Toyota says it will contribute $75,000 toward the effort to build a bronze statue of Medgar Wiley Evers at Alcorn State University.
Wil James, president of Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, made the announcement Friday.
The 50th anniversary of the June 12, 1963, assassination of Evers is next year. Alcorn State has begun a campaign to raise funds to build a statue honoring Evers, who graduated there in 1952.
John H. Jones, national chairman for the Medgar Evers Statue Campaign, has said the group hopes to raise $200,000 to $250,000 by August so the statue can be finished in time for a Black History Month event in February 2013.
The statue is expected to be placed on campus outside the university’s new dormitories, the Medgar Wiley Evers Heritage Village.
