Historic Hometown car tags to help shine the light on small Mississippi towns

PEARL, Miss. (WLBT) -The charm and character of small towns could soon be on display while you take a drive. Main Street was where you’d find most of the activity in a small town. The Mississippi Main Street Association is working with towns across the state to help those hubs make comebacks.

“Small towns are the backbone of Mississippi,” said MS Main Street Executive Director Thomas Gregory.

And Pearl, Mississippi, with a population of just over 27,000, is one of the small towns the Mississippi Main Street Association is working with to create a robust downtown area. The non-profit organization works with a network of more than 50 main street communities to promote and revitalize their historic downtowns.

Pearl’s version is in the works. It’s being called Midtown Pearl and will be located near the City Hall Complex.

“Their citizens wanted to create an authentic downtown-like place in their community,” said Gregory. “And they wanted to build that on the principals of the main street approach which we use in our communities.”

To help promote small towns in the state, the agency is offering a specialty license plate that features some of the state’s landmarks. Included are the Mississippi River Bridge in Vicksburg, the State Capitol, Meridian’s Three Foot Building and the Biloxi Lighthouse.

“We’re gonna use those proceeds to promote all of our historic communities in the Mississippi Main Street network,” added Gregory. “After World War II a lot of our downtowns saw decline and de-investment, and there was a movement in the late 70′s early 80′s to bring back our downtowns as vibrant communities. So that’s what Main Street’s all about.”

The Historic Hometown license plates will be printed when 300 are ordered. As of mid-August, 75 have been requested. To learn more about the specialty tags, go to www.msmainstreet.com.

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