Cochran donating papers to University of Mississippi

OXFORD, Miss. (AP) - Retired U.S. Sen. Thad Cochran will donate his papers to the University of Mississippi.

Cochran, who holds both undergraduate and law degrees from Ole Miss, was first elected to the U.S. House in 1972 and to the Senate in 1978.

The university says Cochran’s donation will include 3,500 linear feet (1,000 meters) of documents and nearly 6 terabytes of digital files.

Leigh McWhite, the university’s political papers archivist and associate professor, says Cochran’s papers focus on subjects including wildlife conservation, the return of veterans from the Gulf Wars and the Mississippi Gulf Coast after Hurricane Katrina.

Ole Miss also hosts papers of former Sens. Trent Lott and James O. Eastland, former U.S. Rep. Jamie Whitten and current U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker.

Cochran in May received the university’s Mississippi Humanitarian Award.