Author: Lee Matz

As tracks are installed along the Milwaukee Streetcar route, crews cement them into place decades after the original line was covered. Along N. Milwaukee Street, workers poured an additional 320 feet of paving as construction of the new transit system moves through downtown. Recently, crews uncovered old rails from the 1800s that had been used for the original streetcar line along the same road. When that platform removed in 1958, much of the track length was paved over as the streets were reconstructed. Next year when the Milwaukee Streetcar begins operations in 2018, it will close the 60 year...

The completed project will build off other neighborhood development activities which have occurred over the past 10 years, thanks to the tireless efforts of the late Welford Sanders.

The 46th Annual Juneteenth Day Festival was held June 19 along Milwaukee’s MLK Drive, between Center and Burleigh Streets, attracting a crowd of thousands to celebrate the end of slavery that still lacks a national federal holiday. Dating back to 1865, it was on June 19th that Union soldiers, led by Major General Gordon Granger, landed at Galveston, Texas with news that the war had ended and the enslaved were free. In the early years, little interest existed outside the African American community for participation in the Juneteenth celebrations. In some cases, there was hostile resistance by forbidding the...

The Milwaukee Urban League’s fundraising gala highlighted the organization’s nearly one hundred year effort to support the local African American community.