Obama: Black history museum tells story of US

“That’s what this museum is about”.

The trials and tribulations of the African American experience are told as well as the community’s contribution to life in the United States in exhibitions created to resonate with everyone.

A tour brings visitors chronologically through freedom, segregation, and civil rights – stories which are told through the help of an interactive lunch counter. “The one that’s told here – it is complicated and it is messy and it is full of contradictions”.

That duality lingers still, Obama said, through successes such as his presidency, and trials such as the police killings of black men.

“It can not be overstated the significance and the impact and the feeling that we have as African Americans and what we should have as all Americans to see that finally after this more than 100 year struggle to get this museum open on the National Mall”, DuSable Museum CEO Perri Irmer said.

“Perhaps it can help a white visitor understand the pain and anger of demonstrators and places like Ferguson and Charlotte”, Obama said.

Other displays at the $540 million museum include a slave cabin from SC, a robe used by boxing great Muhammad Ali and the coffin of Emmett Till, whose 1955 murder in MS helped galvanise the civil rights movement.

This museum, Obama says, provides “context for the debates of our time”.

That view is shared by President Barack Obama whose presence at Saturday’s opening, as the first black USA president, is a strong symbol. The first family enjoyed a private preview earlier this month. Curators also collected artifacts and videos about the death of Freddie Gray while in the custody of Baltimore police.

Be prepared for road closures, large crowds and heightened security in the area surrounding the National Mall.. “Black and white and Latino and Native American and Asian American – see how our stories are bound together”, Obama said.

A separate section examines the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Power era of the 1960s and 1970s and other activism remembering many activists, including Lewis and Dr. Martin Luther King.

“I’m so happy to see that so many people of color are coming out together just to celebrate themselves and one another”, said 50-year-old Derek Jones, who ventured from NY to attend Saturday’s celebration that included music, poetry, and dancing.

The museum’s opening is being celebrated with three days of festivities, including concerts by artists such as rap group Public Enemy and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.

At night, the corona glows from the light within the building.

Lead designer for the project was David Adjaye, the son of a Ghanaian diplomat. The 400,0000-square-foot building was built at a cost of $540 million, half sourced from federal funds and the remainder by the Smithsonian.

He also reflected on Obama’s role in Saturday’s event.

The museum, the nineteenth and the newest of the Smithsonian Institution, came to be after a years long fight for funding. Among those relics are auction notices and other documents attesting to the ownership of some humans by others.

“I am overwhelmed. I’m humbled”, said Deborah Elam, president of the GE Foundation and chief diversity officer for General Electric, as she waited Saturday among the dignitaries on the National Mall. Consider what this artifact tells us about history, about how it’s told, and about what can be cast aside. “It faces its flaws and corrects them”.

Speakers at Saturday’s ceremony also included American Express Co. Robert De Niro, Angela Bassett, Will Smith and Patti LaBelle are among those presenting during the dedication.

“I’ve been waiting to see this day for 15 years – and in some ways, my whole life”, said Rep. John Lewis of Georgia, who was active in the museum’s creation, speaking at its opening. “Today, a dream too long deferred is a dream no longer”, said museum director Lonnie Bunch about the museum’s grand opening.

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After singing soulful rendition of the song “A Change is Gonna Come”, singer Patti LaBelle said “Hillary Clinton” into the microphone before leaving the stage.