Alabama Frame of Mind

We sailed into Alabama yesterday late morning, listening to alternative country mix on my iPod and feeling pretty good.  We had a good night's rest in Tallahassee, and Shelby Lynn was singing about "Alabama frame of mind"  (her song Where I'm From).  Alabama surprised me in a few ways. First, it is a lot prettier than anticipated -- rolling hills, lots of trees, large farms, cotton fields.  I expected it to be the scrub we've seen in southern Georgia, but not so much.

But as we drove along and made a stop in Montgomery for lunch, I found three reasons (and I'm sure there are more) on why I couldn't live in Alabama:

1. Paula Deen as guest speaker at the Ozark Civic Center  (they are obviously expecting a crowd.)
2. The t-shirt on a young lady in McDonalds.  It had a confederate flag on the back and it said: "If you find this offensive, you need a big ol' history lesson"  (Begs the question -- who really needs the history lesson.)
3. The big signs along the road that say "Go to church or the devil with get you" complete with a picture of the Satan himself.

One of the kitschy things the Bama's (as they like to call themselves) do is set up what are called "pioneer village" attractions with a bunch of old dilapidated houses and stores from days gone by.  One of these attractions doubled as a flea market.  None of them looked to have any actual visitors--perhaps they are only open on the weekends.  Nevertheless, we have been playing the license plate game in the car, and most of the plates we've seen in Alabama belong to the Bama's (one even says Sweet Home Alabama -- but I bet you guessed that), or Tennesseeans, who always seem to be in a great hurry to get out of Alabama. Made me wonder just who is going to these exhibits.

As we traveled toward Birmingham, the hills got steeper.  So much of that area reminded us of  West Virginia, around the Charleston area.  If I ever knew it I had forgotten that Birmingham was a steel and mining town at one time.  I was expecting a little more Atlanta, a little less Pittsburgh.

We found our destination easily enough: Kelly Ingram Park in downtown.

Ever since my first year teaching, I have taught the Birmingham Children's March which took place in May, 1963 and was directly responsible for finally getting desegregation laws passed in Alabama and the rest of the country.  Kelly Ingram Park was the meeting place for the people who participated.  This was organized after Martin Luther King had been jailed for nonviolent protests (called unlawful parades) and where he wrote his famous "Letter from Birmingham Jail."  Young people rallied to the cause, as their parents were not in positions to take such risks.

The first day of the protests, the police arrested over 1,000 young people.  The next day, when even more showed up, they turned the fire hoses on them and set the dogs loose. This sad history is commemorated in Kelly Ingram Park.

Detail of dog attack

The park itself is a large, public square (which sadly hosted more than one hanging of a black person lynched in early days) and now contains a pathway called "The Walk of Freedom" which allows a visitor to follow the philosophy, the steps taken in the movement, and is complete with sculptures depicting various events of the march.  There is also a large statue of Martin Luther King, looking toward the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, the site that would later suffer a bombing and the loss of four young lives.

Sculpture of water hoses pointed at young marchers.

We walked around the park and I took pictures of everything, feeling now I will be able to enhance my lesson on this further.  Many of the locals were happy to act as tour guides -- okay, they were homeless black men, but they were friendly enough, telling us all about the various sculptures and, of course, just charging a small tour guide fee.  We engaged in many of these conversations and honestly, it just added to the enjoyment.

The church was already closed to tours when we got there, so we headed over to the Civil Rights Institute, an impressive collection and timeline of the Civil Rights Movement.  I have been to many exhibits and museums in my life, and I have to say this one ranks very high in my mind for its artistic displays and organization.  It is comprehensive in scope, very moving in parts, with actual video footage playing, speeches by King, and more.  It takes a cold hard look at segregation and its effects.

Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, site of bombing

So I was having a great time taking pictures of everything I found of interest in the museum, when an employee came up to us and engaged us in a conversation -- oh, you're a teacher? My sister is a teacher!  Friendly and warm, but with a message -- you're not allowed to take pictures in here, it is all copyrighted, they should have told you when you came in.  I was super bummed at that point, because I knew they had the actual jail cell King was in, and I wanted a picture of that for sure.  I did sneak one later, but it didn't come out that good, because I sincerely did not want them kicking me out of the museum. Because of that, I won't be posting any pictures of from the museum here, but I will make a slide show for my classroom.

Walking up the stairs to the Civil Rights Institute

Today we head to Nashville, traveling a scenic route to get there.  Tonight we have tickets for the Grand Ole Opry, and will be doing some additional sightseeing over the weekend connected with the huge country music tradition in Nashville.  Just relaxing and taking it all in!