St. Louis Gateway Classic Logo. Courtesy St. Louis Gateway Classic Sports Foundation
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St. Louis Gateway Classic Sports Foundation
In the eight years since its
inception in 1994, the St. Louis Gateway Classic Sports Foundation
has become a premier sports organization that focuses on events and
opportunity for urban youth. The foundation provides the St. Louis
community with high quality sporting events where the athletic
talent of young people is recognized, celebrated and supported.
These events include high school basketball championships; track
and field meets; punt, pass and kick competitions; tennis matches;
and amateur boxing events. The annual signature event is the Annual
Budweiser Gateway Classic football game, featuring teams from
historically Black colleges. It has become the largest sporting
attraction in the region for local and out-of-state African
Americans.
The Gateway Classic wants to send a strong message to
youth that someone does care about them, that someone will invest
in their skill and provide positive, nurturing alternatives to
negative situations. The Foundation has invested more than $1.5
million dollars in the black community and has provided at least 20
full, four-year college scholarships to area high school students
each year since 1998. The foundation's outreach has increasingly
emphasized the importance of building a better future for youth
through programs that target the educational, health, intellectual,
physical, social and spiritual development of young people.
Other programs include a Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Youth Awareness Day program that recognizes area high school
students for essays about Dr. King and the outstanding community
services they have performed. The foundation also features a Feed
the Hungry Thanksgiving program, a Christmas celebration, a
scholarship awards banquet, and the Southwestern Bell Miss Gateway
Classic Scholarship Pageant.
Documentation includes text, videotapes, posters,
magazines, newspaper articles, a calendar, programs and a press
release.
Originally submitted by: William (Bill) Clay, Representative (1st District).
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The Local Legacies project provides a "snapshot" of American Culture as it was expressed in spring of 2000. Consequently, it is not being updated with new or revised information with the exception of "Related Website" links.
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