Donna Ladd: From a Wall-to-Wall Racist Childhood to Equality Fighter in Mississippi

The leader of the "Jackson Free Press" rose above her poor, white background in rural Mississippi to fight for equality 24/7.

Periodically, NextTribe will present profiles of midlife women who have risen from daunting childhoods or difficult pasts to accomplish much and make a difference.

Donna Ladd, 57, is one of the most significant editors of a regional newspaper in America. Her Jackson Free Press has won numerous awards, helped widely reveal the racist education of political candidates (including one who just won election), and helped defeat the onerously sexist Personhood amendment, in addition to being a voice for progressive politics and the complex task of reckoning in a state, Mississippi, that has long been thought of as the most racist in the country.

And she got to where she is the true way—and the hard way.

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