Fifty years ago this month, crowds turned out by the thousands to cheer as Pekin welcomed its second sitting president in just over two years. President Gerald Ford was in town for a singular purpose: To officially cut the ribbon and open the Dirksen Congressional Center. 

As part of the activities to commemorate the 50th anniversary, members of the Pekin community are invited to a free open-house reception from 5 – 7pm on Tuesday, August 19, at 2815 Broadway. Light refreshments will be available, and the Center will be displaying rarely seen documents and artifacts connected to the history of its operations first at the Pekin Public Library and, since 2003, at its current home on Broadway. That will include highlighting donations from members of the Pekin community, showcasing their links to Sen. Dirksen and the work of groups including the Dirksen Center Guild.

Ford's ribbon-cutting and the 1973 cornerstone-laying ceremony featuring President Richard Nixon were symbols of the esteem the nation held for the Center's namesake, Sen. Everett McKinley Dirksen. Dirksen envisioned the Center as not just a repository for his papers but an opportunity to showcase the many consequential changes to the nation's history from the 1930s to the 1960s during his tenure in Congress.

The Center continues that vision, serving as a community resource in multiple ways, from aiding teachers with primary-source documents for classroom lessons to assisting local historical societies in their research. It supports the annual PCHS Close Up program that offers an immersive visit to Washington, D.C. for teens, and also provides scholarships to Bradley University students preparing for careers in public service, as well as others seeking summer internships on Capitol Hill.

During the last several years, it has sponsored the writing of a play about Sen. Everett Dirksen's life which is currently being reviewed for potential production, and it has assisted a local children's book author in preparing an illustrated book about Sen. Dirksen that saw live readings last month at Dirksen Primary School and last year at the Pekin Marigold Festival.

As it moves into its second half-century, the Center has employed high school interns from Pekin, as well as two Bradley University students, as part of a multi-year project to digitize key elements of Dirksen's civil rights papers and make them available online. The ongoing, federally funded work for the American Congress Digital Archives Portal will also include material from the separate collections of House Minority Leader Bob Michel and U.S. Rep. and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

It is also processing an additional series of papers donated by former Reps. Cheri Bustos, Rodney Davis, and Adam Kinzinger, continuing their role as the archive of choice for retiring members of Congress in Illinois.