Kellerman Foundation presents The Oliver Family: Reflections On A Legacy

The Oliver Family exhibit is on display at Heritage Hall located at 102 Main St. in Cape Girardeau and will be a permanent installation at the location. The exhibit features a vast collection of paintings, books and artifacts from the Oliver family, all supplied by descendants of the family to the Kellerman Foundation.

Members of the Oliver family, including Marie Oliver who is known as the "Betsy Ross of Missouri," were influential in Southeast Missouri during the 19th and 20th centuries. Marie Oliver designed the official flag Missourians display today, and it became Missouri flag in 1913. Mary Ann Kellerman, one of the creators of the Kellerman Foundation for Historic Preservation, made the decision the exhibit would be permanent.

"Because of the importance of this to our region, we think it should always be here," Kellerman said. "We will keep adding and adding and making different interpretations or different arrangements of things as we go through the rest of the boxes.

Members of the foundation have received more than 150 boxes of items from various Oliver descendants and have still not looked through all of the boxes. They currently have one intern who is working on cataloging each item and identifying people in photographs with Dr. Frank Nickell, noted historian. As of Wednesday, 66 boxes still remained unopened at Heritage Hall.