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Howdy ex-neighbor! I lived in Mississippi, near Natchez for 3 years. Nice people, and - much less bigotry there than other places I lived, i.e. Detroit, Harrisburg/York, PA, and Virginia where I live now. And I was not unaware of the social environment. I paid close attention to it. Mississippians are nice people, bad in some places like other areas, but does not deserve such a bum rap.

Sometimes the Northerners (and I grew up in Pittsburgh so I can say this) are more prejudiced, more severe, and more inclined to exclude black Americans than was once, long ago, the situation in the South.

Underneath I believe many in the North really resented the immigration of the black people after the Civil War. They had no idea that soon those running/escaping from slavery would become their neighbors. They just wanted the idea of slavery to 1) Be resolved, and 2) Not affect them. The struggle of the blacks in the northern ghettos was much more harsh than the Northerners will admit. Not that slavery was good, but the Yankees really didn't give them a more comfortable environment.

And, besides that, it was a whole lot colder and there were no wonderfully smelling gardenias, or magnolia, cypress, or great spreading oak trees dripping with Spanish Moss. Boy, I loved the beauty of that state.