Greenwood, Mississippi

Greenwood is a city in and the county seat of Leflore County, Mississippi, United States. It is located approximately 96 miles north of the state capital, Jackson, at the eastern edge of the Mississippi Delta; Memphis, Tennessee is 130 miles to its north. As of the 2020 census, Greenwood had a population of 14,490. It is the principal city of the Greenwood Micropolitan Statistical Area.

The first European-American settlement in the area was established in 1834 next to the Yazoo River. A nearby settlement was founded by Chief Greenwood Leflore. The city was incorporated as "Greenwood" in 1844. It became a center of cotton planting in the 19th century, as it is located in the fertile Mississippi delta, and became a port for shipping cotton to markets along the Mississippi. Railroads built in the 1880s bolstered the local economy, especially the cotton business. In the first half of the 20th century, Cotton growing and processing became largely mechanized, reducing the need for sharecroppers and farmerworkers. Later in the 20th century, some farmers shifted to corn and soybeans.

Sally Humphreys Gwin planted 1,000 oak trees along the city's Grand Boulevard. Stokely Carmichael gave his "Black Power" speech in Greenwood in 1966.