June 7, 1992

A meeting was held at Philander Smith College Auditorium to organize an association to preserve the Mosaic Templars of America National Grand Temple in downtown Little Rock (Pulaski County). The Mosaic Templars, founded in 1882, was a civic and fraternal organization that provided burial insurance to African Americans. In 1992, the building was for sale, and a number of potential buyers wanted to raze it. The building was saved, with the City of Little Rock purchasing it; the city turned the building over to the Department of Arkansas Heritage, which was overseeing its renovation, but an early morning fire on March 16, 2005, destroyed it. A new $7 million cultural center opened on the site in 2008 with exhibits interpreting Arkansas’s African-American history.

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