The Mifflin Legacy: A Story of Community & Social Justice

Commemorating the Past. Honoring the Present.   Setting Sights on the Future.

Join our efforts to refresh the Mifflin Street Mural, with your input & support. In October 2019, ABC for Health embarked on a quest to refresh the public art on our building’s north-western facing façade, long the site of multiple murals.

ABC for Health’s beautiful and eclectic building sits on the corner of Mifflin and Bassett Streets in Downtown Madison’s Capitol Neighborhood. The site, the longtime host to community-centered grocery stores and food coops, leveraged its large brick canvas, to host advertisements and colorful murals over many decades. As ABC celebrates a milestone anniversary of 25 years, the timing is ripe to refresh the mural, one that goes above and beyond the image we currently see every day. This is, after all, the “granddaddy” of all the murals in Madison!

ABC for Health developed The Mifflin Legacy Project: A Story of Community & Social Justice to commemorate the culture and traditions of the Mifflin Street community, especially the influential period of the late 1960s, while honoring the present values of the city, our nonprofit organization, and new neighbors. We also look toward the future of Madison, with hopes for visual representations of the people who live, work, and play in our neighborhood, and that encourages us to look to the future with optimism, hope, and progress.

ABC for Health developed The Mifflin Legacy Project: A Story of Community & Social Justice to commemorate the culture and traditions of the Mifflin Street community, especially the influential period of the late 1960s, while honoring the present values of the city, our nonprofit organization, and new neighbors. We also look toward the future of Madison, with hopes for visual representations of the people who live, work, and play in our neighborhood, and that encourages us to look to the future with optimism, hope, and progress.

Public art that honors the evolving history, culture, and tradition of the Mifflin Street community:  

The current mural is deteriorating, designed to be ephemeral, and as ABC celebrates 25 years of serving children and families in our community, the time is right to move forward with a project that tells a new story with an emphasis on health equity and other social justice issues our community feels strongly about today.

The final goal of The Mifflin Legacy Project is to create a visual representation of the stories heard on this landmark corner of Mifflin and Bassett Streets. We aspire to create a piece of public art that honors the rich history and traditions of our Madison community.

Over the last 5 decades, the mural has seen four different iterations, the most recent and current version completed in 1987. Now, we seek your input and support on deciding what comes next. What would you like to see in the next mural? Email us at info@safetyweb.org.

Check payments are also welcomed. Make checks payable to ABC for Health at 32 N. Bassett St. Madison, WI 53703 with the Memo: Mural.

What's New:

3/3/20 - Support the ABC Mural Project "The Mifflin Legacy" in this year's online giving day, The Big Share.

2/7/20 - Semifinalists Artists first interviews complete!

1/10/19 - Our new fundraiser is now available on Facebook.

12/16/19 - The Call for Artists is now closed! Submissions will be reviewed and semifinalists selected by January 31,2020.

Changes Could Come to Historic Mural in Downtown Madison (Channel 3000, 19 October 2019)

Nonprofit Welcomes Local Input for New Mifflin Street Mural (Daily Cardinal, 17 October 2019)

Mifflin Street Mural to Get New Design with Help of Public (Badger Herald, 16 October 2019)

Longtime Mifflin Street Mural is About to Undergo a Change (Wisconsin State Journal, 15 October 2019)

PRESS RELEASE: ABC for Health Launches Mural Project (ABC for Health, 15 October 2019)