Alabama

A Crash Course in Civil Rights

After a brief stop in the Florida Panhandle (Destin, Fl) to enjoy the sugary white sand and endless miles of beach, we drove to Montgomery on March 6th. Our original reason for being in Alabama was to see Pat's cousin Becky and her daughter Katie who live in Birmingham, but we stopped in Montgomery to check out The Legacy Museum which is one of four different sites in different locales around Montgomery.

The Legacy Museum opened in 2021 and is probably one of the most well thought out and impressive places I have ever seen. Admission is only 5 dollars to get into all the sites and a free shuttle takes you to them, which include a short boat ride down the Alabama river.

You are not allowed to take pictures inside the museum. The Legacy attempts to capture the beginnings of slavery from the 1600's to the early 1900's. The first stop is a hugh screen with a giant ocean wave bearing down on you.

You feel as if you are in the ocean drowning. This signifies the 12 million slaves brought to our shores from Africa never to return home. Two million died on the journey. No state was exempt from engaging in slavery in the early days. The city of Newport, RI was in fact one of the busiest and largest ports for slavery.

Its impossible to explain all that this museum encompasses but suffice it to say we spent several hours there.

Lynchings: After the Civil War and the emancipation of slaves, the former white slaveowners looked for new ways to punish black people. For any offense imaginable or for no reason, including a black person simply passing a note to a white person, the punishment was hanging. Thousands of blacks were hanged by the Klan and others and they were not held to account by courts in the south. The Legacy Museum sought to bring justice to these victims by tasking their descendents to collect dirt from around the very tree they were hanged from and put it in a jar. These jars are in the museum with the names of the victims and their date of death on the jar. While I don’t have a photo of this, I have a postcard that shows this wall.

Freedom Monument Sculpture Park: This is a beautiful park with giant sculptures that also depict the struggles of slavery.

Birmingham: On Friday, March 7, we visited Patti's cousins who took us to the Civil Rights Museum, which happens to be across the street from the 16th Street Baptist Church where 4 young girls were killed when members of the Klan bombed the church in 1963. It took 40 years to bring the culprits to justice.

Selma: Today we visited The Edmund Pettus Bridge where 60 years ago tomorrow marchers who bravely attempted to walk across the bridge were met with water hoses, snarling dogs and angry state troopers. We had a hard time finding the bridge and had to dodge a parade in the center of town to find it. A big ceremony will be held tomorrow, but we just wanted to walk across it. We parked the car and began to walk, not knowing which direction it might be and fearing crowds of people would be on it. All of a sudden, we turned a corner and there it was. Not a single person on it but the two of us. It was very emotional to stand there and touch the bridge.

The whole experience of the last two days has taught us so much and has stirred a myriad of emotions.

Note: I want to thank my niece, Julia Dzafic for setting up this blog for me and adding photos, usually next day. So always check back in to see photos.