June 12, 1963 Medgar Evers Is Assassinated In an act of racial violence, Medgar Evers, field marshal for the NAACP, is fatally shot in the driveway of his home in Jackson, Mississippi. As a WWII veteran, he is buried with full military honors at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

One of the newest additions to the National Park System, Medgar and Myrlie Evers Home National Monument commemorates the legacies of two civil rights activists who, from their small ranch home, devoted their lives to ending racial injustice against Black Americans through local and national activism. The assassination of Medgar Evers in the carport of their home in 1963 was a catalyst for the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.