Jefferson Davis - Legacy

Legacy

Numerous memorials were created to Jefferson Davis. Examples include the 351-foot (107 m) concrete obelisk located at the Jefferson Davis State Historic Site in Fairview, Christian County, Kentucky, marking his birthplace. Construction of the monument began in 1917 and finished in 1924.

The Jefferson Davis Presidential Library was established at Beauvoir Plantation, the white-columned Biloxi mansion that was Davis's final home, in 1998, after its use for some years as a Confederate Veterans Home. Dedicated in 1998, the house and library were damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The house reopened in 2008. Bertram Hayes-Davis, Davis's great-great grandson, was recently hired as executive director of Beauvoir, which is owned by the Mississippi Division Sons of Confederate Veterans.

Based at Rice University in Houston, Texas, The Papers of Jefferson Davis is an editing project to publish documents related to Davis. Since the early 1960s, it has published 12 volumes, the first in 1971 and most recently in 2008; three more volumes are planned. The project has roughly 100,000 documents in its archives.

The birthday of Jefferson Davis is commemorated in several states. His birthday, June 3, is celebrated in Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana and Tennessee; in Alabama, it is celebrated on the first Monday in June. In Mississippi, the last Monday of May (Memorial Day) is celebrated as "National Memorial Day and Jefferson Davis' Birthday". In Texas, "Confederate Heroes Day" is celebrated on January 19, the birthday of Robert E. Lee; Jefferson Davis’ birthday had been officially celebrated on June 3 but was combined with Lee's birthday in 1973.

In 1913, the United Daughters of the Confederacy conceived the Jefferson Davis Memorial Highway, a transcontinental highway to be built through the South. Portions of the highway's route in Virginia, Alabama and other states still bear the name of Jefferson Davis. On September 20, 2011, the County Board of Arlington County, Virginia voted to change the name of "Old Jefferson Davis Highway" (the original route of the road in the County) after the chairman of the Board, Chris Zimmerman, who was originally from the Northeast, stated: "I have a problem with 'Jefferson Davis' ... There are aspects of our history I'm not particularly interested in celebrating. I don't believe Jefferson Davis has a historic connection to anything in Arlington. He wasn't from Virginia".