One place in Jefferson City records the lives of pioneers, business leaders, politicians, former slaves, professors, soldiers and everyday people who have made the Capital City their home during the last 200 years. Buried Jefferson City History will highlight some of the stories from more than 2,700 people interred at Woodland-Old City Cemetery. Cemetery preservationist Nancy Arnold Thompson has devoted seven years to seeing monuments cleaned and reset and unmarked burials restored. Local author Michelle Brooks helps capture the stories behind the graves. The people buried here are among Cole County's first settlers. They built the buildings, formed and ran the government, created the businesses and schools, enforced the laws, piloted the steamboats, and fought the wars. They are the history of Jefferson City.
Michelle Brooks has enjoyed writing since before she could read, pretending to fill pages of notebooks with swirls. In the sixth grade, her book Pop Goes the Popcorn! (illustrated by Renessa Bottom Wiggins) won her a trip to a young author’s conference. During high school, she provided copy for the local newspaper, the Carthage Press, about her school’s activities. Her first published work was a poem in her college English department’s annual magazine. It became apparent that her strength was in nonfiction, and Michelle returned to newspapers, writing for the college newspaper and then for the Daily Dunklin Democrat in Kennett, the Monroe City News and the Current Local in Van Buren. Her skills improved immensely due to the influence of editors at the Jefferson City News Tribune, to which nineteen years’ experience with Central Missouri Newspapers Inc. and more than one hundred newspaper industry awards can attest. The interest in history matured later. Michelle became a student of Jefferson City history when given the historic preservation beat at the News Tribune. Her appreciation for the impacts of local history on present-day events grew over the years. Since studying anthropology and history at Lincoln University, Jefferson City, Michelle has worked on larger research projects, including identification of members of the Sixty-Second U.S. Colored Troops, founders of Lincoln University;and discovering the broad and pioneering career of her grandfather Harry “HAP” Peebles, who was a country music promoter across the Midwest from 1938 to 1993. Hidden History of Jefferson City was her first book, released in July 2021. She also has self-published Interesting Women of the Capital City, highlighting 10 women from pre-Civil War to the 21st century, whose stories have never been fully told. Her next book with The History Press will be Lost Jefferson City in 2022. She is currently working on Blue Tigers in the Air, about students and faculty from Lincoln University, Jefferson City, Mo., who served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II among the first Tuskegee Airmen