The Manteca Senior Center saw a packed house as residents celebrated Black History Month on Tuesday evening.
Gwendolyn Grace, otherwise known as DJ Grace, launched the event in its 3rd annual celebration, filled with soul train dancing and food, a raffle, and informative Black history trivia.
"The father of Black history, Carter Woodson, was in - I think they said he was in class earlier in college, and the professor told him that Black people had no history. So, he started Black History Week and turned it into Black History Month, and we've been celebrating for 100 years now."
Kattie Cephus, 81, a member of the Manteca Senior Center, grew up in the Civil Rights era in segregated Gulfport, Mississippi.
"Today is like a sweet and bitter situation because we fought so hard back in the 60s to come forward today and to live out a dream that Martin Luther King initiated for us," Cephus said. "Thurgood Marshall and all of those guys wanted to bring us forward with education. A lot of us received the education. A lot of us didn't because of finances and money."
Cephus attended 33rd Avenue High School, where she said it was great, with Black teachers. Successful athletes and opera singers were also graduates of this school. Cephus then moved to California when she was around 18 years old and reflected back on her journey in the segregated South.
"I saw and witnessed and was a part of the movement," Cephus said. "It was challenging. It was hard, and some of it was heartbreaking. Lost a lot of lives, too. Lives that people don't even talk about or know about. So, I saw that from living in Mississippi."
Fast forward to today, where Cephus never wants to forget where she came from, wanting to keep her heritage alive in families, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren to know what their struggle was while also celebrating where they are today.
"Today, I always think of where I came from to be who I am, and I thank God for that," Cephus said. "And I thank Martin Luther King for that because I came in his era. And when he passed away, I knew that things (were) going to change, and I thought they would change for the best. But, as I live out my life, I'm 81 years old now. I feel a little disappointed in how far we came back then to where we are now; we're still kind of not where I would like to see us."
Cephus longs for Dr. King's example of nonviolence to continue as she fears history is repeating itself, but she said "we're not going back to where we came from" and she has a dream - for her grandchildren and great grandchildren, "that they would be able to challenge and live in a better world".
Grace believes it's important for people to know their history and to celebrate it.
"Black history is American history," Grace said. "We are together in this. We are one people."