Biloxi, MS

Interviewee Collection Sort descending Description Interviewer Date of Interview Location of Interview Affiliation
Kim Hai Dinh Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Kim Dai Dinh is a Vietnamese-American, living in East Biloxi, who worked in seafood processing plants.

Linda VanZandt, Angel Truong Phan Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Hang Nguyen Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Mrs. Hang Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American, the wife of a shrimper, and a resident of East Biloxi, Mississippi. She was the only child of Binh Nguyen and Nhung Nguyen, born in 1968 in Can Tho, South Vietnam. Her father, who passed away in Seattle, Washington in 2009, served in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnamese Army). Her mother worked in the home. After the fall of South Vietnam, Mrs. Nguyen’s father was sent to reeducation camp. It was then that her mother had to go to work selling fish, coffee, and fabrics in different places.

Linda VanZandt, Angel Truong Phan Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Daniel Quan Nguyen Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Reverend Daniel Quan Nguyen was born, one of five children, on July 15, 1941, in Tay Ninh Province (east of Saigon), South Vietnam. His parents were farmers and his father died when he was just a year old. Reverend Nguyen attended high school and university in Saigon, studying science and law, then becoming a high school math teacher. From 1968 to 1975, he served as an infantry commander in the Army of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnamese Army). He was stationed with the Fourth Battalion Regiment of the Seventh Division in the Mekong Delta.

Linda VanZandt, Angel Truong Phan Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Suong Ngoc Nguyen Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Reverend Suong Ngoc Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American living in Biloxi, Mississippi, serving the Vietnamese community, there, many of whom work in the fisheries system. Nguyen was born, one of four children, in 1944 in Cambodia (to Vietnamese parents), but was raised in Tay Ninh Province in South Vietnam. Her grandfather was a leader of the Cao Dai religious group in Tay Ninh Province. Her father sold goods in a market and disappeared one day in 1946 during the French-Viet Minh war.

Linda VanZandt, Angel Truong Phan Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Thang "Peter" Nguyen Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Mr. Thang "Peter" Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American, former shrimper, now community liaison for Mississippi State University Coastal Research and Extension Center.  He was born in 1967 in Vung Tau, South Vietnam. His parents were fisherfolk and told him the story of escaping Vietnam in the family boat two weeks before the Communists took over South Vietnam, when Mr. Nguyen was just eight years old.

Linda VanZandt Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Franklin Lance Parker Deepwater Horizon Oil Disaster Oral History

Mr. Frank Parker is a lifelong commercial fisherman in Biloxi, Mississippi. He was born on July 4, 1973, in Biloxi, Mississippi, to Mr. Olin Boyce Parker (born April 13, 1944, in Pascagoula, Mississippi) and Mrs. Velma Elaine Terry Parker (born January 26, 1945). His father was a fisherman and a furniture refinisher from 1964 to 1999. His father’s family were farmers in the Mississippi Delta. His mother was a homemaker. His mother’s family were watermen, including fishermen, ship captains, and ship pilots.

Stephanie Scull-DeArmey Biloxi, MS NOAA-NMFS, University of Southern Mississippi - Northern Gulf Institute
Leroy Duvall Ethnicity in the Seafood Industry on the Mississippi Gulf Coast

When Leroy Duvall refers to himself as one of the younger people, it's despite his 64 years, but it's without a trace of irony. Part of it is that he is the President of the Fleur de Lis Society, a club half the size of what it once was because its membership is slowly passing from old age. And part of it is that, after 30 years of shrimping on the Gulf, his body still feels young. Eventually, the economic repercussions of endangered turtles forced him to retire from shrimping, and when Hurricane Katrina washed away his bakery, he retired from that, too. Mr.

Francis Lam Biloxi, MS Southern Foodways Alliance
Corky Hire Ethnicity in the Seafood Industry on the Mississippi Gulf Coast

Corky Hire may have had an inauspicious beginning to his shrimping career, taking over for his ailing father, but now 70 years later, his memories of working the Gulf are almost all fond ones. His time on boats, through the 30's and 40's, was during a time when Biloxi's seafood industry was growing tremendously and ail schooners were being replaced by powered boats, and Croatian families were making the shift from immigrant laborers to cannery owners and professionals.

Francis Lam Biloxi, MS Southern Foodways Alliance
Frank Parker Ethnicity in the Seafood Industry on the Mississippi Gulf Coast

Even in a town like Biloxi, it's not often someone can claim seven generations of fishing heritage. The line in Frank Parker's family may have stopped at six when his parents pushed him to go to college and consider other lines of work, but the years of growing up playing on the dock had him pretty well convinced he was going to go back out onto the Gulf. So at 24 years old, 12 credits shy of graduating, Frank decided to listen to the sirens and bought himself a boat. The funny thing, though, is that his parents listened to them too.

Francis Lam Biloxi, MS Southern Foodways Alliance
George Trojanovich Ethnicity in the Seafood Industry on the Mississippi Gulf Coast

Georgo Trojanovich is, as he says, "The only real Croatian in Biloxi." But in a city as proud as this one is of its Croatian heritage, everyone here knows what he means: with the arrival of Croatian families tailing off by the second half of the 20th century, Georgo is one of the few - yes, perhaps only - Croatian-born immigrants in town. A distant relative of a local restaurateur, Georgo came as a teenager to escape Tito's Communist regime, working as a dishwasher at Mary Mahoney's restaurant.

Francis Lam Biloxi, MS Southern Foodways Alliance