Jewell to commemorate Marian Anderson’s concert

WASHINGTON (AP) - Interior Secretary Sally Jewell is joining a commemoration of Marian Anderson’s concert at the Lincoln Memorial 75 years after the historic event.

Jewell will join the Washington Performing Arts Society and local school children at the memorial Wednesday. They are commemorating the Easter Sunday concert in 1939 when Anderson performed at the memorial after she was denied access to perform at Washington’s D.A.R. Constitution Hall because she was black.

First lady Eleanor Roosevelt and then Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes arranged the Lincoln Memorial concert in 1939. And Roosevelt publicly resigned her membership in the Daughters of the American Revolution in protest.

The commemoration ceremony is planned for Wednesday at 11 a.m.