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…
![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…