Oral history with the Honorable Frank Barber

              Oral history with the Honorable Frank Barber
F341.5 . M57 vol. 667
Funding for this project provided by The Mississippi State Legislature, The Mississippi Humanities Council, The Mississippi Department of Archives and History, and the Center for Oral History and Cultural Heritage at the University of Southern Mississippi.
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Biography
The Honorable Frank D. Barber was born on April 2, 1929, in Hot Springs, Arkansas. His parents were Frank and Mary Venus Barber. When he was three, the family returned to Mississippi, his mother's native state. He attended public schools in Hattiesburg and Laurel as well as Sacred Heart Academy in Hattiesburg and a Benedictine boarding school in Louisiana and graduated from Hattiesburg High School in 1947. While in his senior year of high school, he worked afternoons in the law offices of Paul B. Johnson, Jr.
Barber attended one year at the University of Mississippi, before volunteering for the U. S. Army. He served one year active duty and was to serve the balance of his military obligation with the National Guard. However, with the outbreak of the Korean War, his National Guard unit was called up, and he was eventually sent to Germany with the Seventh Army, where he was made sergeant. While there, one of his duties was to teach American soldiers who were enrolled in the literacy program at the American School in Frankfurt.
After military service, Barber returned to school at Mississippi Southern College. He was elected treasurer of the student body during his first year at Southern and president in his senior year. His major accomplishment as president was to oversee the writing of a new school constitution. He received a bachelor's degree in history, political science, and English. His legal training began at the University of Mississippi, where he attended law school one year before transferring to the National Law Center at George Washington University in Washington, D. C. After receiving his law degree, he was admitted by examination to the District of Columbia and the Mississippi bars.
Barber's first foray into politics came when he was ten years old and he went door- to- door distributing flyers for Paul B. Johnson, Sr. Soon after graduating from high school, he worked in Paul B. Johnson, Jr.' s unsuccessful 1947 campaign for governor. He was fieldman in James O. Eastland's 1954 senatorial race and advance man in Paul B. Johnson, Jr.' s 1955 senatorial campaign.
A list of Barber's accomplishments and service is wide and varied. While working on the Washington staff of then- U. S. Senator Eastland, he held many positions including legislative assistant on the committee
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