List of Famous people born in Mississippi, United States of America
Spencer Haywood
Spencer Haywood is an American former professional basketball player and Olympic Gold Medalist. Haywood is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, being inducted in 2015.
Fletcher Cox
Fletcher Cox is an American football defensive tackle for the Philadelphia Eagles of the National Football League (NFL). He was drafted 12th overall by the Eagles in the 2012 NFL Draft. He played college football at Mississippi State. Cox is a Super Bowl champion and has been selected to the Pro Bowl six times.
Sela Ward
Sela Ann Ward is an American actress, author, and producer. Her breakthrough TV role was as Teddy Reed in the NBC drama series Sisters (1991–96), for which she received her first Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 1994. She received her second Primetime Emmy Award and Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Drama for the leading role of Lily Manning in the ABC drama series Once and Again (1999–2002). Ward later had the recurring role of Stacy Warner in the Fox medical drama House, also starred as Jo Danville in the CBS police procedural CSI: NY (2010–2013) and starred as Dana Mosier in the CBS police procedural series FBI (2018–2019).
Robin Roberts
Robin René Roberts is an American television broadcaster. Roberts is the anchor of ABC's Good Morning America.
Barbara Siggers Franklin
Barbara Vernice Franklin was the mother of American singer–songwriter Aretha Franklin and wife of C. L. Franklin, the African-American Baptist minister of New Bethel Baptist Church in Detroit, Michigan.
Hayley Williams
Hayley Nichole Williams is an American singer, songwriter, musician, and businesswoman who is best known as the lead vocalist, primary songwriter, and keyboardist of the rock band Paramore.
Sarah Thomas
Sarah Thomas is an American football official, currently for the National Football League (NFL), who wears uniform number 53. Thomas was the first woman to officiate a major college football game, the first to officiate a bowl game, and the first to officiate in a Big Ten stadium. On April 8, 2015, Thomas was hired as the first full-time female official in NFL history, and for the 2020 NFL season, she is on the officiating crew headed by referee Shawn Hochuli.
Mary Wilson
Mary Wilson is an American vocalist, concert performer, music rights activist, motivational speaker, author and former U.S. Cultural Ambassador. Wilson is best known as a founding member and longest member of the Supremes, who during the 1960s became Motown's most successful act, and are the best-charting female group in US history, as well as one of the world's best-selling girl groups of all time. The group released a record-setting twelve number-one hit singles on the US Billboard Hot 100: "Where Did Our Love Go", "Baby Love", "Come See About Me", "Stop! In the Name of Love", "Back in My Arms Again", "I Hear a Symphony", "You Can't Hurry Love", "You Keep Me Hangin' On", "Love is Here and Now You're Gone", "The Happening", "Love Child", and "Someday We'll Be Together". However, Wilson did not sing background on "Love Child" or "Someday We'll Be Together". Wilson remained with the group following the departures of other original members, Florence Ballard in 1967 and Diana Ross in 1970. Following Wilson's own departure in 1977, the group disbanded. Wilson later became a New York Times Best Seller in 1986 with the release of her autobiography, Dreamgirl: My Life As a Supreme, a record setter for sales in its genre, and later Supreme Faith: Someday We'll Be Together; both books later were released as an updated combination. Continuing a successful career as a concert performer, Wilson also became a musicians' rights activist as well as a musical theater performer and organizer of various museum displays of the Supremes' famed costumes. Wilson was inducted along with Ross and Ballard into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1988.
Marsha Blackburn
Marsha Blackburn is an American politician and businesswoman serving as the senior United States Senator from Tennessee since 2019. A member of the Republican Party, Blackburn previously served in the U.S. House for Tennessee's 7th congressional district from 2003 to 2019. She was also a State Senator from 1999 to 2003. On November 6, 2018, she became the first woman to be elected to the U.S. Senate from Tennessee, defeating former Democratic Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen.
Floyd Mayweather, Sr.
Floyd Mayweather, Sr. is an American boxing trainer and former professional boxer who competed from 1974 to 1990. Fighting at welterweight during the 1970s and 1980s, Mayweather Sr. was known for his defensive abilities and overall knowledge of boxing strategy. He is the father and former trainer of undefeated five-division boxing champion Floyd Mayweather.