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31st Street Beach To Be Named After Dr. Margaret Burroughs

CHICAGO (CBS) -- A South Side beach that was once the site of an infamous race riot will soon be named after Dr. Margaret Burroughs, who founded the DuSable Museum of African American History.

The Chicago Park District Board was set to vote on a proposal to rename 31st Street Beach as "Dr. Margaret T. Burroughs Beach & Park" during its next meeting on Wednesday, and unanimous approval was expected.

Chicago Park District Supt. Michael Kelly announced the plan to rename the park on Tuesday, alongside Congressmen Bobby Rush and Danny Davis.

The beach is where the 1919 Chicago Race Riot started, after a mob of white people threw stones at a black teenager who wandered across an unofficial imaginary boundary separating blacks from whites.

"This is an historical site. This was the beach for black people, 31st Street. Now, as we look out today, which is wonderful, it is an integrated beach, and that's what Dr. Burroughs worked for. She worked to bring us together as one humankind," said Burroughs' friend, Peggy Montes, founder of the Bronzeville Children's Museum.

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Rush, who had been pushing for a city landmark to be named in Burroughs' honor, said the renaming of the beach is an historic moment.

"She was not only a member of the Park District, and an artist, but she was an institution builder in our community. So today we are going to complete the trilogy," he said.

That trilogy refers to three honors for influential women in Chicago in the past year: the opening of Maggie Daley Park, the dedication of the Jane Byrne Interchange, and now Margaret Burroughs Beach and Park.

Ald. Will Burns said the beach has been a traditional summer spot for African Americans, pointing to a group of kids using the beach on Tuesday.

"It's for them, so that they know that there were powerful African American people who saw the world, not as it was, but as it could be, and helped to give voice to people who had not been able to speak before," he said.

An art gallery at the South Shore Cultural Center was named after Burroughs in 2010.

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