A century and a half later, the country's first black president helped break ground on a National Mall museum meant to give voice to the African-American experience long ignored by the chief repository of U. S. history and heritage.
The 19th Smithsonian museum, set to open in 2015, will rise on ground where "lives were once traded, where hundreds of thousands once marched for jobs and for freedom," President Barack Obama said. It was here that the pillars of democracy were built often by black hands.
