The U.S. Marshals Service and the families of their fallen now have a place to honor the men and women who have served the federal agency over the past 230 years.

More than 500 gathered Tuesday at the U.S. Marshals Museum on Riverfront Drive in Fort Smith to take part in a dedication of the new, mostly completed, museum and education center. The nation’s oldest law enforcement agency was formed by Congressional charter on Sept. 24, 1789, in the Judiciary Act.

“I could talk all day long about the kinds of things we do, but if there is something tough that needs to be done, you want to call a deputy U.S. marshal,” Donald W. Washington, director of the U.S. Marshals Service, said Tuesday during a two-hour dedication ceremony.

Washington, who was named the new director in March, said Fort Smith was “the perfect place” for the U.S. Marshals Museum because of its importance in the Marshals Service's history. More U.S. Marshals and deputies based out of Western District of Arkansas in Fort Smith have died in the line of duty than any other district.

Washington pointed out U.S. Marshals annually arrest about 100,000 fugitives and 11,000 sex offenders. Since 2005, Marshals have recovered 1,500 endangered children in conjunction with the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children. The agency has 94 district offices, 218 sub-offices and four foreign offices.

In its history, U.S. Marshals have tracked down spies during the Civil War and World War II, protected African-American students during integration of schools, and have even been in charge of the U.S. Census, Lt. Gov. Tim Griffin noted during the dedication.

The McDonogh Three — a nickname for the three African-American girls who were the first black students to integrate an all-white school in New Orleans — attended the dedication Tuesday. Leona Tate, Tessie Prevost and Gail Etienne Stripling were joined with the marshal who protected them that day in 1954: Deputy U.S. Marshal Herschel Garner.

Also in attendance were the family of Deputy U.S. Marshal Josie Lamar Wells, who was shot and killed in March 2015 as he and other members of the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Task Force attempted to serve an arrest warrant on a double-murder suspect at the Elm Grove Motel in Baton Rouge.

And now the Marshals have a Hall of Honor to remember Wells and 375 other fallen deputies and Marshals.

The hall of honor was named in memory of the late Sam M. Sicard of Fort Smith, an ardent supporter and benefactor of the museum’s mission. The museum building is named for museum supporters Mary Carleton and Robert A. Young III of Fort Smith.

The museum is 80 percent complete, said Doug Babb, chairman of the U.S. Marshals Museum board of directors. Babb noted the museum is expected to be completed by CDI Contractors in December. Because of historic flooding and rain delays, the museum’s completion was set back more than 60 days. It rained again Tuesday during the dedication, creating a muddy field for museum supporters to exit. Two people got stuck, but their cars were eventually freed with help from Cody Faber, a National Park Service ranger at the Fort Smith National Historic Site.

The museum’s fundraising arm has about $8 million remaining of a roughly $15 million total fundraising goal. Once the $8 million short-term goal is completed, the museum can order the museum’s high-tech interactive exhibits from Thinkwell of Los Angeles.

Gov. Asa Hutchinson, a former U.S. attorney for the Western District of Arkansas in Fort Smith, was also on hand for the ceremony and talked about the importance of the federal judges and U.S. Marshals in upholding justice and the rule of law. Hutchinson recalled his work with Marshals on a high-profile case in the early 1980s that involved prosecuting Arkansans who harbored Gordon Kahl, a founding member of the anti-government group Posse Comitatus. U.S. Marshal Kenneth Muir and Deputy U.S. Marshal Robert Cheshire were killed in a gunfight with Kahl and supporters near Medina, North Dakota, in February 1983. An exhibit in the hall of honor tells their story.

Jim Dunn, former president of the U.S. Marshals Museum Foundation, said the new museum is more than a learning center for the Constitution and American history.

“The family members fallen U.S. Marshals and deputies have never had a place to go to honor them,” Dunn said. “Now they do.”

Alice Alt, president of the U.S. Marshals Museum Foundation, said Tuesday’s ceremony helped illustrate the importance of the U.S. Marshals Service.

“For me, for us, the team, watching other people experience what we know is true was powerful,” Alt said. “This place has impact. People from all over the country came to this today.”