Enduring Families Project

The Juneteenth Court at the Mapleleaf Parade!

A wonderful August Ball was held at the Capella Arts Center last weekend. The community's 3rd, to honor the August Ball held in La Crosse in the late 19th Century. Reenactors ( portraying George Edwin Taylor and Lilian Davenport) told its story. The traditions of cotillion mixed with rich local history continues!

Blanche Wilkins was born in La Crosse on December 1, 1876. She became deaf at an early age and enrolled in the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf when she was 8 years old. In 1893, she became the first African American woman to graduate from the Minnesota State Academy for the Deaf, graduating at the top of her class.

In 1895, she became the first Black deaf woman teacher at the North Carolina School for the Colored Deaf and Blind. According to a North Carolina newspaper from 1897, she received a yearly salary of $250. She retired from her role in 1898.

In 1926, a prominent deaf magazine, "The Silent Worker," described her as "the most accomplished deaf lady of her race in America."