KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Black History goes beyond the month of February, and an exhibit dedicated to a woman whose contributions to medicine will live on forever sits on the campus of Kalamazoo College.
The Henrietta Lacks Travel Museum means everything to Jermaine Jackson as it's a dedication to his aunt.
Lacks was a Black woman with terminal cervical cancer. She was treated at Johns Hopkins University where doctors took her cells without her knowledge.
"It's important that when Black stories are told that it is told in accurate form. And so, it is important for people to understand, again, that this is a Black woman," Jackson told FOX 17.
Jackson launched the exhibit around 2021. Since then, it has traveled all over Michigan, using pictures and timelines to share the story of Henrietta Lacks.
"The goal and focus has always been to have live this Black woman, Henrietta Lacks, and for people to know about her just being a human, and to talk about her family as well," he added.
Her cells are famously known as HeLa cells because of their unique ability to replicate themselves in a lab, even after Lacks's death.
Now, Lacks is regarded as the Mother of Modern Medicine.
According to Dr. Robert Sawyer from Western Michigan University Homer Stryker M.D. School of Medicine, Lacks made two major contributions to the field.
"She had cells from a cancer that were preserved in those cells, have some characteristics, including how rapidly they grow," Dr. Sawyer explained.
The other is making sure patients are recognized for their contributions to modern medicine.
"Because it did not happen at all for Ms. Lacks and it was, it's only been in the decades since that, we have understood that that was not right," Dr. Sawyer added.
Like Jackson, Dr. Sawyer feels that Lacks's story is one that needs to be told forever.
"In the long run, the whole history of how those cells were used, or so forth, are very much entwined in the thoughts about how we were treating African American patients," he said.
The traveling museum is just one of many ways Jackson is keeping his aunt's name alive. In 2022, he pushed for the city of Kalamazoo to declare October 4 "Henrietta Lacks Day."
His next mission is to get a statue erected in the city.
