Biography

James Chaney was born on May 30, 1943 in Meridian, Mississippi, USA. He died on June 21, 1964 in Neshoba County, Mississippi, USA.

He, along with Michael Schwerner & Andrew Goodman, were killed in their car on Rock Cut Road, right off Highway 19 in Neshoba County (near Philadelphia) in June 1964. They were members of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). Chaney was black and Goodman & Schwerner were white. The movie, Murder in Mississippi (1990), is based on this incident.

The families of Andrew Goodman and Mickey Schwerner wanted their sons buried alongside James Chaney but Mississippi law prohibited it. Chaney was buried alone in a segregated cemetery.

Posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Barack Obama 24 November 2014.

His murder, along with Michael Schwerner and Andrew Goodman, by the Ku Klux Klan is depicted in the 1965 Norman Rockwell painting entitled, "Murder in Mississippi", which is held in the permanent collection of the Norman Rockwell Museum.