History in Danger

One of the reasons that motivated members of Mount Zion Baptist Church in Cedar Rapids to found the African American Historical Museum and Cultural Center of Iowa in 1994 was the concern that African American history was being lost.

One of the examples cited was that after the death of Cedar Rapids activist Viola Gibson in 1989, her papers were thrown out as there was no place to put them. Curator Susan Kuecker was delighted when going through some books that Gibson's daughter, Juanita Smith, donated to the Museum in March, 2006 to find a box of Viola Gibson's papers that were assumed to have been destroyed. Included in this box were many records from Christ's Sanctified Holy Church where Gibson was a minister, meeting minutes of many committees that Gibson served on regarding housing, the elderly, and the Oak Hill-Jackson neighborhood of Cedar Rapids, and a few photographs of Gibson.

These papers shed light on Gibson's roles in some of these organizations and committees. They proved to be very helpful in developing the changing exhibit "Scrapbook of Memories: African American History in Linn County, Iowa." They couldn't have turned up at a better time!

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