NATCHEZ &045;&045; At 2 p.m. today, a host of dignitaries and the public at large will witness the latest milestone in Natchez’s long history.

That’s when a ribbon-cutting ceremony at the Natchez Trace Parkway intersection with Liberty Road will mark the extension of the parkway into Natchez, the pathway’s original starting point.

Close to 25 dignitaries are set to take part in the ceremony, including keynote speakers Sens. Thad Cochran and Trent Lott and the U.S. representative for the 3rd District, Rep. Chip Pickering.

It’s a day that’s taken 67 years to happen. That’s when the parkway, whose construction actually started in 1937 with three grading projects, was accepted as a site of the Natchez Park Service.

The project actually started as an effort by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1905 to mark the path of the Old Natchez Trace with granite markers along its length. From there, the DAR and several other groups and individuals pushed to have a paved parkway built to commemorate the Trace.

With funding coming in stops and starts since its first days as a New Deal project, the project to extend the roadway from its former terminus on U.S. 61 North in north Adams County got new life in 1993.

That’s when local officials pushed for the 8.7-mile Trace extension. The project was finished in December but won’t open until today.

This morning a ceremony will be held in Clinton to mark the completion of an adjacent segment of the parkway. Dignitaries and caravans of classic cars and RVs will make its way down the Trace to Natchez for the 2 p.m. ceremony.

Events will include the unveiling of a commemorative painting commissioned by the Mississippi Art Commission and the unveiling, at the end of the Natchez ceremony, of a granite marker by the DAR.