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NATCHEZ — Copiah Lincoln Community College has partnered with The Sons of the American Revolution to host its 36th annual Natchez Literary and Cinema Celebration, “Follow the Frenchman through Natchez: The Farewell Tour of Lafayette.”

The celebration, which takes place Thursday, March 27, through Saturday, March 29, will be a bicentennial salute to the 200th anniversary of Marquis de Lafayette’s farewell tour of the United States.

Lafayette is an often-overlooked historical figure who played a key role in American independence, including his help writing the Declaration of the Rights of Man, which inspired the Declaration of Independence, said Brittany Caldwell, the director for the NLCC.

“Because of him, we are not British today,” she said. “He was the last general left of the Revolutionary War. … His tour of America would bring people together and make them realize why we came together as a country to begin with.”

One of Lafayette’s stops was in Natchez as he worked his way up the Mississippi River from New Orleans.

“He stayed the night and they had a banquet and a series of toasts and all of those sorts of things to celebrate him,” Caldwell said. “Lafayette was also an avid abolitionist. He actually carried through on the words of the Constitution. ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.’ He went to the final conclusion on that all men, regardless of their skin color, are created equal and tried very, very hard with both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson to have slavery abolished, because he believed that no country that was founded upon slavery would ever possibly last.”

The celebration will feature a variety of events, including lectures by historians, a living history educational encampment for hundreds of eighth through 12th-grade students and ticketed events with expert speakers.

Events on the afternoon of Thursday, March 27, including a 7 p.m. documentary screening of “Lafayette: The Lost Hero,” are free and open to the public at the Natchez Convention Center.

On Friday, celebration goers have the opportunity to have lunch with Robert Rhodes Crout, president emeritus of the American Friend of Lafayette and author of Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution — Selected Papers.

The celebration will also include a grave marking for of Winthrop Sargent (1753–1820), who served as the first governor of the Mississippi Territory and one of the original owners of Gloucester, followed by sweet tea and lemonade in the gardens and a historical talk about the house by its current owner.

The following Saturday, beginning at 8:30 a.m., is a reception for General Lafayette that begins at the Natchez bluff bandstand with a brass band performance followed by a cannon salute at Rosalie.

Other highlights include the “General’s Banquet,” a ticketed cocktail dinner with period music and dance at 5:30 p.m. on Saturday at the Natchez Convention Center featuring Julien Icher, president of The Lafayette Trail Inc.

The NLCC was founded 36 years ago by Carolyn Vance-Smith as “a way to bring literature and the humanities to our little corner of Mississippi,” Caldwell said.

“From that time to today, it has brought countless experts for lectures and very important people to discuss life in the south, including history, culture and all sorts of things from civil rights to feminism,” she said.

“This is something people look forward to every year because they know that they can come and hear really good academic lectures. And this year, we have the added effect of having all of these interactive experiences.”

To purchase tickets or to learn more, visit www.colin.edu/community/natchez-literary-cinema-celebration