Artist Bryce Cobbs (left) and sculpltor Larry Bechtel with Cobbs's drawing of Ms. Lacks

 A Celebration Long Delayed

The former Lee Plaza in downtown Roanoke (named for the Confederate General) has been renamed Henrietta Lacks Plaza, honoring a Black Roanoke-born woman who has been and continues to be instrumental in crucial medical advances.

Ms. Lacks' stem cells have been used for years without the permission of Ms. Lacks or the family in development of vital drugs for the treatment of disease. They have been worth billions of dollars, according to a Lacks family lawsuit. The family has never been compensated.

The new plaza will be enhanced next October with a 6-foot-tall, 400-pound, hollow bronze sculpture by Larry Bechtel of Blacksburg. The sculpture will be in part based on the drawing by Roanoke artist Bryce Cobbs, which was unveiled at a ceremony at noon today downtown.

Ms. Lacks is long dead, but her son, Lawrence, grandson, Ron, and cousin, Ragene Coleman, attended the festivities today and each spoke, along with a group of luminaries.

The re-designation of the plaza is in concert with the naming of the municipal building for late Mayor Noel Taylor and civil rights lawyer Oliver Hill, for whom the courthouse building is named. All, of course, were African Americans and Roanokers. It is yet another example of Roanoke's laudable emphasis on diversity.

Here is a look at some of what happened today.