Growing Kings Retrace Historic Steps
February is reserved to celebrate the contributions of Blacks to American society. Recent field trips and scavenger hunts at the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute and historic 4th Avenue Business District afforded students in our Measures of a Man program the opportunity to see how far African Americans have come in America, and the part many young people played in these advancements.
This area served as the business, social, and cultural center for Blacks in Birmingham. Businesses in the area included barber and beauty shops, mortuaries, saloons, restaurants, theaters, law firms, medical practices and motels.
Student tours of the district began on the corner of 5th Avenue and 16th Street where two important buildings sit; the A.G. Gaston Motel and the Arthur D. Shores Law Building. Arthur Shores served as the personal legal counsel for Dr. Martin Luther King, while the A.G. Gaston Motel served as Dr. King and many other activists’ lodging during the famed “Birmingham Campaign,” of the Civil Rights Movement.
The tour progressed from 5th Avenue towards 4th Avenue as students listened to Ms. Brady tell the story of the district. They passed the Wheaton Printing house, home of the first printing press dedicated to black publications, to the corner of 4th Avenue and 17th Street home of the Carver Theatre, and the Colored Masonic Lodge. The Carver Theatre served as the home of entertainment for Birmingham’s Black Community during the Jim Crow, and is still in operation today. It houses the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame, a museum highlighting Alabama’s contribution to jazz music. A genre of music many Measures of a Man students recognized heavily influenced artists and musicians that they listen to now.
Across from the Carver Theater sits the Negro Masonic Lodge. With its stunning architecture, it’s easily the most eye catching of all the buildings in the district outside of the Civil Rights Institute. Three days of tours and Ms. Brady never once had to point out the building to students, as it almost always grabbed each group’s attention. The Negro Masonic Lodge housed the offices of many notable Black professionals, businesses, and organizations.
Students continued down 4th Avenue towards 18th Street, students encountered the Eddie Kendrick Memorial Park, a park dedicated to the famous member of the Temptations. A bronze statue of Eddie onstage flanked by his band mates greeted the young men as his music played through speakers hidden throughout the parks gardens. Students from each school group got on stage, and danced and sang their favorite Temptation songs. Students from Wilkerson found themselves so caught up in the fun they nearly forgot to answer their scavenger hunt questions about the names of Eddie’s backup singers.
The tour and scavenger hunt ended in front of the old Alabama Penny Savings Bank/Pythian Temple. Founded in 1890, the Alabama Penny Savings Bank was the first Black-owned and operated financial institution in Birmingham, and one of the first three opened in the United States. It was built by Windham Construction, a construction company that built some of the more iconic structures in the district, including 16th Street Baptist Church, and the Colored Masonic Lodge. The bank closed in 1915 and was sold to the Knights of Pythias and has since been known as the Pythian Temple.
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On Sixteenth Street North on the west lawn of Kelly Ingram Park sits the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. Opened in 1992 it exists as a dedication to the Alabama’s place in American History, and as a cultural & educational research center that promotes equal rights for all people. The exhibits and displays tell stories of a past that’s not so distant, and serves as a reminder of Birmingham’s historical value.
Measures of a Man students began their tours & scavenger hunt in the Barriers Gallery. The Barriers gallery represents a period in Birmingham between 1920 and 1950, when segregation was at its zenith. The gallery is a collection of replica establishments that existed in the city, and what they looked like during Jim Crow. When entering the gallery, students are immediately confronted with the reality of segregation when they see two water fountains on a wall separated by race, one for whites another for blacks. There was a replica of what a school classroom looked like in 1953, where the young men learned that before the integration of schools in Alabama, the state spent $120 for every White student to be educated, opposed to only $60 on Black students.
After passing through the school students passed through a two-sided home. One side represented the quality of homes offered to white families, and the dismal living arrangements usually sold to blacks. In the Black home there was not much space, dated appliances and the home seemed to be starved for repairs. The young men found themselves shocked that anyone could live in such conditions, but they also recognized that for Blacks during Jim Crow this was reality.
The Barriers gallery leads into the Confrontations gallery. The Confrontations Gallery exhibit represents the aggressions People of Color faced in Alabama. Students saw advertisements, and images created by Whites to promote a negative perspective of black people to the public, from Birmingham’s own Aunt Jemima to picaninnies. At the mouth of the gallery students were confronted by ghostly frosted glass portraits of Whites who had been displeased with integration efforts, and an authentic Ku Klux Klan robe. Some of the young men wondered aloud how children their age managed to deal with such conditions, and get an education.
They continued through the gallery to the second half of the Confrontations Gallery where they learned about the harrowing journey of the Freedom Riders. Freedom Riders were college students who rode busses from the North into the South promoting civil rights. The students watched a short film in the shadow of a burned out replica of the Freedom Riders’ Greyhound bus that was fire bombed in Anniston, Alabama.
The boys continued through the gallery where they were surrounded by the words, sounds and images of what is now known as Freedom Summer. Students heard the declarations of Police Chief Bull Connor, the rousing sermons of Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, and the motivating speeches of Dr. Martin Luther King. The young men witnessed footage of the school walk outs, and the subsequent harsh reaction of police against those students, and the harsh reactions of the police to participants in the march from Selma to Montgomery. They examined artifacts and debris from the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing that killed four black middle school aged black girls.
In the final exhibit, Measures of a Man students were able to see the strides Birmingham made post-struggle and how Birmingham went from the turbulence of desegregation, to voting its first Black mayor, Richard Arrington, Jr. into office.
Birmingham is a city that’s rich with Black History, and the city’s influence on American culture can be felt the world over. The young men fervently expressed their pride in the city and its heritage, how proud they were to call it home. To quote Wilkerson 7th grader Jeremiah C., “I’m just amazed that teenagers could stand up against all that hate and change the heart of a nation. They made such a big impact a young age not just in Birmingham but around the world, and I feel inspired to go out and do the same.”
