Spire has good things in store for Patrick Henry School
@stlouisamerican
Serving, empowering and advocating for equity in St. Louis since 1928
Vol. 94 No. 3
@stlouisamerican
St. Louis American See page B1
The
CAC Audited APRIL 14 – 20, 2022
stlamerican.com
Legacy Institute prepares youths for a changing world “COVID showed me the importance of doing things differently.” – Terran Rome, Executive Director of Legacy Institute By Sylvester Brown Jr. The St. Louis American For years now, Terran Rome has grappled with a consistent fear. “Man, our people are last on every important list.” That fear went into overdrive in 2020 when the coronavirus pandemic struck the globe. “We’re already behind and this is really going to hurt us more,” Rome said. It took almost a year, but Rome was able to craft a program that he feels will prepare young people for a very challenging but opportunity-filled future. It’s called Legacy Institute, a Saturday mentoring program primarily for boys and young men (ages five to 24). For 10 weeks youth attend classes from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m, where they are exposed to a litany
See LEGACY, A6
Photo by Brian Munoz / St. Louis Public Radio
Larry Thompson, 9, (left) a student at St. Ann Elementary watches the move of Ryen Day, 10, from Mary Institute Country Day School Saturday, April 9, 2022. Behind them are Terran Rome, executive director of the Legacy Institute and board member Dr. Darryl Bradley.
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson spoke of her journey to being confirmed as the first Black woman Supreme Court justice at the White House on Friday, April 8, 2022.
COMPLIMENTARY
St. Louis will miss positive contributions of Michael Neidorff Served Black community ‘specifically, unapologetically’
By Alvin A. Reid The St. Louis American Michael Neidorff became Centene Corp., CEO in 1996 and immediately demonstrated his commitment to philanthropy and community service. His visionary leadership and hard work led the company from a $40 million single health care plan to a global health care company with revn As his firm enues of $125 billion grew into a that serves 25 million Fortune 50 com- members and has nearly pany, so did his 75,000 employees. As his firm grew into commitment to a Fortune 50 company, groups and orgaso did his commitment to nizations that groups and organizations served primarily that served primarily Black and minori- Black and minority popty populations far ulations far from corporate boardrooms and from corporate offices. boardrooms and He was especially generous to and offices. supportive of The St. Louis American and the St. Louis American Foundation, as well as advisor to their leadership. Neidorff passed away on April 7, 2022, after a lengthy illness, and his positive impact on underserved communities and charitable causes throughout the region will be difficult, if not impossible, to replace. Michael McMillan, Urban League of Metropolitan St. Louis president and CEO, said Neidorff being a member of the National Urban League board of directors helped St. Louis land the organization’s 2017 Annual Conference. However,
See NEIDORFF, A7
Photo by Nyah Marshall / HUNS
‘Today is a wonderful day’
VP Harris, Black women hail Ketanji Brown Jackson confirmation By Alvin A. Reid The St. Louis American A sometimes-tearful Ketanji Brown Jackson, fresh off her victorious battle to win Senate confirmation as the first Black woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, told the world on Friday April 8, 2022, “We’ve made it. All of us. All of us.” Speaking on the South Lawn of the White House flanked by President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, Jackson said triumphantly, “Our children are telling me that they see now more than ever that here in America, anything is possible.”
HEALTH
Black Maternal Health Week targets birth disparities
Black Maternal Health Week opened Monday nationwide, including a ceremony at Jamaa Birth Village in Ferguson.
Page A12
“I am feeling up to the task, primarily because I know that I am not alone. I am standing on the shoulders of my own role models. Generations of Americans who never had anything close to this kind of opportunity, but who got up every day and went to work believing in the promise of America.” Harris beamed as she declared, “Today is indeed a wonderful day.” She added, “This will answer fundamental questions about who we are and what kind of country we live in. You will inspire generations of leaders. They will watch your confirmation hearings and read your decisions in the years to come.”
Some Republicans’ bitter, distasteful questioning did not stop Jackson from a bi-partisan 53-47 confirmation vote, and Biden said her triumph “is going to let so much sunshine on so many young women, so many young Black women.” “We’re going to look back and see this as a moment of real change in American history,” he said. St. Louis’ first Black woman mayor, Tishaura O. Jones, was among the first to congratulate Jackson after she won confirmation. “This is a remarkable moment for our
See BROWN, A7 SPORTS
National Urban League says Black America ‘under siege’ By Stacy M. Brown NNPA Newswire Marc Morial, National Urban League president and CEO, said that factions of state and federal lawmakers, working in concert with shady political operatives and violent extremists, are dangerously close to dismantling American democracy and establishing autocratic rule. The organization’s 2022 State of Black America report, released on Monday, outlines “the conspiracy and the urgent case for a national mobilization to protect and defend our most sacred constitutional right,” Morial noted in the report titled, “Under Siege: The Plot to Destroy Democracy.” “The anti-democracy wave that began to rise after record-high Black voting rates in 2008 and crested with the Supreme Court’s 2013 decision in Shelby County v. Holder to gut the Voting Rights Act has now broken against ‘The Big Lie,’ the relentless campaign to invalidate the 2020 elec-
See URBAN LEAGUE, A6
LIVING IT
St. Louis American Girls ‘Fab Five’
Black Rep to present ‘Sweat’ in Kansas
Page B3
Page C1
The team features two tremendous point guards in Saniah Tyler of Incarnate Word and JaNyla Bush of Whitfield.
A tribute to Lynn Nottage as part of the 39th William Inge Theater Festival next weekend.