The Colorado Springs Pioneers Museum presents the 2023 lecture series, featuring a wide range of speakers offering diverse perspectives and unique insights on Pikes Peak regional history. 

Legacy Matters. Tell Your Story–Everybody Has a Foot Locker.

Presented by Juanita Stroud Martin 

Sharing family history is an invaluable means of passing on to coming generations the skills, values, dreams, and strengths that previous generations employed to overcome obstacles to success. The Stroud family of Colorado Springs exemplifies this strategy. 

The Art of History

Presented by Ashley Cornelius 

Poetry has always been a way to capture and preserve history. This presentation will explore Payne Chapel and its significance for the Black Community, and highlight influential Black leaders, Fannie Mae Duncan, Lulu Pollard, Vera Gang Scott, and the McRae Sisters. You’ll learn about these incredible women through history and poetry.

Including a vocal performance by special guest, Peggy Shivers. In 1993 Clarence and Peggy Shivers founded the Shivers Fund and Concert Series, which provides for the purchase of library books and for the community celebration of history, culture, and the arts. The late Clarence Shivers sculpted the Tuskegee Airman statue at the U. S. Air Force Academy. The Shivers African American Historical and Cultural Collection at Pikes Peak Library District continues to enrich our community.

ABOUT JUANITA STROUD MARTIN 

As young children, my three siblings and I left Colorado Springs to live in Detroit, Michigan, with our mother and step-father. After graduating from high school with honors, I enlisted in the Navy for 4 years and was honorably discharged as a Yeoman 2nd Class. I have seven children and am married to Greg Johnson. I graduated with honors from three colleges in Philadelphia and attained an MS Degree in Elementary Education from the University of Pennsylvania. Greg and I have volunteered KRCC programming in the past and have volunteered ethnic programming on Comcast Channel 17 for well over 25 years. I am retired from the El Paso County Department of Social Services. 

ABOUT ASHLEY CORNELIUS   

Ashley Cornelius is the Pikes Peak Region Poet Laureate and is a Licensed Professional Counselor (LPC). Ashley is a nationally recognized and awarded spoken-word poet and facilitator, her poetry reflects her intersectionality as a Black queer woman and is committed to increases access and invisibility for BIPOC and queer artists. Ashley received the Bee an Arts Champion Award from the Bee Vradenburg Foundation in 2021 and the Lyndon E e Music and Arts Influence Award in 2022. She is the 2019 winner of the Colorado Springs Independent Best of Artist Category and a two-time Tedx speaker. Ashley grew up in Colorado in Colorado Springs and is excited about the way poetry has shaped her experiences and aims create spaces for others to feel connected and joyous through art.