June 16, 1964 -- Ku Klux Klan nightriders beat up several blacks in Philadelphia Miss., and burn down Mount Zion United Methodist Church.

June 21 -- Chaney, Schwerner and Goodman visit the church and interview victims, then are arrested for speeding, and jailed by Neshoba County Deputy Sheriff Cecil Price. After release on $20 bail, they dispappear.

June 23 --FBI enters the case when their torched station wagon is found in a swamp.

June 25 -- On orders from then-President Lyndon Johnson, 200 sailors from Meridian Naval Air Station, accompanied by a Navy helicopter, join the search.

Mid- July -- Mississippi U.S. Sen. James Eastland suggests on Senate floor that the disappearances are a hoax.

July 27-30 -- Greg Scarpa takes top secret journey from New York to Miami to New Orleans to Philadelphia, Miss., to find out where the slain civil rights workers are buried, and returns to New York.

Aug. 1 -- FBI scouts out earthen dam six miles southwest of Philadelphia, Miss.

Aug. 4 -- Bodies of rights workers found under more than 10 tons of soil.

Dec. 4 -- FBI arrests 20, including the imperial wizard of the White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, Samuel Bowers Jr., Sheriff Lawrence Rainey and Deputy Sheriff Price for conspiring to violate the civil rights of the slain workers.

Oct. 20, 1967 -- An all white jury convicts Bowers, Price and five others, who subsequently serve from three to 10 years. The others are acquitted or have charges thrown out by trial judge.