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Funds Available For Monument Honoring Ida B. Wells

By Mary Garrity, Restored by Adam Cuerden
Wikimedia Commons

Backers of a Chicago monument honoring suffragette and civil rights icon Ida B. Wells-Barnett say enough money has been raised and pledged to build the structure.

Wells-Barnett's great granddaughter, Michelle Duster, says more than 900 people donated money for the monument to be built on the city's South Side.

Duster says the cash donations to the Commemorative Art Committee will cover most of the cost of the granite and bronze monument, to be designed by sculptor Richard Hunt. Duster says the goal is to have the monument installed next year.

Duster and other volunteers have worked for more than a decade for a monument acknowledging Wells-Barnett's legacy. The activist, who died at age 69 in 1931, crusaded against the lynching of black men, pushed for women's right to vote and started organizations designed to help African-Americans gain economic and political power.

Interest in Wells-Barnett accomplishments has increase in recent years, with the city of Chicago considering renaming a major thoroughfare after her.