3 places in town are on the National Register, among them two historic districts with 227 buildings between them. Below: 6 old photos and papers, maps from 1886 on, and the census since 1850.
Founding year: the first Lexington post office (Blevins & Helbock, CC0).The full story ↓
History grade
What drives Lexington’s History grade
On its age, its old homes and the National Register, Lexington is more historic than 60% of U.S. towns. Its National Register listings hold the grade up; its age pulls it down.
B
HistoryA character grade: shown, never part of Lexington’s overall grade.
Mississippi towns list more on the Register than most of the country (a typical Mississippi town has 71.9 per 10,000 residents, the U.S. 2.4), so Lexington’s 1,696 sits above most of its state (99% of Mississippi towns have fewer) while its 229 historic buildings outnumber those of 94% of U.S. towns.
How sure. Graded on any two of the three inputs instead, the letter would range from C to A. The pre-1940 share is a Census survey estimate (±8.3 points). The founding year is the first post office, not a stated founding date.
Founding year: the first post office (other dates in Quick answers). Homes: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register: National Park Service, May 2026 list; each listing counted once (boundary changes and added documentation belong to their listing), and a historic district counts its contributing buildings. How TownRatings grades history →
What stands out about Lexington’s past
Read from the archive, the National Register and the record. The page puts what stands out first.
National Park Service, National Register of Historic Places. Photos from Wikimedia Commons, credited on each place’s page.
Every building
Lexington, building by building, 1886–1914
Fire insurance maps drew every building, what it was made of and what it was used for, so insurers could price the risk of fire. Pick a year, then a sheet.
1886Sheet 1 of 1
Edition
Sheets
BrickWoodStone
Sanborn Map Company, via the Library of Congress. Editions published in 1930 or earlier, which are in the public domain.
People over time
Lexington, census by census
Peaked at 3,198 in 1950; 1,602 people lived here in 2020.
18 censuses, 1850–2020.
U.S. Census Bureau decennial counts, from the census table on Lexington’s Wikipedia page.
Incorporated in 1836, the city was founded by European-American settlers after most of the Choctaw people, who had long occupied this area, were forced to cede their land to the United States and remove to the Indian Territory. The new settlers initially developed riverfront land along the Yazoo and Black rivers for cotton plantations, primarily worked by enslaved African Americans. The enslaved people were brought by planters with them from the Upper South or transported in the domestic slave trade. In total, more than one million African Americans were transported to the Deep South, breaking up many families. The African-descended enslaved people soon constituted the majority of the Holmes County population.
Nothing in the archives for these yearsWeddings on Main Street, storms, parades, school pictures, the old store. If it’s in your family album, it belongs here.
The Lexington post office opened in 1933, the earliest record of the town by name (U.S. post office records).
How does Lexington rank for history?
Lexington is more historic than 60% of U.S. towns. The History grade combines the town’s founding era, the share of homes built before 1940 and its National Register listings. It’s a character grade, so it isn’t part of the overall grade. How it works.
What is on the National Register in Lexington?
Three places: the Holmes County Courthouse Complex (listed 1994), the Gov. Edmund F. Noel House (1999) and the Lexington Historic District (2001).
How old are the homes in Lexington?
15% of Lexington’s homes were built before 1940 (Census estimate, ±8.3 points), against a typical 4.5% for a Mississippi town; the median home was built in 1969.
Founding dates: Wikidata, Wikipedia, the U.S. post office records of Blevins & Helbock (CC0) and the Census. Homes by year built: Census ACS 2020–24. National Register of Historic Places: National Park Service (list of May 22, 2026). Old photos, postcards and papers: Wikimedia Commons, the Library of Congress and other public archives, credited on each item’s page. Maps: U.S. Geological Survey historical topographic maps (via Esri) and Sanborn fire-insurance maps (Library of Congress). History text and census tables: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0). Places that used to be: USGS Geographic Names Information System (2021).
From Wikimedia Commons (3), the Library of Congress (3), the National Register of Historic Places (3), Wikipedia, Wikidata and Wikipedia for famous people, U.S. Geological Survey historical maps, U.S. Census counts (via Wikipedia), the US Post Offices dataset (Blevins & Helbock), the USGS Geographic Names Information System and Sanborn fire insurance maps (Library of Congress). Archive images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.
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