Birmingham, Alabama

My Saturday morning train ride from Atlanta to Birmingham trekked through quiet small towns and calming fog covered forests. It was a lovely way to travel a week after celebrating my 50th birthday with my wonderful family and friends. 

After a restful four-hour train ride, we slowly pulled into the downtown Birmingham area. I was caught off guard by the oddly picturesque smoke stacks and other features of the Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark.

 

Birmingham, Alabama is probably the most friendly city I've been to during my sabbatical travels. Hopefully you can pick up on the underlying message - that the other cities are also full of friendly people, but I give the top spot to the "Magic City". Birmingham got this name because of its incredible growth at the turn of the last century, magically rising from the already existing small towns and modest mountain landscape. The city's claim to fame stems mostly from its iron and steel industry, making it known as the "Pittsburgh of the South". The city's industrial history is symbolized by a rather unique statue of Vulcan, the Roman name for the God of fire and the forge, considered the largest cast iron statue in the world. 

Downtown Birmingham Mural

One of the more sacred sites of the civil rights movement, Kelly Ingram Park, is in downtown Birmingham. Originally called West Park and across the street from the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, it is most known by the public through powerful images of school-aged protesters being blasted by Eugene "Bull" Connor's powerful water canons and attacked by his police dogs in May 1963. The protests were guided by the work of Rev. James Bevel, a highly influential leader (and later controversial figure) of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference as well as the civil rights movement. These young protesters were also attacked in front of nearby businesses like the Magic City Barber Shop, which is still exists on 4th Street, just two blocks southeast of the park (under the far left red awning).

Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, as seen from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

I spent part of this late September Sunday afternoon learning about this iconic park with two local historians, Frederick Dwayne Smith and Jermaine Grimmett. Frederick told me his Grandfather, the Rev. Nelson H. Smith, along with A.D. King and John T. Porter, led marchers through Birmingham to protest the arrests of Rev. Fred Shuttleworth, Ralph Abernathy and Dr. King. It was during this time that Dr. King wrote his landmark letter to a group of white clergy who were questioning King's strategy of nonviolent direct action. 

These two kind and extremely knowledgeable gentlemen helped me better understand what happened in this park. For example, they told me the brick path design you see in the picture below symbolizes the unity of all people. I didn't find any marker explaining this feature so I wouldn't have know this is if weren't for Frederick and Jermaine.

Brick path through Kelly Ingram Park

The park has several jarring sculptures, all stark reminders of the violent manner in which the protesters were treated.

If you are looking for a book on what happened in Birmingham during the civil rights movement, I recommend Why We Can't Wait by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He expertly describes the challenges of segregation in Birmingham, who was involved and provides a powerful explanation of why he believed in and used nonviolent methods. Written and published during the years 1963 and 1964, the title reminds me of the event that took place in 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation.