Theodore G. Bilbo - Death

Death

Bilbo retired to his "Dream House" estate in Poplarville, Mississippi, where he wrote and published a summary of his racial ideas entitled Take Your Choice: Separation or Mongrelization (Dream House Publishing Company, 1947). His house, which served as the namesake and office of his publishing company, burned down in late fall that year, with the fire consuming many copies of the book.

Bilbo died at the age of 69 in New Orleans, Louisiana. On his deathbed he summoned Leon Louis, the editor of the black newspaper Negro South to make a statement:

I am honestly against the social intermingling of Negroes and Whites but I hold nothing personal against the Negroes as a race. They should be proud of their God-given heritage just as I am proud of mine. I believe Negroes should have the right, and in Mississippi too—when their main purpose is not to put me out of office and when they won't try to besmirch the reputation of my state.

Bilbo was treated at the forerunner of New Orleans' Ochsner Medical Center called Ochsner Clinic. An orderly named Frank Wilderson, an African-American student at Xavier University (later a vice president at the University of Minnesota), worked part time at the Oschner Clinic at the time. After Bilbo died, the orderly staff left his body in the room until Wilderson began work later that night, so that the African-American orderly could remove the body of the segregationist. Wilderson said in a 2004 newspaper article, "the moment was stark because alive he would have resisted any attempt for me to touch him."

His funeral at Juniper Grove Cemetery in Poplarville was attended by 5,000 mourners, including the governor and the junior senator. A bronze statue of Bilbo was placed in the rotunda of the Mississippi state Capitol building. It was relocated to another room, which is now frequently used by the Legislative Black Caucus. Some of the members use the statue's outstretched arm as a coat rack.