Museum Without Walls are designated locales of reclamation and reintroduction of Weston’s people of African descent. Our goals are simple: to bring about awareness of the lives and contributions of this once obscured population before and after they became citizens, and honor the Black forebears, their descendants, and their achievements that helped to make Weston the town we all love today.
Museum Without Walls
THE DINAH ROBINSON COURTYARD
Dinah (Wright) Robinson, born about 1817, arrived in Weston, Missouri, from Virginia as an enslaved person in the mid-1840s. On February 16, 1859, she purchased her freedom, and that of her husband Thomas, and their children, Moses and Eliza Jane, from Rev. J.B.Wright.
Blackhawk Walk Memorial
This 1844 section of this Weston Township map shows the continuation of Blackhawk Street, twice interrupted by the wandering Mill Creek. During the decades following the Civil War, this area, prone to flooding on either side of Blackhawk Street, was home to many of Weston’s Black Community members and entrepreneurial endeavors. Due to access to the Second Missionary Baptist Church and the Weston School for Colored Children, renamed Mary McLeod Bethune School in 1900, baptisms and neighborhood social gatherings were often held here.
Decades later, this section between Thomas and Spring and Main and Washington Streets became Weston City Park.
Walking and Driving Tour
Walking and Driving Tour text goes here. A short description of the tour and it’s importance and value.
Weston Banners Celebrating
Black History Month
Our latest Museum Without Walls project commemorates some of Weston’s notable residents of African descent through seventeen banners, featured along Main Street in Historic Downtown Weston during February 2024. You can learn more about them by scrolling left to right above. Please consider helping us honor them with your sponsorship of $150 per honoree.