St. Louis: History Museum: #1 in Civil Rights Exhibit

#1 in Civil Rights Exhibit, Missouri History Museum, St. Louis, Missouri. March 2018.

I learned about the #1 in Civil Rights Exhibit at the Missouri History Museum through the Readings on Race Book Club at the Ferguson Municipal Library.

Although I'm not much of a museum person, the exhibit captured my attention for about an hour.

I plucked the bits that I ingested on the spot or that I will investigate more deeply in the future.

#1 in Civil Rights Exhibit, Missouri History Museum, St. Louis, Missouri. March 2018.

Harriet Scott?! Why had I only heard about Dred Scott all these decades of my life? Here is one story of Harriet Robinson Scott's adult life. In this account, we learn that Harriet Robinson was only 16 when she married Dred Scott. This suggests another story, untold. Further, because the legal status of children of enslaved persons followed the maternal line (i.e. if the mother was enslaved, then her children were also enslaved), one could argue that Harriet Scott's name should have been the more prominent one on the Supreme Court case, as the futures of their two children depended on the outcome of the case.

#1 in Civil Rights Exhibit, Missouri History Museum, St. Louis, Missouri. March 2018.

It was only a few weeks before I visited the History Museum that I learned about the East St. Louis Massacre. The confounding range of estimated killed between 40 and 200 reminds me of the similar obliqueness about the Opelousas Massacre.

#1 in Civil Rights Exhibit, Missouri History Museum, St. Louis, Missouri. March 2018.

 The above quote by William Wells Brown countered the mealymouthed exhibit on slavery in the state capitol's history exhibit.

St. Louis: A Korean Lunch

Korean lunch, St. Louis, Missouri. March 2018.

March 2018


I have enjoyed the pleasure of working with several Korean students.

St. Louis is home to many Korean-Americans. I don't know how many people make their home here, but there are at least seven churches that serve the Korean-American community.

And  "St. Louis is home to a 'shockingly high number of [Korean] restaurants,'" according to the managing editor of the magazine Sauce, according to this piece on St. Louis Public Radio in 2017.

I went to one of these restaurants.

My eyes lit up like Oliver Twist's at the sight of all the dainty plates of banchan, or side dishes, that accompany an entree.

I ate every single bit of every single plate.

Oh, and the sizzle of the spicy pork dolsot bibimbap:

Creative Life: On Cold and Flame

Runge Nature Center, Jefferson City, Missouri. December 2006.

Wintry in Missouri.

My hands are cold, but another's vengeance drip, drip, drips a molten sludge of thick poison into my gullet, seeking to liquidate my spirit.

My hands are cold, but my gut twists from a dull, yellow ember of acid fear that seeks to burn.

My hands are cold, but my heart constricts from a subterranean rage that seeks to consume it.


Come soon, spring.

Icy serviceberry, Jefferson City, Missouri. December 2006.