Selma is a town of contradictions.
A small population (comparable to Ashburton) sprawling over a considerable land area. Everything seems very spread out and walking anywhere is tricky. Fortunately, we have Warren and his bus.
West Selma is the leafy, white suburbs and schools. East Selma contains the African-Americans and the shotgun shacks:
Confederate flags still festoon the graves at the local cemetery:
A War monument lists the white soldiers lost separately to the 'coloured':
The local Country Club's membership is still only open to whites and has recently taken steps to prevent the black nannies supervising the white kids in their swimming pool. Because? Well, you know, tradition.
There was a brief breakthrough when Selma High School was integrated in 1970, but the phenomenon of 'White Flight' took hold soon afterwards, with the creation of new private schools eventually reversing the process. You can read the full story here.
In this atmosphere of de facto segregation, it's heartening to know that groups like 'New Way' exist. We meet three of their educators this morning (L-R below: Jarah, Ronald and Barak), who led us through a non-violence workshop, teaching us about ways of building community and encouraging reconciliation.
This was a very interactive workshop, encouraging us to start by thinking about ourselves as a community. So there were some sharing times:
After lunch at the local College cafeteria (where the workshop was hosted) we took a bus tour of Selma, from whence the above facts and photos come.
Some of us also made a pilgrimage over the famous Edmund Pettus Bridge (if you haven't seen the movie Selma, you really must - it gives you vital context for all this), whilst others were put off by a swarm of bees around the mid-point of the crossing - health and safety first.
Discussion as to whether the bee swarm is to be taken on or not.
Following the bridge, we farewelled our wonderful guides and Selma, travelling one and a half hours north to the city of Birmingham. We will be checking out the history tomorrow, but satisfied ourselves tonight with a last taste of Southern Soul Food at local landmark John's City Diner. And celebrated Jess' birthday!
Waking up in Birmingham, we packed our bags on the bus and headed for the most significant part of town, historically-speaking: the intersection of 16th Street and 6th Avenue. This was the site of arguably the most successful Civil Rights protest in US History, the Children's March during the 1963 Birmingham Campaign. It was here that the fire hoses and police dogs were set on the mainly school aged protestors, causing a media storm that travelled around the world, prompted President JFK to propose a Civil Rights Bill to Congress that would outlaw segregation in the USA.
A photo of the Children's March at Birmingham
Kelly Ingram Park was the location of the protests - this is marked by some statues commemorating the events of the protests.
Sadly the backlash that followed the success of the Birmingham Campaign also led to the KKK bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, which had been the central hub of the protests. This action took the lives of four girls aged 11-14. We were given a guided tour of the church and learned the story of the girls and the community's response to the tragedy.
A fantastic stained glass window donated to the church by a Welsh(!) group.
Also on that same corner is the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, which summarises beautifully not just the events at Birmingham but the key events through the peak Civil Rights era of the 1950s and 60s and beyond. This seemed a really fitting way to end the Alabama leg of the Tour.
Stopping afterwards briefly for lunch at a shiny new food hall downtown (the Pizitz, opened Feb 2017), we were headed out of town and back to Atlanta and the Braves ballgame. This was a really fun experience for the group. Baseball is not everyone's cup of tea and this wasn't the greatest game, but the vibe of the stadium was great and we appreciated the various attempts to keep us entertained during the almost 3 hours of game time. Sadly, the Braves were beaten 3-2 and we had a very late night prior to a early Friday morning flight to San Fran, but the girls remain impressively hardy and high-spirited.
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