Mansfield, Louisiana

Mansfield, Louisiana
Mansfield, Louisiana
City
	City of Mansfield
	Downtown Mansfield 2019
	Location of Mansfield in De Soto Parish, Louisiana.
	Mansfield, Louisiana Mansfield, Louisiana
	Coordinates: 32°01′58″N 93°42′09″W / 32.03278°N 93.70250°W
Country	United States
States	Louisiana
Parish	DeSoto
Government
• Mayor	Thomas Jones (D) (began first term July 1, 2022)
Area
• Total	3.66 sq mi (9.48 km2)
• Land	3.65 sq mi (9.46 km2)
• Water	0.01 sq mi (0.02 km2)
Population (2020)
• Total	4,714
• Density	1,290.80/sq mi (498.33/km2)
Time zone	UTC-6 (CST)
• Summer (DST)	UTC-5 (CDT)
ZIP code	71052
Area code	318
U.S. Highways
Website	cityofmansfield.net

Mansfield is a small city in, and the parish seat of, DeSoto Parish, Louisiana, United States.^[3] Mansfield is part of the Shreveport–Bossier City metropolitan statistical area, with a 2020 population of 4,714.

Geography

Mansfield is located at 32°1′58″N 93°42′9″W / 32.03278°N 93.70250°W / 32.03278; -93.70250 (32.032782, -93.702475)^[4] and has an elevation of 335 feet (102.1 m).^[5]

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of 3.7 square miles (9.6 km²), all land.

Demographics

Historical population
Census	Pop.	%±
1870	813	—
1880	770	−5.3%
1890	908	17.9%
1900	847	−6.7%
1910	1,799	112.4%
1920	2,564	42.5%
1930	3,837	49.6%
1940	4,065	5.9%
1950	4,440	9.2%
1960	5,839	31.5%
1970	6,432	10.2%
1980	6,485	0.8%
1990	5,389	−16.9%
2000	5,582	3.6%
2010	5,001	−10.4%
2020	4,714	−5.7%
U.S. Decennial Census^[6]

Mansfield racial composition as of 2020^[7]
Race	Number	Percentage
White (non-Hispanic)	727	15.42%
Black or African American (non-Hispanic)	3,691	78.3%
Native American	15	0.32%
Asian	28	0.59%
Other/Mixed	122	2.59%
Hispanic or Latino	131	2.78%

As of the 2020 United States census, there were 4,714 people, 1,916 households, and 1,165 families residing in the city.

Notable people

Mansfield was the childhood home of Joshua Logan, an award-winning director, producer, playwright and screenwriter for film and stage. He is most famous for directing Hollywood classics such as South Pacific, Picnic, Paint Your Wagon, Sayonara, Bus Stop and Fanny. Logan received the Pulitzer Prize at the age of forty for the libretto of South Pacific, which he cowrote with Oscar Hammerstein II. Logan used Mansfield as the setting for his play The Wisteria Trees.

Ocie Lee Smith was an American singer, who performed with Count Basie's band from 1961 to 1965 and sang on the 1969 Grammy Award-winning recording of the song "Little Green Apples". He was born in Mansfield on June 21, 1932.

Mansfield is the birthplace of major league baseball player Vida Blue, a left-handed starting pitcher. In a 17-year career, he played for the Oakland Athletics, San Francisco Giants, and Kansas City Royals. Also Jesse Hudson, New York Mets pitcher. They graduated Mansfield High School in 1967 together.

Mansfield is also the birthplace of Albert Lewis (born October 6, 1960). Lewis made his professional debut in the NFL in 1983 with the Kansas City Chiefs. He played for the Kansas City Chiefs, Oakland Raiders, and Los Angeles Raiders over the course of his 16-year career. NFL cornerback Fakhir Brown (born on September 21, 1977) initially attended Mansfield High School.

Others affiliated with Mansfield by birth or residence include:

Sylura Barron (1900-1997), first African-American woman delegate to a national political convention (1948)
Country Jim Bledsoe (1930-1988), blues guitarist and singer who recorded for Imperial and Specialty record labels in the late 1940s and early 1950s^[8]
Riemer Calhoun (1909-1994), state senator from DeSoto and Caddo parishes from 1944 to 1952
Joe T. Cawthorn (1911-1967), lawyer, businessman, and politician affiliated with Long faction^[9]
Charles Wheaton Elam (1866–1917), state representative from 1892 to 1896
Joseph Barton Elam, Sr. (1821–1885), state representative, U.S. representative
Walter T. Griffith (1911-1966), U.S. Navy submarine commander during World War II
Jeff Hall, accountant in Alexandria and Democratic member of the Louisiana House for District 26 since 2015; former Mansfield resident^[10]
Charles Johnson (born 1956), American football player
Jeter Jones, blues musician
Sidney Maiden (1923-1970), country blues musician, a singer and harmonica player who played with the guitarist K. C. Douglas^[11]
Sammy Joe Odom (1941–2001), professional football player. Odom was a college football standout at Northwestern State University in Natchitoches and played a season for the Houston Oilers in 1964.
Arthur T. Prescott (1863-1942), founding president of Louisiana Tech University, born in Mansfield but reared in St. Landry Parish^[12]
Mack Charles Reynolds (1935–1991), professional football player
C. O. Simpkins (1925–2019), African-American dentist, state representative, and civil rights activist in Shreveport^[13]