Historical December 1995 article. Dates, prices, services and contacts describe the source period; current availability has not been established.
The Skinker DeBaliviere Community Council and Grace and Peace Fellowship will again hold a commemoration of the life and work of Martin Luther King Jr. in conjunction with the national celebration of his birth.
The commemoration will be held at Grace and Peace Fellowship, located on Delmar at Clara, from 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. on Sunday, January 14th. Everyone is invited to attend this event.
The New Cote Brilliante Church of God choir will sing and students from a number of area schools will perform skits and musical numbers. Participating schools include: Bethel, Crossroads, Hamilton, New City. Jack Wright, a past president of the Skinker DeBaliviere Community Council and an elder at Grace and Peace, will serve as emcee and deliver the opening remarks. Kurt Lutjens, new pastor at Grace and Peace, will begin the program. Jack Wright chairs the committee which organizes the commemoration.
He has been assisted in the planning this year by Ruth Johnson, NSO Jackie Wellington, SDCC Director Laure Porterfield, Shirley Polk, and Lana Stein.
The Committee is particularly pleased that a longtime neighbor will be the principal speaker. Patricia C. McKissack, an award-winning author, has agreed to keynote the commemoration this year. McKissack moved to St. Louis from Smyrna, Tennessee when she was three years old.
For many years, she and her husband Frederick, her frequent co-author, resided on the 59xx block of Pershing and were among the neighborhood’s most renowned residents.
They still spend a great deal of time there, using the home as their place to write. McKissack has written a number of books geared to young audiences on topics of great interest to African-Americans including a biography of Jesse Jackson and with her husband, “Black Diamond: The Story of the Negro Baseball Leagues.” The McKissacks have been recipients of the Coretta Scott King Honor Book Award, the American Library Association Notable Children’s Book Award and the Boston Globe/Horn Book Award for the biography ‘Sojourner Truth: Ain’t I a Woman?’ This volume also received the NAACP Image Award and was the American Library Association’s Best Book for Young Adults.
The McKissacks are also authors of “Christmas in the Big House. Christmas in the Quarters,” which delineates the discrepancies between the lives of the owners and the lives of slaves. Patricia McKissack began writing at an early age.
She wrote her first poem in third grade.
As an adult, she taught for nine years and then was an editor for six.
She says that, “Teaching helped me recognize what books were needed and what children enjoyed reading; editing taught me how to develop an idea.
She notes that, ‘Writing is hard work but rewarding. …
We try to communicate to a wide audience that Africans and African Americans have made outstanding contributions to civilization.” McKissack is a most appropriate speaker for this commemoration of the work of Dr. King and can bring back to us the life and times and deeds of the man who led the way to freedom for so many.
Following her remarks, the Rev. Miki Merritt of New Cote Brilliante will offer the benediction and all in attendance will join in singing “We Shall Overcome.” Grace and Peace Fellowship then will host a reception in the social hall of the church for all the participants and the audience.
Original photograph caption
Patricia and Frederick McKissack. Photographer not credited.
Originally published in The Times of Skinker-DeBaliviere, December 1995.
Read this article in the original newspaper issue.
Original source: SD_Times1995_12.pdf, printed page(s) 1, 4; PDF page(s) 1, 4.
