Camp Sister Spirit

In July 1993, Wanda and Brenda Henson, a lesbian couple living in Gulfport, bought 120 acres of land in Ovett, Mississippi. The land was a “defunct pig and grape farm” on Bogue Homa Creek. It had five barns and one house in need of renovation and cost $60,000. Wanda was from Pascagoula, and Brenda, originally from Ohio, had lived in Mississippi since 1981. The two met in May 1984 while volunteering as escorts at an abortion clinic. After both left heterosexual marriages, they fell in love and adopted and shared the name Henson.

The Hensons named the Ovett property Camp Sister Spirit. They planned a “feminist educational and cultural retreat center focusing upon the concerns of Southern Lesbians/Womyn.” When locals in Jones County learned about the camp, some were not happy. On 8 November 1993, Brenda Henson’s daughter discovered a “dead dog tied to their mailbox.” It “was a female, shot in the stomach, with tampons stuffed under its body.” This was an early incident of chilling hostility and aggression. Other responses to the camp opening included some Jones County residents wanting to buy back the property. Others brought in lawyers, and others carried out threats and intimidation to drive Camp Sister Spirit away, but Wanda and Brenda Henson persisted. They responded to hostility by building local relationships and defending themselves from nuisance legal action. Over the next decade, Camp Sister Spirit and Wanda and Brenda Henson were a significant part of queer Mississippi.

A core activity of Camp Sister Spirit was its annual women’s music festival. On their own land, women gathered for the event with high spirits. Over the next seven years, Wanda and Brenda held their festivals, organized programs for women and lesbians, operated a food bank, and did works of service that benefited the people of Ovett and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Brenda contributed op-eds to the Hattiesburg American, more often about opportunities for community service than about lesbian issues. The Hensons were also lesbian spokespeople on issues like gay marriage bans, the 1998 coming-out episode of the hit sitcom Ellen, and the inclusion of gay and lesbian people in the US Census.

In 2002, Brenda and Wanda Henson left Camp Sister Spirit. Brenda was diagnosed with cancer, and Wanda needed to work to support her. They moved to Edgard, Louisiana.

Camp Sister Spirit was in the headlines again in the fall of 2005. After Hurricane Katrina, Camp Sister Spirit, under the leadership of Andie Gibbs, Brenda Henson’s daughter, provided shelter and food to area residents affected by the storm. Gibbs tried to revitalize Camp Sister Spirit and make it a folk school, but activities slowed, and eventually the property, though still owned by the Hensons, was abandoned.

In February 2008, Brenda Henson died from colon cancer in Arkansas at the age of sixty-two. Wanda died on 22 May 2025 after her own battle with cancer.