Master storyteller Gladys Coggswell shares inspirational tales and “down-home” stories about all walks of African-American life on Sunday, April 18 at 2 p.m. at the Central Library, 14 W. 10th St.

All along the rivers, from the front porches of Hannibal to the neighborhoods of St. Louis to the cotton fields of the Bootheel and west to Kansas City, stories are being told. Coggswell has heard many of them, compiled them in her book Stories from the Heart: Missouri’s African-American Heritage, and shares them with audiences throughout Missouri and the Midwest.

Coggswell is a master storyteller with the Missouri Folkarts program. She was presented the Missouri Arts Council’s Individual Artist of the Year Award in 2005.

This presentation is part of the Missouri Valley Speakers Series, a program of the Missouri Valley Special Collections at the Central Library. The series is made possible in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.