HIlliard Lackey and his wife Lillian Troupe Lackey at their north Jackson home surrounded by photographs of themselves and their children throughout the years, Thursday, July 3, 2025. The couple and two of their children have received doctorates, along with several other family members. Credit: Vickie D. King/Mississippi Today
As children during the 1950s, Hilliard Lackey and Lillian Troupe often had to skip school to pick cotton with their sharecropping parents.
They grew up together in the small north Mississippi town of Marks, both raised by devoutly Christian families…