Civil Rights Public History Miniterm

Welcome to the blog for the inaugural Civil Rights Public History mini-term. From December 1st to December 18th, 2009, our class, HST 277T, traveled throughout the South, visiting the sites of the major Civil Rights actions. Our trip took us from Charleston, through Atlanta, Montgomery, Selma, Birmingham, Memphis, Little Rock, Jackson and finally into New Orleans. Along the way, we stopped at the iconic sites of the movement and met with a number of its participants. Our goal was to learn about the most influential social movement of the twentieth century and to study the way that movement has been commemorated.

Here we are in Charleston, the morning after we arrived.  To follow the trip from the beginning, scroll to the bottom of this page and click on “older posts,” then scroll to the bottom of that page,  or click on the day-to-day links on the right.  For the students’ final reflections on their return from the tour, see “Reflections” above.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank Dr. Estelle Cooke-Sampson, whose generous support allowed this journey to take place.

Today was the last day of our two and half week Civil Rights journey. It has been an amazing trip, and we are all exhausted! But we were eager to make the most of our time in New Orleans, so we immersed ourselves in the history and culture of Black New Orleans. After a leisurely morning, we met for lunch at Lil’ Dizzy’s, famed soul food restaurant, where we enjoyed chicken, macaroni and cheese, and bread pudding.  At Lil’ Dizzy’s we also met up with Greg Osborne, archivist and tour guide extraordinaire, who brought us to St. Louis Cemetery Number 1. Established in 1789, the cemetery consists entirely of above ground vaults and is the burial site of many prominent African Americans from the region, including Homer Plessy (of Plessy vs. Ferguson) and Ernest Morial, the city’s first black Mayor. 

We then toured Congo Square, a gathering place for New Orleans slaves on their days off in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. 

For our last night, we dined at Deanie’s, a local and highly recommended seafood restaurant; then it was off to Preservation Hall.  Founded in 1961 to ensure the preservation of traditional New Orleans jazz, the club hosts a variety of jazz bands.  We caught the New Birth Brass Band, and they played a number of traditional favorites, including  ”When the Saints Go Marching In,”  ”What a Wonderful World”  and “Do You Know What  it Means to Miss New Orleans?” It was, as one student remarked, a perfect way to end our journey. 

Last night we arrived in New Orelans, where we were welcomed into the home of the Gourriers, parents of our student Jared. The Gourriers served up a spectacular meal of crawfish pasta, gumbo, rice and beans, and fried chicken, and after two weeks on the road, we all reveled in the warmth of a real home. This morning we had a rare few hours off, so joined by Prof. Ken Aslakson,  a group of us headed to Cafe du Monde for beignets and coffee, then explored Jackson Square, St. Louis Cathedral, and the Mississippi riverfront.

The afternoon was more somber: having acknowledged the triumphs of the Civil Rights movement, we wanted to think deeply about its limits, so we set off on a tour of the damage done by Hurricane Katrina. Though we all agreed that our tour guide tried hard to whitewash the severity of the social injustices that the disaster of Katrina represented, our tour through the lower ninth ward spoke for itself.  The devastation that remains is heartbreaking: those who rebuild too often find themselves living amidst houses still bearing the marks of the flood and the symbols of the belated search and rescue effort.

We also drove by a few of the houses that Brad Pitt’s “Make it Right” Foundation has sponsored

and the memorial erected to those lost in the flood. The bars symbolize the level the water reached; the empty chairs to the right, those who lost their lives:

After our tour,  the students met to begin strategizing ways that they could effect change in their world.

Student Responses:

Peter:  We are visiting New Orleans to connect the Civil Rights Movement to the present and think about how race and politics played a major role in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Today we took a guided bus tour of the city and got to see a lot of the damage that was done by the storm 4 years ago. When the tour first started, the bus driver/ tour guide made an off-the-cuff comment about why people would want to see the damage. Although he probably shouldn’t have said that to paying customers, I understand that having to relive the memory of Katrina everyday is a difficult thing for someone that Katrina affected so much. While on the tour we passed by houses and spaces in the city with serious damage still left: roofs with holes, deserted golf courses, leveled houses, and trailers on front lawns still remain in the city. It was by no means easy to see. Then the tour went through the lower 9^th Ward, the area probably most devastated by the storm. It was horrible what the storm did to these houses and the lives of the people it took and affected. It’s hard to imagine this being a reality, but it was and still is a reality for anyone associated with New Orleans in any capacity.           

For me today, one of the most difficult things to grasp is the fact that the government did not use all its resources to help the victims of the storm and the fact today that the insurance companies are still not willing to dish out the money that they owe to these people. It’s sad to see that a dollar amount has been placed on human life. Clearly, this country has a ways to go before we get it right.

On a more positive note, it was great to see that the power of people is still strong because a lot of the work done on homes and the donations made to various causes to help after the storm were contributed from individual private citizens and that was a great thing to see.

Liz: We went on a bus tour of the damage done by Hurricane Katrina. The bus driver was quite interesting:  he stated that he did not “understand why people are still interested” in this event.  Although he was a native of New Orleans, he failed to realize that, as Americans, we should all learn from this event and make changes-not only the government.  He failed to realize that not everyone on the bus was a spectator, but maybe an individual coming to terms with the reality in our country that we’ve heard so much about.  He failed to realize that maybe someone on this tour, like me, could be encouraged to come and help this city. 

New Orleans was one of my favorite places to go on this whole trip.  I am so encouraged to come back and help out the people.  This city has everything from culture to amazing food….but it also exemplifies the failures of government to realize the need in our own country.  Because of this trip, I am so encouraged to bridge the gaps left open by blind eyes.  Until we begin to close the gaps in our country then we cannot move on to become the powerful nation we strive to be. 

We pulled into Jackson very late last night. On the bus en route,  we watched “Ghosts of Mississippi,” a movie that tells the story of the 1994 prosecution and ultimate conviction of Byron de la Beckwith for the assassination of Medgar Evers, the field secretary for the Mississipi NAACP.  Evers’ courageous stand against Jim Crow laws had placed him in harm’s path for years - it was Evers who, in 1955,  travelled to Money, Mississippi to investigate the lynching of 14 year old Emmitt Till.  In 1963, he was gunned down in the driveway of his Jackson home while his wife and three children waited up for him inside. We had studied Evers in class, but few of the students knew the story of the trial and conviction of his assassin,  and the film set the stage for our visit to the Evers’ modest house.  Evers’ widow, Myrlie Evers Williams, donated the house to Tougaloo College, and it has since been turned into a museum.  The curator from Tougaloo told us that Ms. Evers Williams had to sell most of their possessions to move to California after the murder, so the furnishings in the house are period but not original. The concrete in the driveway still bears faint blood stains that trace the path Medgar Evers crawled after he was shot.

Student Responses:

Peter: Jackson, Mississippi. I’ll be honest; I’ve been more comfortable in my life. As an African-American from the north, I can say that I felt a little uneasy in the presence of Mississippi, a state that is known for its ugly and often violent race relations, especially in the mid-twentieth century. So, that being said, today we visited the home of Civil Rights worker Medgar Evers, the same place where he was also assassinated. The house itself was an ordinary house, designed to look like it did back in the 1950’s and 60’s. Getting a tour of the house was quite interesting. We got to see how in the room where Medgar Evers’ children slept, the beds were on the floor because the family was afraid that the children would get shot with a stray bullet. To me that made the experience more real, because we got to see first hand the real danger that not just the crusaders for equality were in, but their families as well. These individuals risked everything, including family for the betterment of the U.S. and many, including Medgar Evers paid the ultimate price. Evers was slain in his driveway as he returned home. He was shot in the back while his family was in the house. It was still possible to see where his blood had been spilled because the stains in the cement were still visible some 50 years later. That was unbelievable to me that the stains were still so visible after so long. It really dawned on me that these Civil Rights workers and leaders lived in the battlefield. They were in an environment where they could be tormented and even murdered, and even worse, they called it home. These people risked their lives everyday so that our generation can live better, and I truly feel that if my generation embraces this ethos, we have a tremendous opportunity to make a great change for the better in our lifetimes.

For many of us, Little Rock was a much anticipated destination. We had grown up hearing about the Little Rock Nine, and the image of Elizabeth Eckford, the 15-year-old in the crisply starched white dress with black gingham trim, hounded by screaming mobs as she attempted to make her way into Little Rock Central High, was iconic.  Our plan for the day was to tour the school and then meet with two of the LR 9: Minniejean Brown Trickey and Thelma Mothershed Wair.

The school itself is an imposing structure: built in 1927, it was celebrated at the time as the most beautiful high school in the nation. The attempt to integrate Central High 30 years later resulted in an internationally televised showdown between the national government and the state of Arkansas- a showdown that twice involved the national guard.

Though it still operates as a public high school, Little Rock Central High has been turned into a national historic site.  To accomplish this dual function, tours are timed during classes to minimize disruption.  Our guide walked us down the same path that the nine had taken the day they finally gained admission to the school. Inside the school itself, we walked the hallways, viewed the stairways where, as our guide explained, harrassment of the LR nine was most common, and stopped in the cafeteria, where a 15 year old Minniejean Brown spilled chili on a white boy who was harrassing her.

We then met with Ms. Brown Trickey, who shared her experiences and her views on contemporary race relations. Many of us were struck by the toll that the abusive treatment of the Nine took on her. We think often about the lives that were lost during the Civil Rights movement; less often about those who suffered at the hands of white supremacists but survived. 

We also met with Ms. Mothershed Wair, who entered Central High with a heart condition.  Ms. Wair described her decision to enter Central and the discrimination she experienced at times at the hands of her teachers.

After our meetings we proceeded to the grounds of the state Capitol, where statues commemorate the Little Rock Nine.

Student Responses

Ewo: 

The Little Rock Nine! I can’t even believe it. When we walked to the high school, I had another moment in which I was inside a history book. I have seen the image of Central High School so many times, and it definitely was an impressive sight. The school was massive. In 1957, there were 1900 white students at Central and they only let in nine African Americans. This is shocking but apparently the school is built for 3000! It’s hard to understand the fear and hatred that the people felt toward blacks, especially towards children. All they wanted to do was get an education. In the play by Spirit Trickey, she writes about how her mother once saw a dump truck come by her school and empty books on the grass. These books are the books that are passed down from whites schools. Outdated, pages ripped, and covered with insults, I am so impressed by the students who still learned and went on to higher education. An example of another atrocity was how the school was funded. In today’s money, it would have taken $17 million dollars to build Central High School. The school district told blacks to build their own school. So while their tax money already contributed to the construction of Central, they had to fundraise for their own school. Wow. I enjoyed the tour of Central. The hardest thing to really wrap my head around was the bullying. Of course it happened, and of course it was ugly and cruel. But the size of the school really hit home. Those students walked alone the majority of the time, all around those huge hallways. They were tormented day in and day out. I don’t know how they survived.

Many things surprised me about Minniejean Brown Trickey.  I used to think people like Ms. Brown Trickey survived on pure strength, but I am not sure if that is true anymore.  She has not reconciled with how she was treated.  I can’t blame her. American democracy failed her fifty years ago, and still fails many African-Americans.

While we enjoyed our time off in Memphis, our original motivation for coming here was to study the later Civil Rights Movement, including the turn to social and economic issues and the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr. on April 4, 1968.  The site of the assassination, the Lorraine Motel, was turned into the National Civil Rights Museum in 1991.

The museum purchased the property across the street (the boarding house from which Dr. King was shot) in 2001. It now contains a reconstruction of the rooms the assassin used, along with many artifacts from the shooting and an extensive review of the investigations into and conspiracy theories surrounding the conviction of James Earl Ray. But by far the most compelling sights for us were the completely intact façade and balcony of the motel. A wreath still marks the spot where King stood at the moment he was shot. Room 306 has been recreated to look exactly as it did in the police photos. It was a somber moment as we all stood together, looking up at the balcony, visualizing the events of that day.

Student Responses:

Georgia: Today we went to the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel the site where Dr. Martin Luther King was assassinated. Two things touched  me about being at this Civil Right museum: one is that the site looked as if it was frozen in time, never changing from April 4, 1968; the second thing that moved me was that it allowed me to come full circle with life and death of Dr. King. I saw his birth home in Atlanta, I stood at the pulpit where he preached at Dexter Baptist Church in Montgomery Alabama, stood around the table where he formed  Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and wrote some of his famous speeches, I looked at the spot where his house was bombed , I touched the bars where he was jailed and wrote the famous “Letter from Birmingham City Jail,” I touched the pulpit that he used during his famous “How long, not long “speech at the end of the Selma to Montgomery march and now finally I saw the balcony where he was assassinated and saw the place where the assassin stood and killed the dreamer but not the dream.In these last few days I have seen where Dr. King took his first and last breath. He was a martyr for the cause, a cause that was paid with the price of his life as stated, “If physical death is the price that I must pay to free my white brothers and sisters from a permanent death of the spirit, then nothing can be more redemptive.” He worked and died to correct the triple evils of racism, poverty and war. He knew that his death was imminent but also knew his dream would live on. “I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the Promised Land. So I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man.”Through these commemorations I got to understand the dynamics of this remarkable man. A man whose life, death, struggles and triumphs have allowed me to follow my dreams.

Ewo: As we walked toward the Lorraine motel, I felt like I was entering a graveyard. The gray of the day also definitely contributed to this feeling. And then there it was, room 306, where on unsuspecting day he was murdered. I pictured him stepping out on to the balcony. I could almost hear the shot that rang out. And then in my head was the image of the men pointing towards where the shot came. Honestly, although the museum was informative, entering the portion in which you could see into his room was for me was the pinnacle. Again, my thoughts were racing with images of what he did and said that fateful day. I looked outside the window, across the street to where James Earl Ray supposedly shot Dr. King. Across the street in large, black, iron letters, is an excerpt for his “from the Mountaintop” speech. It reads “I may not get there with you. But we as a people will get to the promised land.” How prophetic!!! There is no doubt in my mind that he knew, or rather, he felt that soon he would die. But his death was not in vain. He died in the midst of a righteous cause whose movement continued after his death. He has helped not only the people of this nation but what he called the “beloved community” of global citizens.

Peter:  Today we went to the Lorraine Motel, the sight of the Martin Luther King Jr. assassination on April 4^th, 1968. The motel has since been turned into a Civil Rights Museum. In terms of the museum itself, it was definitely one of the, if not the best museum we have been to yet. It seems to cover more aspects of the Civil Rights Movement than any other museum that we have been to yet, and I really appreciated that. What really moved me was being able to see the balcony that Martin Luther King had been shot on. I’ve seen the balcony 1000’s of times in pictures, as it is one of the most infamous images of the movement. Being there was a different story. I felt humbled to be there in the presence of the space that marked the end of the life and beginning of the legacy that is Martin Luther King Jr. It really put things into perspective for me about life and how we shouldn’t take it for granted. Martin Luther King is a man who in name and legacy, will live forever, but he was cut down because of another man’s hatred for humanity. Yet at the same time, Dr. King was assassinated at a young age and accomplished so much before his 40^th birthday. In his lifetime, he accomplished more than generations before him had. He gave not just African-Americans, but Americans a dream to aspire to, a goal to strive toward, a mission to accomplish. This was so powerful to me, and it’s a feeling that I am confident that I will not soon forget.

On to Memphis!! We spent our time on the road to Memphis watching “The Witness, ” an award winning documentary. It focuses on Reverend Billy Kyles, who was on the balcony with Dr. King when he was shot. Rev. Kyles talked about the years he spent wondering why God had chosen him to witness this event; he concluded that it was his purpose to spread a  message:”You can kill the dreamer, but you can’t kill the dream.” The film was to prepare us for our Sunday visit to the Civil Rights museum.

Until then, we are enjoying some much needed down time.  Friday night we headed to B.B. King Blues Club, where we had great Bar-B-Que for dinner and then stayed for hours, listening to the B.B. King All Star Band. The band played such intergenerational favorites as “Stand By Me,” “Mustang Sally, ” and “My Girl.” Saturday was our first (and only!) day off. It was cold and rainy, but that did not stop us from exploring Memphis - for some of us it was back to Beale Street or off to Graceland; others took much need naps!

Student Comments:

Ewo: Today is our day off in Memphis, Tennessee. The city is not that lively except for Beale Street. Last night was amazing at B. B. King’s restaurant. Of course we had a good ‘ole southern fried dinner, but this time we got to also listen to some great Blues music. When the actual house band came on we all went downstairs to dance. I really enjoyed this. Our group gets along so well and this makes me happy. I had so much fun dancing to the music that I grew up on. They played all the greats from the Temptations to Marvin Gaye. It was just a great place.

During the day in Memphis a few of us had planned for a while to go to Graceland. Why not, right? When we first arrived there we were very confused. We saw a tacky stone building with too many neon lights. Marisa wondered, “Where is the mansion?” It turns out Graceland is like going to Disney World. The actual mansion was beautiful. However, inside was pretty tacky…I didn’t know much about Elvis before I went there, and still know very little. But I am very happy I went. For me it was a break away from the emotional experience that is the miniterm. For those few hours I forgot about slavery, racism, and the movement.

We awoke this morning knowing that today would be a tough day - we were heading to the Sixteenth Avenue Baptist Church, where a Klan bomb killed four young girls in 1963. We went first to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, which powerfully describes life in Jim Crow Birmingham. The museum has a particular focus on “Project C” (C is for Confrontation) in Birmingham, and features such items as the bars from the jail cell where Dr. King wrote “Letter from the Birmingham Jail” and the tank in which Bull Connor, Birmingham’s police chief, rode through town.

Across the street is Kelly Ingram Park, where policemen turned dogs and firemen turned firehoses on the hundreds of children who were gathering to march. The park houses monuments that commerate that struggle in an unusually frank manner - statues of lunging dogs, firehoses, and children in jail suggest the violence that marked Birmingham during this period.

Finally, we headed to the church. Our guide was Carolyn McKinstry, who was 14 and a friend of the four girls who were killed in the bombing. Ms. McKinstry answered the church phone that morning and heard a voice say “Three minutes.” A child herself, she had no idea what that meant, and one minute later dynamite exploded. Ms. McKinstry described the day and her feelings over the years as she has grappled with the pain of the violence and loss. We met with Ms. McKinstry for three hours, drawn in by her stories and frank discussion.

Student Responses: Jessica: During this miniterm we will be meeting with various Civil Rights pioneers. Today we met with Mrs. Carolyn McKinstry who was a close friend of the four young girls killed in the bombing of the Birmingham Sixteenth Street Baptist Church on September 15^th, 1963. I admired Mrs. McKinstry’s persistent emphasis on forgiveness. She mentioned that erecting monuments and winning Supreme Court cases would not be enough to heal the wounds of those who were physically and emotionally affected by segregation. It’s people who heal people. This solution is one that I have heard before; however, I never truly considered it until now. Mrs. McKinstry has been through a lot including losing her four friends because of hatred from white supremacists. I commend Mrs. McKinstry for mentioning this because it must have taken a lot for her to come to the conclusion that understanding and forgiveness are the only keys for internal healing. She experienced emotional stress but overcame them by traveling to other countries and telling others of what she went through. Honestly, I loved meeting with Mrs. McKinstry because, although I too have been hurt by others, it will never compare to what she has gone through. If she can forgive those who oppressed her daily because of her race, then I should forgive as well. Life is too short to hold grudges. Instead of remaining at the same stage, let’s forgive and move forward.

Jared: As we have spoken with various participants of the movement thus far, a consistent theme they have preached to us is that it is up to us to make a difference and carry on the dream. The last thing that Carolynn McKinstry mentioned to us as we left is that she depends on us. She, like C.T. Vivian said it is our responsibility to make a difference for generations to come. That is a powerful message, as if they are directly passing the torch. It means a lot for people who have made such an impact in history to look to you and depend on you. ..If kids of our generation take what they said personal and accept it as an obligation as opposed to a right or a choice, then a difference can be made. This calls for our generation to get beyond the way they have been conditioned that everything is about self. As C.T. Vivian explained, it is about everyone working together for the beloved  community.

We packed up in Montgomery this morning and headed up to Selma, along the same route that the Selma to Montgomery Voting Rights March took in 1965. The highway is peppered with historic markers commemorating the march and the individuals who supported it.We stopped at the Lowndes County Interpretive Center and met our guide for the day, Ms. Joann Blackmon Bland, the former director of the National Voting Rights Museum and a participant in the Bloody Sunday march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The Interpretive Center covered the history of the area in the 1950’s. Ms. Bland brought to our attention that the site was a tent city rarely mentioned in the history books. After black sharecroppers marched and registered to vote in 1955, white landowners evicted them from the land they had farmed for generations. These people had nowhere to go and were put up in tent cities for 2½ years until desegregation supporters were able to help them find homes.

In Selma, we toured the town and stopped at the Brown A.M.E. Chapel where the march departed from. Ms. Bland took us around the back of the church to the very ground that marked the starting point. She had each of us pick up a pebble, and told us stories of the individuals who had stood on those pebbles on the day of the march.

Finally, the marchers were beaten back to the First Baptist church on Bloody Sunday. We stood on the steps as she described the violence that took place that night.

Lunch at Essie’s Place was a hit, not only because the food was delicious, but also because we were got to meet two other people who were part of the history of the area. First, Ms. Bland’s sister, Lynda Blackmon Lowery, who was beaten on Bloody Sunday, and went on to march the entire way from Selma to Montgomery two weeks later in order to show the governor what he had done to her. The second was a gentleman who happened to be in the restaurant, Mr. Dudley, who had lived in the area his whole life, and been active in voter registration. In 2000, after 16 years on the police force with a perfect conduct record, he ran afoul of the whites in power and was arrested on a false charge of voter registration fraud. He was sent to jail for two years. He spoke about how powerless he felt then, as he had the times when his aunt was “taken advantage of” by whites when he was a child. He told us that he used to hate white people, but through religion, had let go of that hate.

After lunch, Ms. Bland took us to the foot of the Edmund Pettus Bridge and spoke to us about the need to commit to making the world a better place for our children. We crossed the bridge stopping to visualize the events that had taken place there. We spent a long time soaking up the presence of the place before visiting the new National Voting Rights Museum, which is still in the process of moving.

Our dinner discussion lasted late into the night as we talked about what we had seen and how we felt about it.

Student Responses:

Sarayfah: Joanne Bland was one of the most extraordinary persons that I have met so far on this trip. I was really honored to be in her presence as she was one of the many foot soldiers of the Civil Rights Movement. Joanne was selfless in her wish to make life better for future generations - to help them succeed and have equal access to the basic right of voting. We were able to carry with us a piece of the playground on which Joanne and other participants walked on their way to march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. These are some of the priceless experiences that a person can have when they realize that the history and the struggle that took place in Selma only 40 years ago has not died and the fight  persists.

Joanne has taken it upon herself to reach out the youth in her area as she knows all too well the vicious cycle that these youth fall into as a result of the breakdown in communal structure. It is clear that the black community is not as strong as it used to be and that the black community has lost cohesion when a small amount of progress has been achieved. However, I think that Joanne was making clear that the battle is not over yet and that we are the generation to affect those changes. Those men, women, and children who marched for freedom and equality have laid the ground work for my generation to dream that anything is possible. But, that dream will not be fulfilled and the opportunities that youth have will not be fully understood and appreciated until history is portrayed accurately. People like Joanne should be recognized for their bravery and I am making a commitment and pledge to make her dream a reality through my life’s work. She is my hero!

Amanda: Our two days in Montgomery also included Selma. We learned that the two places go hand in hand when thinking about the Civil Rights Movement due to the march from Montgomery to Selma over the Edmund Pettus Bridge.  Joanne Bland, a native from Selma who participated in the march, led us through Selma starting in its projects. These projects were where the black churches resided within the town, the black churches in which the march was planned and where it began.

As emotional as walking on the bridge was, walking through the projects was the part of the day that affected me most. Joanne, who is practically a celebrity in Selma due to her participation in the movement, is forced to see the movement’s failures almost every day through the continuous poverty. Young people stand on the corners, possibly selling drugs or participating in gang violence when they should be in school receiving some kind of education. Though the education in these places might only give them a fourth grade reading level at the most. They are stuck in this poverty. As C.T. Vivian, Charles Person, and Carolyn McKinley preached, it is the youth of America that has to continue the movement, and education is the key.

Peter:  Selma. That was our day today. Probably the most powerful day that we have experienced on this trip thus far. The day was awesome! We had a wonderful tour of the area from Joann Bland and we drove over the Edmund Pettus Bridge. We ate some awesome Southern food, and we got to speak to some great individuals like a man we will only know as “Mr. Dudley” who was arrested and spent two years for what seemed to be an unlawful conviction on chargers of voter fraud. We listened to Southerners our parents’ age talk about race relations in the 60’s and now, and it was fascinating to hear their first hand accounts of life and living in the deep American South. However, after we spoke to these people we were able to walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The same way the protesters did led by John Lewis and Hosea Williams in March of 1965. We traced their same steps towards freedom and equality 44 years later.

Walking across the bridge was something else. I’ve seen the video of John Lewis and countless others taking the courageous steps towards the police on the other side of the bridge on video more times than I can recall, but actually taking the same steps was a whole other experience. My initial reaction was when we first crossed the bridge; we couldn’t see the other side because of the arc of the bridges architecture. It’s not until you get to the middle of the bridge that you can see the other side. My initial response was wow; there were armed police on the other side of the bridge waiting with billy clubs, tear gas, horses, and hate on the other side of the bridge waiting for these unarmed civil rights demonstrators. The protestors couldn’t see this, although they knew they were there, and they marched anyway. They marched because they had sight into the future, they marched because they wanted to, and they marched because they had to. There was no other option; living in an oppressive was not an alternative.

Bloody Sunday was just that. People were tracked down and beaten by the authorities; men, women, children, were injured for the cause. The bridge was a symbol, the bridge was a symbol of moving from the past to the future and I was privileged enough to be afforded the opportunity to make this physical connection to history. I doubt I will ever forget what it was like to walk across this bridge for the rest of my days. Words really can’t describe the power that this bridge and this history hold.

Few places symbolize the African American struggle for basic civil rights more than Montgomery, Alabama, where for over a year thousands of black men and women chose to walk rather than ride the city’s segregated buses. We began our tour of Montgomery at the Rosa Parks museum. The museum tells the story of the bus boycott using a multi-media interactive approach: among the highlights were a re-enactment of Park’s arrest aboard a replica of the bus and numerous original documents.

Our next stop: an external exhibit covering the outside wall at the now closed Greyhound Bus Station. Here the SNCC Freedom Riders were attacked by a waiting Klan mob; several were wounded severely during the attack. (When the police chief was asked where his men were that day, he responded that it was Mother’s Day, and he had given them the day off to spend with their mothers.)

We then headed up Dexter Avenue, and the students,. getting into the spirit, broke into freedom songs, clapping and singing “This Little Light of Mine” and “Oh, Freedom.”

We soon arrived at Dexter Ave Bapist Church, where King pastored from 1954 to 1960 and where he and other Montgomery leaders met to organize the boycott. The pews are the same pews in which King’s congregation sat years ago, listening to Kings sermons, singing to keep their spirits up. The pulpit at Dexter was the same pulpit from which King preached, and in the basement was the pulpit that the congregation carried up to the steps of the capitol for King’s “How Long” speech at the end of the Selma to Montgomery march. Our next stop was the Dexter Avenue parsonage - the small home where the Kings lived during the boycott.The building is now a national historic landmark, and houses much of the original furniture, including the dining room table around which King and other MIA members sat to discuss strategy.

We ended our day at the Southern Poverty Law Center Memorial and Museum. Designed by Maya Linn, the Civil Rights memorial powerfully commemorates the martyrs to the movement, while the museum itself tells their stories.

In the rear of the museum is the Wall of Tolerance, which records the names of individuals who pledge to commit to work against hate and injustice. We all entered our names, and watched as they flowed down the room size wall.

Student Responses:

Aaron: The Civil Rights Memorial center was one of the more memorable experiences that I have had on this trip. Even after a long day of traveling and walking around in miserable weather, I was rejuvenated by what this center represented. It had a great monument outside of the center that told a story of the Civil Rights Movement through a series of incidents and dates while covered in a constant flow of water. Inside, the exhibits on the walls told the stories of people who lost their lives during the Civil Rights Movement, a sacrifice for a bigger cause. These were stories that not only the common person in this country have not heard, but stories that as someone who has studied the Civil Rights movement extensively, I had not heard. As we moved throughout the center, there were stories on the wall about people who lost their lives not during the Civil Rights Movement, but more recently. These men and women had died in the same sort of senseless ways that people lost their lives during the Movement, showing that we still have a long way to go. Some of the stories that I read I remembered hearing in the news when I was younger, and it really touched me.The last part of the museum was the Wall of Tolerance. It was a large wall that had names projected onto the wall to appear to be falling. There were computers where you could enter your name and have it projected on the wall but in doing so you were making a commitment to tolerance. Seeing this many names that were in the system, although only representing a small percentage of this nation’s population, left me with the sense that we as a group are not the only ones who have the same passion of doing what is right.

Peter: At the Dexter Ave Baptist church, it was quite an experience to stand at the same podium that Martin Luther King Jr. stood at as he took command of his followers and demanded change from a nation and from a world. That was powerful - to place my hand in the same spot where he did and make that connection to him through the past. The home of Martin Luther King was also a very special place. It was sobering to say the least to touch the spot on the front porch of the home where the bomb went off that was meant to kill MLK and his family, to be able to see his actual belongings and to be able to touch them was an awesome feeling. At the Southern Poverty Law Center, it was humbling for several reasons. First, the exhibits had a lot to do with those that lost their lives in the struggle for civil rights in the twentieth century. All of these individuals were cut down because of their love of mankind and that’s a pretty powerful thing. The wall of names that the museum had was also powerful, basically what it is, is a place where people can show their commitment for the struggle for equal rights no matter what the situation is. People added their names to the list of names that rotated on a screen through computers. But you could feel it in the air that people weren’t really just putting their names down on the list. They really meant what they were doing. It was something that was unspoken, but surely felt. One thing that also struck about the museum was the fact that it had more security than any other place we had visited. I do know that the Southern Poverty Law Center has had some high profile court cases against hate groups such as the kkk, but the fact that this heightened security was so visible reminded me where we are. We are definitely in the south, a world where the ghosts of Jefferson Davis and Jim Crow still linger in the shadows.