Category Archives: Commemoration

Announcement, Commemoration, Education, Reconciliation

GRAND REOPENING OF THE OLD COURTHOUSE AND FESTIVAL IS MAY 3, 2025

After being closed for 5 years, the Old Courthouse in St. Louis will celebrate its long-awaited Grand Reopening on Saturday, May 3 at 10:00 a.m. with a ribbon cutting ceremony. Along with totally revised galleries on the first floor and an expanded and beautifully attired new book store and gift shop, there is now an elevator to the second floor.

The building is now telling more of the stories of the history of the cases, uses, purpose and construction of the edifice.

Mock trails will continue to be held on the first floor’s new courtroom as well as in the refurbished original courtrooms upstairs.

Dred and Harriet Scott have a new gallery dedicated to the legacy of the impact of their story. 

Special guests will join the occasion that day.

Cbabi Bayoc is the designer of the festival’s theme. 

Across from the Scott’s room is the Pathways to Freedom gallery that explores African-American life in St. Louis, etc.

The festival will take place in Kiener Plaza until 3 p.m.  The courthouse will be open for visitors throughout the day until its closings at 5 pm.  The public is invited.

Gateway Arch Park Foundation – Old Court Grand Reopening

Spectrum News Article

Announcement, Commemoration, Education, News

Governor Parsons Pardons Former Slave Celia Newsom on December 20, 2025

Great-great granddaughter of Celia Newsom, Pamela  Westbrooks-Hodge, secured a pardon from Missouri Governor Mike Parson upon leaving office on Dec 20, 2024.

KSDK Interview with Pamela

Letter in Support of Pardon of Celia Newsom

CELIA LETTER FOR PARDON SIGNED AND SENT AUGUST 22 2024Download
Announcement, Commemoration, Educate

Constitution Day Special

166 YEARS AGO ON SEPTEMBER 17, 1858
DRED SCOTT DIED ON WHAT IS
CONSTITUTION DAY

In honor of his life and passing, the DSHF created a special commemorative pocket sized constitution booklet in 2023. This handsome keepsake has a black leatherette cover with gold leaf lettering. Because of the Dred Scott Decision of 1857, we have the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments, often called the Reconstruction Amendments, the Civil Rights Amendments and sometimes called the Dred Scott Amendments.

SHARE THIS IMPORTANT DOCUMENT WITH FAMILY AND FRIENDS, NOT ONLY AS A KEEPSAKE BUT TO SHARE THE HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF OUR NATIONAL LEGAL DOCUMENT.

READ FOR YOURSELVES WHAT THIS LONGEST ENDURING (237 YEARS OLD) CONSTITUTION HAS TO SAY.

LIMITED TIME OFFER

Purchases made by September 30 will receive free shipping

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SUPPORT!

Commemoration, Reconciliation

Celebrating the Life of John Lebourgeois

In July 2024, we celebrated the life of a dear friend and family member, John LeBourgeois, the great-great-grandson of Charlotte Blow, daughter of Dred Scott’s original owners (Peter and Elizabeth Blow) who left this world on April 11, 2024. He was a member of Dred Scott Presents:  Sons and Daughters of Reconciliation and a staunch and devoted supporter of the Dred Scott Heritage Foundation along with many of his family members. 

John and his wife Mimi, one daughter Anne and a nephew, Ashton, met Lynne Jackson in Southampton, VA at the dedication of the Dred Scott Blow Family Highway marker installed by another Blow descendant, Jeffrey Hines.  Because of Facebook, total strangers met whose lives were entwined. The other daughter, Louise, has participated in three major Dred Scott programs in Marshfield, Missouri, St. Louis, and at Calvary Cemetery.

The LeBourgeois family has been as dear to us today as their ancestors were to Dred Scott, helping him and Harriet in their eleven-year battle for freedom.  Today the family is engaged in helping us promote the principals and necessities as well as the joys of reconciliation.  I spoke at the memorial which was held in John’s favorite spot, Promontory Point Field House on Lakeshore Drive in Chicago, Illinois. John was a man of many disciplines and everyone who attended thought we knew him, until we heard the warm and hilarious stories about his life and career at the memorial.   I found out John was an artist. The caricature portrait of John was drawn by Tom Bachtell.

John’s family graciously invited donations to be sent to the Dred Scott Heritage Foundation and The Whitney Plantation. Rest in peace dear John and thank you for representing what God’s humanity to man can look like.  We will always remember and love you!

Lynne

Announcement, Commemoration, Education, Reconciliation

New Marker for Harriet Scott

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Harriet Robins Scott is buried at Greenwood Cemetery in St. Louis.  For many years, her location was not known.  Mrs. Etta Daniels had the records and a few people knew but it was not revealed publicly until 2006 when Mrs. Ruth Ann Hager, a certified genealogist was doing research on Harriet and through several attempts concluding with a phone call to Lynne Jackson, she was able to narrow down the many Harriet’s to one, our Harriet at Greenwood.  This happened to occur in 2006, a year prior to the 150th anniversary of the Dred Scott Decision in 2007. As Lynne likes to say, “She wasn’t going to miss out  on the party!”

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Harriet Scott Memorial Dedication Gallery

Announcement, Commemoration, Education, Reconciliation

New Monument Celebrating the legacy of Dred Scott

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Lynne Madison Jackson, President and Founder DSHF
Lynda Burgman, Grant Writer and avid supporter

On September 30, 2023  Dred Scott received a new memorial monument.  

It was for the occasion of the 165th anniversary of his death which was September 17, 1858.  As it turns out, that became Constitution Day!

The new monument replaces the wonderful headstone which has been there since 1957 and was donated by Mrs. Harrison of Pennsylvania, a descendant of Scott’s original owners Peter and Elizabeth Blow.

To share his legacy and impact on our nation, his great-great granddaughter, Lynne Madison Jackson and her Dred Scott Heritage Foundation, provided a new monument with the aspects of the Foundation’s goals of Commemoration, Education and Reconciliation noticeably visible.  The new memorial is in Calvary Cemetery in St. Louis, MO where Scott is among the top most asked for gravesites in the cemetery of over 300,000 persons.

Dred Scott Descendents
Pastor Rafael Green, Louise LeBourgeois, Brenda Young, Dawn Eden Goldstein,
Treasure Shields Redmond, Lynne Madison Jackson, Dred Scott Madison II,
Peggy Lewis LeCompte, Dr. David Konig, Dr. Kimberly Norwood
Dred Scott Board of Directors
donate

Dred Scott Memorial Monument
Dedication Gallery 1
September 30, 2023

Dred Scott Memorial Monument
Dedication Gallery 2
September 30, 2023

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Commemoration, Education, Event

Dred Scott Memorial Monument Dedication

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The Dred Scott Heritage Foundation will dedicate a new memorial monument on Dred Scott’s gravesite, Saturday, September 30, 2023, at 11:00 a.m., at St. Louis’s Calvary Cemetery,

If you would like to support us in our continued efforts, please click on the button below.

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Click on the links below for local news articles:

St. Louis Post-Dispatch Article
Fox 2
KMOX

Announcement, Commemoration, Education

Juneteenth Conference at Arch

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The St. Louis Gateway Arch National Park is hosting the Gateway to Inclusive History Conference on Juneteenth, Monday, June 19, 2023, from 9:00 a.m. to 4:15 p.m.

Conference attendees will hear from representatives from theNational Underground Railroad Network to Freedom; the Reconstruction Era National Historic Network; and the African American Civil Rights Network and learn how to nominate St. Louis area sites to these networks.

Conference speakers include Barry Jurgenson, Midwest Region Program Manager for the National Underground Railroad Network to Freedom;Nathan Betcher who is a historian with the Reconstruction Era National Historic Network; and Ariel Roy, partner historian with the Association for the Study of African American Life and History.

The conference also includes presentations from local groups and individuals working to commemorateAfrican American history in St. Louis.

2:00 Afternoon speakers will be include:Lynne Jackson from the Dred Scott Foundation,Linda Nance from the Annie Malone Center,Dr. Angela DaSilva from the Mary Meachum CrossingNetwork to Freedom Site, andVivian Gibson author of The Last Children of Mill Creek.

Kelly Schmidt, Postdoctoral Research Associate with the WashU& Slavery Project, and Elizabeth Simons, Community Program Manager with Great Rivers Greenway will moderate a roundtable about a potential African American Heritage Trail in St. Louis.

Attendees will include members of the National BlackMBAs St. Louis Chapter.Contact Michelle Perkins at 314-608-8846 for more information to join their group for a Juneteenth program at 1 p.m. that will end by joining the Arch program at 2 p.m.

The conference is free to attend, no registration is required.You will be required to go through security.

Please contact Pam Sanfilippo at [email protected] for more information. 
Gateway-To-Inclusive-History_Flyer_V4Download