Youth team at The Yards. Photograph by RAM arts.
Columbia · Marion County · Mississippi
Home of Hall of Famers.
Two Pro Football Hall of Famers were born in this town of 6,525. So was a Blues Hall of Famer. And the first rodeo in America held at night under electric lights was right here, on the high school ball field.
The short version
Walter Payton
Five halls, one hometown.
Walter Payton was born in Columbia in 1954 and played at Jefferson High School before transferring to Columbia High for his senior year in 1970 — the year the two schools integrated. He is a member of five halls of fame:
- Pro Football Hall of Fame — 1993
- Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame — 1993
- College Football Hall of Fame — 1996
- National Black College Alumni Hall of Fame — 1988
- National High School Hall of Fame — 2022
In November 2011 the Pro Football Hall of Fame brought its Hometown Hall of Famer honor to Columbia and installed a permanent plaque and bust at the Charles L. Boston Athletic Complex at Columbia High School. Three road signs went up around town at the same time.
The plaque is still there. It is a good place to start if you want to show somebody what this town has produced.
Population 6,525 — U.S. Census Bureau, Vintage 2025 Population Estimates (1 July 2025) for Columbia city, Mississippi. Source figure supplied by the City Clerk's office, August 2026.
Two brothers from Columbia Two brothers from Columbia
Eddie and Walter.
Eddie in 39. Walter in 34. Two boys from the same house in Columbia, Mississippi, on an NFL sideline at the same time — Eddie returning kicks, Walter becoming the best running back the game had seen.
Eddie was the older brother and he went first: Jackson State, then the NFL. Walter followed him to Jackson State in 1971. That order matters. The most famous athlete Mississippi ever produced took his cue from his big brother, and both of them learned the game on fields in this town.
They are each in a hall of fame now — Walter in five of them, Eddie in the Black College Golf Coaches Hall of Fame's first class in 2022, for the decades he spent coaching at Jackson State after he stopped playing.
Also from here
The other names on the list.
Jackie Smith — Pro Football Hall of Fame, 1994. Born in Columbia; raised and schooled in Kentwood, Louisiana. One of the finest tight ends the game has had, and the second Hall of Famer this town can claim by birth.
Eagle Day — Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame, 1981. Born in Columbia, an All-SEC quarterback at Ole Miss and later a Most Valuable Player in the Canadian Football League. If you have ever driven down Eagle Day Avenue, now you know who it is named for.
Wolf Stephenson — Blues Hall of Fame, 2016, and the Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame, 2017. Born in Columbia, he became an engineer and co-builder of Malaco Records in Jackson, the label behind an enormous share of Southern soul and blues. A town known for football also produced a national Blues Hall of Famer.
Eddie Payton — Black College Golf Coaches Hall of Fame, 2022, in its first class. Born in Columbia, a returner in the NFL, and for many years the golf coach at Jackson State. Walter's older brother.
September 24–26, 1935
The first rodeo in America held under electric lights.
Mississippi's first rodeo was held on the Columbia High School baseball field over three days in September 1935. It is recognized as the first outdoor rodeo in the nation staged at night under electric lights.
It was put on by two local businessmen — rancher Samuel Hickman of the B Bar H Ranch and George Baylis, who owned Baylis Drug Store. Among the cowboys who competed was Earl Bascom, later called the Father of Modern Rodeo. In 1936 Bascom designed and supervised the building of Mississippi's first permanent rodeo arena, here in Columbia.
The Mississippi Department of Archives and History marked the site in 2018 — the state's first historical marker devoted to the sport of rodeo. The Mississippi Rodeo Hall of Fame is based in Columbia, and Texas Rose Bascom, billed as the Queen of the Mississippi Cowgirls, made her professional debut at the Columbia rodeo in 1937 and became the hall's first woman inductee.
Neither of the Bascoms was from Mississippi. Columbia is simply where their rodeo was made.
Marion County Sports Hall of Fame
The county keeps its own list.
The Marion County Sports Hall of Fame inducted its 2023 class on July 20 of that year at The Church on Main. The class: Joey Porter, Jean Bourne, Buddy Blair, Gary Smyly, Paul Pounds, Bobby Hamilton, and Claudis James. Earlier inductees include Bobby Joe Oswalt, Eagle Matulich, Eagle Day, and Walter Payton.
Bobby Hamilton was born in Columbia, played at East Marion and Southern Miss, and won two Super Bowls as a defensive lineman with New England.
Claudis James, inducted after his death and accepted by his widow Emma, was born in Columbia, played at Jackson State, and was drafted by the Green Bay Packers in 1967. He also founded Columbia's first Dixie Youth Baseball league — which is to say some of the names further down this page grew up playing in something he started.
Not finished yet
Still playing.
Logan Cooke — Columbia Academy, then Mississippi State, now the punter for the Jacksonville Jaguars. Pro Bowl in 2024 and 2025, and second-team All-Pro in 2024.
Johnathan Abram — East Marion, then Mississippi State, a first-round draft pick in 2019.
Jaheim Oatis — Columbia High, then Alabama, now Ole Miss.
K. J. Cloyd — Columbia High, then Louisville and Miami, now in the Canadian Football League.
C. J. Cloyd — K. J.'s brother, also still playing ball.
Kentrel Bullock — Columbia High, then Ole Miss and South Alabama, signed by Cincinnati in 2026.
Marion County
Know a name we missed?
This list covers Columbia and Marion County, and it is almost certainly incomplete — halls of fame for music, rodeo, coaching, and the military do not all keep searchable records. If someone from here belongs on it, tell us and we will look into it.