Welcome to the
Ozarks Afro-American Heritage Museum Online
The New Digital Home of The Only Museum Dedicated to the History of African Americans in the Missouri Ozarks
African American history is a little discussed subject in the Ozark Mountains of Missouri and Arkansas. In 2004, Fr. Moses Berry founded a small storefront museum in Ash Grove, MO. to collect artifacts and photographs that illustrate and illuminate the forgotten history of this region.
In 2013, the museum has migrated to a digital space both because of rising financial costs related to maintaining the physical space and to share this history with a far wider audience.
On this website you can now explore exhibits tracing the lives of African Americans in this region from slavery to emancipation to the struggle against racial violence and Jim Crow racism, browse the collection by item or type and learn more about this unique part of Black history in America. The exhibits offer an overview of African American history in the Ozarks, while the item pages offer descriptions taken directly from Fr. Moses Berry's oral histories.
Featured Item
Geometric design quilt
Cotton quilt with brown trim and squares made of seven triangles. The triangles are in various shades of unprinted cotton.
Featured Collection
Photography - Pullman Porters
A collection of photographs from Glenn Johnson of Cave Springs, Missouri. Johnson was a Pullman Porter in the 1940s and 1950s. These candid photos…
Featured Exhibit
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