NATCHEZ — Despite risks and rising racial tensions, a bond was formed in 1966 between a black civil rights activist and an aspiring white politician that would help build a bridge between blacks and whites in the area during the Civil Rights Movement.

That bond would eventually grow into a lifelong friendship between activist and former Fayette mayor Charles Evers and former Natchez mayor Tony Byrne.

The two sat down for a discussion moderated by retired instructor and historian Jim Wiggins about the Civil Rights Movement in Natchez Tuesday during the Natchez Historical Society’s annual meeting at The Hotel Vue.

After initial involvement in civil rights activism in the 1940s and 1950s, Evers left for Chicago after his businesses were destroyed because of his civil rights work, Wiggins said.

It was in Chicago in 1963 where Evers found out his brother and NAACP field secretary Medgar Evers had been assassinated in Jackson.

“You had a lot of reasons to be bitter and angry, but ultimately you became a moderating influence,” Wiggins said.

Evers returned to Mississippi to take up his brother’s fight, and said he realized that voting rights would be a key in creating equality between blacks and whites.

It would be three years after his brother was killed that Evers would meet Byrne and the two would work with others, at times behind the scenes, to facilitate race relations in the area.

In a time when many whites were not moderate on matters of race, Wiggins asked Byrne why he chose to take the stance he did.

Byrne told the story of when he and fellow Mississippi State University basketball players traveled to Evansville, Indiana, for a championship game. When it was discovered the team would be playing against black players with University of Evansville, the team was summoned home.

The Mississippi State team, Byrne said, had faced black opponents in prior games and could not understand why they would not be permitted to play.

“Coach (Babe) McCarthy … came in and said, ‘Boys, we’re going home,’” Byrne said. “We said, ‘Hell no, we’re not. We’ve worked hard, and we want to play.’”

Byrne said McCarthy explained that he nor the team had a choice, because state legislators did not want them to play against black players.

The team was instructed to get on the bus and not talk to any members of the media.

As the team was attempting to leave, a crowd of white people gathered around the bus and began rocking it and throwing things. The police came, confiscated the bus driver’s license, and the team was only permitted to leave, Byrne said, after the Indiana governor’s office became involved.

“I guess from that point on, my viewpoint kind of changed,” Byrne said.

In 1966, Byrne, who was working for the chamber of commerce, decided to run for a board of aldermen seat. Facing a close race in Ward 4, Byrne enlisted the help of Evers to reach black voters. With the Voting Rights Act having just been passed in 1965, Byrne said many people did not realize the role the black vote would play in elections.

Back then, elections for the various wards were voted on by all city residents. Despite losing his own ward, Byrne won the election mostly due to winning the black wards.

“We won by 1,000 votes thanks to this man right here,” Byrne said pointing to Evers.

Byrne would go on to be elected in 1968 as mayor of Natchez, helped again by Evers who would serve as an ally throughout Byrne’s career.

Shortly after Byrne was elected but before he took office, a riot broke out in Natchez, with black residents burning buildings downtown after a rumor got around that a white man had reportedly killed a black man.

Byrne returned to Natchez from Lake St. John to be met by armed state troopers at the bridge and the city under martial law.

With no luck trying to calm black leaders, Byrne called Evers for help. Evers was in California having just appeared on “The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson.”

“He said, ‘Tony, hold them down, and I’ll be there in three days,’” Byrne said.

Three days later, Evers arrived in Natchez and met at the chamber of commerce and met with local black leaders.

“They were raising hell with him, too,” Byrne recalled. “That’s how he worked. He was very good and letting them blow off steam and listening to their problems, and then when he had enough, he had had enough.

“He told them, ‘Let’s let Tony get in (City Hall),  and if he doesn’t do what he says he’s going to do, then we’ll be back out on the streets.’”

Byrne would go onto serve 20 years in the mayor’s office.

Evers says Byrne was the only “halfway sane” white person he knew who was trying to reach out to both blacks and whites.

“He did more to bring together black and white than any man I know,” Evers said.