the State Historical Society of Missouri
![Melvin Tolson. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-USZ62-134556 DLC]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-07/1.%20Melvin%20B.%20Tolson.jpg?h=c73b0fce&itok=4_Bo8Bag "Melvin Tolson. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-USZ62-134556 DLC]")
Through most of his life, Melvin B. Tolson claimed he was born with the twentieth century…
![Father Augustus Tolton. [Image in public domain]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-11/1.-augustus-tolton.jpg?h=b5104c6a&itok=1ONYRtk_ "Father Augustus Tolton. [Image in public domain]")
Father Augustus Tolton, recognized as the first openly African American priest in the United States…
![Helen Francesca Traubel. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N13460]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-03/1.%20Helen%20Francesca%20Traubel.jpg?h=25357cd3&itok=Id6NGelY "Helen Francesca Traubel. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N13460]")
One of the world’s great Wagnerian sopranos, Helen Traubel was born in south St. Louis on…
While serving as Upper Louisiana’s lieutenant governor between 1792 and 1799, Zenon Trudeau…
![Bess Truman’s official White House portrait by Greta Kempton. [Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, 2008-149]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-01/1.%20Bess%20Truman.jpg?h=ed1f4180&itok=8klDJrns "Bess Truman’s official White House portrait by Greta Kempton. [Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, 2008-149]")
Born in Independence, Missouri, on February 13, 1885, Elizabeth Virginia Wallace, who as…
![Silas Turnbo. [Courtesy of the Springfield–Greene County Library District]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-07/1.%20Silas%20C.%20Turnbo.jpg?h=2741bb13&itok=Ot1erhP8 "Silas Turnbo. [Courtesy of the Springfield–Greene County Library District]")
Silas C. Turnbo collected stories from Ozarkers in the upper White River country of…
![James Milton Turner, circa 1870. [Lincoln University]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2021-03/1-James-Milton-Turner.jpg?h=d64323c3&itok=nkqu6MYa "James Milton Turner, circa 1870. [Lincoln University]")
Although numerous secondary accounts of James Milton Turner’s life list his birth date as…
![Marianne Billeron Vallé’s signature on a baptismal record in 1768. She signed as the godmother to Marie-Louise, the daughter of an enslaved Native American woman. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Ste. Genevieve Parish Records, C3040]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-12/marianne-signature.jpg?h=a2d61f04&itok=bibb_dHf "Marianne Billeron Vallé’s signature on a baptismal record in 1768. She signed as the godmother to Marie-Louise, the daughter of an enslaved Native American woman. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Ste. Genevieve Parish Records, C3040]")
Marianne Billeron Vallé was born in Kaskaskia around 1729, the daughter of…
The Gentry–Threlkeld–Van Horn Tavern, usually referred to as the Van Horn Tavern, was the last known log…
![Charles van Ravenswaay. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Charles van Ravenswaay Photograph Collection, P0014-027765]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-09/1.%20Charles%20van%20Ravenswaay.jpg?h=91b16d31&itok=0nDW2uXL "Charles van Ravenswaay. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Charles van Ravenswaay Photograph Collection, P0014-027765]")
Charles van Ravenswaay, an author, horticulturist, and museum director, was most of all…
![1. George Vaughn. [State Historical Society of Missouri, University of Missouri, Saint Louis Black History Project Collection (S0201)]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-09/1.%20George%20L.%20Vaughn.jpg?h=395d379b&itok=xQ9EjRqA "1. George Vaughn. [State Historical Society of Missouri, University of Missouri, Saint Louis Black History Project Collection (S0201)]")
George L. Vaughn, a prominent Black St. Louis attorney and political activist, was born in…
![George Graham Vest. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Missouri Legislators Portraits, P1084]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-09/1.%20George%20Graham%20Vest.jpg?h=ca2cada9&itok=e06Ku0Tq "George Graham Vest. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Missouri Legislators Portraits, P1084]")
George Graham Vest, who served four terms as a US senator from Missouri (1879–1903), was…
![Jonas Viles with his wife, Ruth, and their four sons. [Image courtesy of the Boone County Historical Society’s Digital Collections]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-11/1.%20Jonas%20Viles_0.jpg?itok=DhuXhAh3 "Jonas Viles with his wife, Ruth, and their four sons. [Image courtesy of the Boone County Historical Society’s Digital Collections]")
Jonas Viles, a longtime professor of history at the University of Missouri, was born in…
![Chris Von der Ahe. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N45223]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2021-03/1-Chris-Von-der-Ahe.jpg?h=8913bb03&itok=-t0p8nOg "Chris Von der Ahe. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N45223]")
Christian Frederick Wilhelm Von der Ahe, a pioneering figure in early professional baseball…
![Henry von Phul. [J. Thomas Scharf, History of Saint Louis City and County, vol. 1 (Philadelphia: Louis H. Everts & Co., 1883)]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-11/1.%20Henry%20von%20Phul.jpg?h=46441fa5&itok=3DIg7Gc5 "Henry von Phul. [J. Thomas Scharf, History of Saint Louis City and County, vol. 1 (Philadelphia: Louis H. Everts & Co., 1883)]")
Henry von Phul was born in Philadelphia in 1784, the son of Johann Wilhelm (later William)…
![William Bradford Waddell. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Waddell Smith Photograph Collection, P0727]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-11/1.%20William%20Bradford%20Waddell.jpg?h=fb232171&itok=P2hTq5Cy "William Bradford Waddell. [State Historical Society of Missouri, Waddell Smith Photograph Collection, P0727]")
William Bradford Waddell typified the mid-nineteenth-century entrepreneur who shaped the…
![Rolla Wells. [William Hyde and Howard L. Conard, eds., Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis (St. Louis: Southern History Co., 1899)]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-11/1.%20Rolla%20Wells.jpg?h=8da26324&itok=CvyBApCu "Rolla Wells. [William Hyde and Howard L. Conard, eds., Encyclopedia of the History of St. Louis (St. Louis: Southern History Co., 1899)]")
Rolla Wells, a businessman and mayor of St. Louis, was born in St. Louis on June 1, 1856,…
![The Whig Party’s national ticket in 1848 included presidential candidate Zachary Taylor and vice presidential candidate Millard Fillmore. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-pga-09004]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2020-07/Whig-Party-1848-election.jpg?h=71843103&itok=jpR2qCOY "The Whig Party’s national ticket in 1848 included presidential candidate Zachary Taylor and vice presidential candidate Millard Fillmore. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-pga-09004]")
Though not organized until several years after the party had formed at the national…
![Osage Chief with Two Warriors, oil painting on card by George Catlin. [National Gallery of Art, Paul Mellon Collection, 1965.16.68]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2024-06/1.-white-hair-paw-hiu-skah.jpg?itok=1uI0lp8Y "Osage Chief with Two Warriors, oil painting on card by George Catlin. [National Gallery of Art, Paul Mellon Collection, 1965.16.68]")
![Otto Widmann in 1883. [Wilson Bulletin, September 1927]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-07/1.%20Otto%20Widmann.jpg?h=dcae2d79&itok=LL3zQoQ0 "Otto Widmann in 1883. [Wilson Bulletin, September 1927]")
![Roy Wilkins in 1963. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ppmsc-01273]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-11/1.%20Roy%20Wilkins.jpg?h=0bae65ef&itok=7q4A-9Ux "Roy Wilkins in 1963. [Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ppmsc-01273]")
Roy O. Wilkins was born on August 30, 1901, in St. Louis. Five years earlier, the US…
Missouri’s third governor, Abraham J. Williams served in that office for less than six…
![Arsania Williams. [State Historical Society of Missouri St. Louis Research Center, University of Missouri Saint Louis Black History Project Photograph Collection (S0201)]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-12/1.%20Arsania%20Williams.jpg?h=3ecb33db&itok=mYANYVHL "Arsania Williams. [State Historical Society of Missouri St. Louis Research Center, University of Missouri Saint Louis Black History Project Photograph Collection (S0201)]")
Born in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, around 1875—sources differ on the year of her birth—Arsania…
![Carl Wimar, circa 1860. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N38636]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2022-12/1.%20Carl%20Wimar.jpg?h=8fbf2b56&itok=SGFB1113 "Carl Wimar, circa 1860. [Missouri Historical Society, St. Louis, Photographs and Prints Collection, N38636]")
In his St. Louis studio, Charles “Carl” Ferdinand Wimar painted the Missouri River frontier…
![John Gabriel Woerner. [William F. Woerner, J. Gabriel Woerner: A Biographical Sketch (1912)]](/sites/default/files/styles/article_header_image/public/2023-01/1.%20John%20Gabriel%20Woerner.jpg?h=d4c90db7&itok=tEHMYccH "John Gabriel Woerner. [William F. Woerner, J. Gabriel Woerner: A Biographical Sketch (1912)]")
John Gabriel Woerner, a celebrated St. Louis lawyer, legal scholar, journalist, and…