It's Time.

Honoring Grandmama'nem: The Cotton Pickers Who Built America

For over 400 years, millions of enslaved and sharecropping African Americans labored in the cotton fields of the Mississippi Delta—the Cotton Kingdom. Their sweat equity built Wall Street and made cotton the #1 industry in America. Yet they were never thanked, never paid, never honored. Until now.

Support our efforts to erect a monument and dedicated historical space to honor them, their sacrifices and unrequited labor.

A message from Bobby Rush, Honorary Chairman of Khafre, Inc.

A Brief Word from the Organizer of this Project:

Send Monetary Donations to:

Upcoming Events

Check back soon!

The International Cotton Pickers UNITE Movement

KHAFRE, Inc. is a Mississippi-based 501(c)(3) organization founded in 2009 by Dr. C. Sade Turnipseed. We are the epicenter of a global social movement dedicated to honoring cotton pickers, sharecroppers, and textile workers whose labor shaped the world economy—from the Mississippi Delta to Manchester, England to Segou, Mali.

Reserve Your Place on the Historic Site with a “Brick of Honor,” in Tribute to Grandmama’nem’s Legacy.

On the Cotton Pickers of America Monument & Memorial Plaza

Join us in honoring grandmama’nem and transforming America, one monumental step at a time.

Ways to Support

Purchase a Legacy Brick

Reserve your place on the historic monument plaza with a personalized brick honoring grandmama'nem.

Donate to the Movement

Support monument construction, educational programs, and cultural preservation efforts.

Attend Our Events

Join us for symposiums, exhibitions, and the annual Cotton Pickers Ball celebration.

Our Three Pillars

Monuments, Exhibitions, and Films Honoring Cotton’s Global Legacy

The Cotton Pickers Monument

The first monument in the world dedicated to those who picked cotton. Located in the Mississippi Delta, this sacred memorial honors grandmama'nem and serves as a living classroom for truth, reconciliation, and healing.

Sculptor: Ed Dwight
Honorary Chairs: Dr. Maya Angelou, Dr. B.B. King, Dr. Bobby Rush

Cotton in My Hands Exhibition

Cotton in My Hands Exhibition The world's largest collection of fine art representing cotton pickers, sharecroppers, and merchants. This exhibition showcases 40 years of collecting by Drs. Leo and Gloria McGee.

Currently on display: Mound Bayou Museum
Previous venues: MVSU, B.B. King Museum, Jackson State University

ADIRE: The Beauty in Our Land

A groundbreaking feature film honoring Africa's "cotton-pickin' ancestors" through traditional West African textile arts. Directed by Cheick Oumar Sissoko, former Minister of Culture of Mali.

Premiered: FESPACO 2025 (Pan African Film Festival)
Produced by: Sankofa Empowerment Initiative

ATTENDEES FOR SEIS

DONATIONS MADE

LEGACY BRICKS PURCHASED

HONORING THE COTTON PICKERS

"Scarred, rough, chained Black hands full of fluffy cloud-like white cotton, a poignant picture of American History. We have all come far, former Black slaves and former White slave owners. All trying to live free and fair lives in our American present. We have far to go but let us be proud that we have come this far with courage. We must not be crippled with guilt, nor with hate. It is imperative that we remember our history for it is true, one who does not learn from history is doomed to repeat it."

— Dr. Maya Angelou

Written for the Cotton Pickers Unite Movement, 2012

Why We Need Your Support

Help us honor their legacy.

It's Purpose

It is essential for America to not only pay their respects, but to honor those who lived their lives confined to plantations.

It's Potential

By erecting this monument and many others, we can help this country move forward with acknowledging the suffrage Cotton Pickers and all enslaved experienced.

It's Importance

Beyond the educational and social value this monument will provide, it will be a necessary extension of the Mississippi Delta; adding to its historical significance and tourist economy.

What Our Attendees Say

Read a few of the responses left by people who attended our Sweat Equity Investment Symposiums in the past.

It was truly an experience. There was so much knowledge and information I received that I would have never thought to consider. It really helps to have this insight so you can be aware and informed of our country's history.

Emily R.

SEIS 2015

I really didn't know what to expect at first but after attending the Symposium I can honestly say that I can't wait for the next one! It really helped me appreciate being from the Delta and learning the importance of paying respect.

Mike D.

SEIS 2016

I've heard great things about the symposium and I'm planning on going this year. As a student, I don't often get to share experiences with my peers that focus on historical aspects outside the classroom.

Dominic J.

SEIS 2017

Be Part of History in the Making

Across the Mississippi Delta, West Africa, and around the world, individuals, families, organizations, and institutions are answering the call to honor those who were never thanked. They understand that this is more than a monument—it’s an act of love, justice, and restoration.

About the Organizers

In 2009, Dr. C. Sade Turnipseed founded KHAFRE, Inc., a not-for-profit entity in the state of Mississippi, USA. Led by a team of African American legal minds, scholars, and community folks the organization articulated its mandate to establish a series of historic sites dedicated to the Cotton Pickers of America, the place, the world-renowned Cotton Kingdom, AKA the Mississippi Delta. This mandate became a Delta-wide social movement based in Indianola, MS, with the catchphrase “Transforming America, one monumental step at a time.” Thereby becoming the international movement known as The Cotton Pickers Monument and Sharecropper Historical Trail project … and Sankofa Empowerment Initiative (SEI).

KHAFRE, Inc’s positioning at the epicenter of this movement facilitates a powerful, positive, and profound shift in the perceptions about the African American experience in the cottonfields of Mississippi Delta; a shift that will necessarily reverberate throughout the state of Mississippi, the United States of America and beyond. KHAFRE’s intent is to transform lives, build communities of equality, and operate as a hub of hope and healing through its historical preservation projects – ones that seek out, connect to, and strengthen individuals, organizations, and groups of consciousness inside and outside of the Mississippi Delta … and it all begins with the narratives of the people who worked the cottonfields of the Mississippi Delta.

Here are the people that help make this possible!

C. Sade Turnipseed is a public historian (educator) and community outreach (Public Relations) specialist. She holds a BA in Radio/TV Communications, SFSU; a MS and MBA in Telecommunications and International Business Management, GGU; and a PhD in Public History, MTSU.

Linda has been working in Special Project Management for over 15 years and currently serves as Project Director for CPOA

Ed’s sculptor will display the rigorous history of “Cotton Picking” and farm labor in the Mississippi Delta.

Check out Ed’s AMAZING portfolio at eddwight.com

Clarice is a longtime teacher and youth advocate with a focus of getting kids excited about history in the Mississippi Delta.

Dr T’s Reflection

I approach cotton as both a historian and a descendant of grandmama’nem—a term I use to honor ancestors of all genders whose hands built the Cotton Kingdom of the world. Cotton is not simply a Southern crop or a relic of the past; it is a global economic system that shaped modern capitalism, labor regimes, and racial hierarchies across Africa, the Americas, and Europe.

In Cotton in My Hands, I examine cotton labor as a site of expertise, innovation, and moral economy. Drawing on historical research, material culture, and the Leo & Gloria McGee Fine Art Collection, I trace how cotton workers transformed coerced labor into enduring systems of care, cultural expression, political consciousness, and community leadership.

My work invites audiences—corporate, educational, and civic—to confront the human foundations of the global economy, and to recognize how contemporary wealth, inequality, and resilience are rooted in the lives and labor of people too often rendered invisible.

Dr. C. Sade Turnipseed

stands as a scholar, cultural steward, and visionary whose work bridges history, community memory, and global African consciousness. As a historian, educator, filmmaker, and public intellectual, she has dedicated her life to truth-telling—recovering, preserving, and amplifying African and African American narratives that have too often been marginalized or erased.

Through her scholarship and teaching at institutions such as Jackson State University and Mississippi Valley State University, Dr. Turnipseed has shaped generations of students to think critically about freedom, land, labor, and self-determination. Her work on cotton history, Black agrarian life, and cooperative Black communities—particularly in places like Davis Bend and Mound Bayou—has reframed Southern history as a site of resistance, innovation, and autonomy rather than solely oppression.

Beyond the academy, Dr. Turnipseed’s impact is profoundly public. She is the architect of major cultural and historical initiatives, including the Cotton Pickers of America Monument, Cotton Pickin’ Storytime, and youth-centered oral history projects such as Cotton Pickin’ Heroes. These efforts do more than document the past—they return dignity to labor, honor elders as knowledge keepers, and empower youth as historians of their own communities.

Her creative work in film, including ADIRE: The Beauty in Our Land and Sankofa Challenge – The Movie, reflects a Pan-African commitment to authentic storytelling. As the former Official Representative of the Diaspora for FESPACO, Dr. Turnipseed continued to build cultural bridges between Africa and its global descendants, advocating for self-defined African cinema and artistic sovereignty.

Dr. Turnipseed’s leadership is marked by courage, clarity, and care. She works at the intersection of scholarship and service, insisting that history must live in the hands of the people. Her legacy is not only found in books, films, or monuments, but in the communities she uplifts, the students she mentors, and the stories she ensures will never be forgotten.

Khafre, Inc. plans to preserve and operate da’ House of Khafre, located at 300 Main Street in downtown Indianola, as a year-round cultural, educational, and community-development center serving residents of the Mississippi Delta. Under the leadership of Executive Director Dr. Cassie Sade Turnipseed, the rehabilitated building will provide a permanent home for programs that preserve Delta history, honor the labor and legacy of cotton pickers and sharecroppers, support artists and cultural workers, engage young people, and strengthen Indianola’s historic downtown.

The building’s planned uses include rotating exhibitions, public-history interpretation, oral-history recording, archival research, lectures, community forums, youth workshops, artist talks, book signings, film screenings, Blues performances, cultural celebrations, and heritage-tourism activities. It will also serve as an orientation and program site for the Cotton Kingdom Heritage Trail, the International Cotton Pickers UNITE Movement, the Sharecroppers Hall of Fame, and related efforts to document the experiences of “Grandmama’nem”—the elders whose memories constitute an essential living archive of the Mississippi Delta.

Youth and intergenerational programming will remain central to the facility. Programs may include Front Porch University, the Young Publishers Network, Seeds of Hope Garden and healthy-living activities, the Mississippi Delta Youth Blues Competition, oral-history training, digital storytelling, arts education, leadership development, and opportunities for young people to interview elders and publish community histories. The building may also accommodate small meetings, educational retreats, visiting scholars, cultural delegations, and community-based research projects.

Khafre, Inc. will serve as the principal occupant and long-term steward of the property. Potential tenants and regular users may include mission-aligned nonprofit organizations, local artists, historians, educators, authors, heritage-tourism partners, creative entrepreneurs, and organizations working in youth development, foodways, music, preservation, and African Diaspora culture. Wallaidu The Agency may use designated office, rehearsal, training, or production space pursuant to a written, board-approved space-use agreement. Flexible rooms may also be rented for meetings, workshops, exhibitions, receptions, and other activities compatible with Khafre, Inc.’s charitable mission. All leases and use agreements will clearly define rental terms, insurance requirements, maintenance responsibilities, security procedures, and permitted uses.

Khafre, Inc.’s Board of Directors will retain fiduciary responsibility and provide policy, financial, and preservation oversight. The Executive Director will supervise day-to-day operations, partnerships, programming, fundraising, and compliance. As resources permit, a facility or operations coordinator will manage scheduling, rentals, building access, vendor relationships, routine inspections, and maintenance records. Program staff, contractors, volunteers, interns, and community advisors will support specific activities. Written policies will govern facility use, conflicts of interest, financial controls, emergency procedures, collections care, accessibility, and the protection of the building’s historic character.

Long-term operation will be supported through a diversified revenue strategy that may include grants, charitable contributions, sponsorships, memberships, program fees, earned income from appropriate rentals, ticketed cultural events, tours, merchandise, and partnerships with educational and tourism organizations. Khafre, Inc. will establish an annual operating budget and a dedicated building-maintenance reserve. A preventive-maintenance schedule will address the roof, foundation, exterior masonry, windows, electrical and plumbing systems, heating and cooling equipment, fire protection, security, accessibility features, and interior finishes. The organization will conduct regular inspections, maintain adequate property and liability insurance, document repairs, and develop a multiyear capital-improvement plan.

Through disciplined management, diversified support, and preservation-centered maintenance, da’ House of Khafre will remain an active community asset rather than a building restored without a sustainable purpose. Its continued use will contribute to downtown revitalization while creating a welcoming place where Delta residents can preserve their histories, develop their talents, educate future generations, and share the cultural significance of Indianola and the Mississippi Delta with visitors from across the nation and the African Diaspora.

It's Time.

Honoring Grandmama'nem: The Cotton Pickers Who Built America

Support our efforts to erect a monument and dedicated historical space to honor them, their sacrifices and unrequited labor.

A message from Bobby Rush, Honorary Chairman of Khafre, Inc.

A Brief Word from the Organizer of this Project:

Send Monetary Donations to:

Recent News

Here’s the latest publication by Dr. Turnipseed…

Upcoming Events

The International Cotton Pickers UNITE Movement

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