Historical December 1987 report or notice. Original dates, prices and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
The Skinker-DeBaliviere neighborhood will honor the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. with a commemorative service that will include singing, dance, drama, and an inspirational address.
The service will be held at 7 p.m. January 9, 1988, at Grace and Peace Fellowship, 5574 Delmar.
It will be followed by a potluck dessert reception in the church’s fellowship hall.
The commemoration is sponsored by the Skinker-DeBaliviere Community Council. Betty Thompson, chairwoman of the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. St. Louis Support Group, will be the keynote speaker at the event. Thompson will speak on, “The Civil Rights Movement: Eliminating Poverty and Apartheid through Non-Violence.” The St. Louis Support Group raises funds for—and disseminates information from—the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Nonviolent Social Change, an Atlanta-based education forum. Foster Solomon, a student at Washington University’s Department of Performing Arts, will present a dramatic rendering of excerpts from Dr. King’s speeches. Solomon, whom Performing Arts faculty member Stephen Duncan describes as a “sterling actor,” has generously agreed to return early from his Christmas break to participate in the event.
Another faculty member has volunteered to coach Solomon in his performance.
The service also will include a dance recital and a presentation by a gospel choir.
The choir director will lead the audience in singing a signal hymn of the civil rights movement.
The date of the commemoration was chosen to allow participation by members of the St. Louis Support Group before their January 15 departure for Atlanta, where they will take part in the annual Freedom March.
As declared by Congress in 1985, the formal federal holiday honoring Dr. King is the third Monday in January.
The Skinker-DeBaliviere commemoration will be among the first events in the city’s week-long recognition of the holiday.
The commemoration was proposed last August by Jim O’Neal, a Rosedale Neighborhood Association representative to the SDCC.
According to the written proposal, the service is intended to “enhance the solidarity and strengthen the common values of Skinker-DeBaliviere residents.” “In this nation’s recent history, no person has better exemplified conscientious rebellion in the service of human dignity than Dr. King;” the proposal stated. “This courageous man fired the conscience of all Americans, pointing up and resisting institutionalized racism.
His constructive, non-violent methods were as honorable as his goal of realizing the human equality promised in the (amended) U.S. Constitution. “Although dramatic marches and sit-ins have given way to more prosaic political and economic reform movements, Dr. King’s dream lives on as an inspiration and a challenge to all people of good will.
It is especially fitting that Skinker-DeBaliviere, a racially integrated neighborhood in a largely polarized metropolis, should honor this American hero and spotlight the ideals he fostered. O’Neal is chairman of the Martin Luther King Commemoration Committee of the SDCC. Other members of the committee are Neville Vatcha and Jack Wright, at-large representatives to SDCC: Bob Mahon, Parkview representative to SDCC; and Shirley Polk, a longtime neighborhood organizer. Council President Jim McLeod and SDCC Executive Director Nancy Farmer are ex-officio members of the committee. Volunteers are needed to perform a variety of tasks associated with the event.
To offer your assistance, please call the SDCC office at 862-5122.
Original photograph caption
The Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Photograph accompanying the commemoration notice in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, December 1987, page 1. Photographer not credited; descriptive archival caption.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, December 1987.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Archival transcription note: Source dates the federal-holiday declaration to 1985; this historical assertion has not been independently verified.
Original source: SD_Times1987_12.pdf, printed page(s) 1; PDF page(s) 1.
