TUPELO, Miss. (AP) — He has never lived in Mississippi. But the state is home in a way much deeper than his own birth.

"This is my homeland," said Thomas Olive, standing at the Natchez Trace Visitor Center on a recent day in Tupelo. "I always get goosebumps when I talk about it."

Olive, 24, is from Durant, Oklahoma. He is also Choctaw. Alongside Alyson Chapman, who is Chickasaw, he completed an internship from June through the end of July at the Natchez Trace Parkway, working in Ridgeland and Tupelo.

Through research and educational outreach, Olive and Chapman helped the parkway make real the...