said Brown , “ We thought Meridian would be the best place to go because we are trying to rebuild after Covid .” M
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