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The journey to freedom: an Alabama tour brings the Civil Rights Movement to life - Living Well Travel

Kalin Thomas

As I listened to the tour guide who led our group through the National Voting Rights Museum and Institute in Selma, Alabama, last January, I realized she was no ordinary volunteer. Joanne Bland experienced firsthand what until then I had only seen in photographs. Bland, who was 11 at the time, witnessed Bloody Sunday, the 1965 voting-rights march that culminated in a clash between Blacks and White Alabama state troopers. A section of the museum chronicles the event. "We couldn't outrun the horses," she said. "A woman stepped right in front of one, and I heard her head hit the ground. Then I fainted. When I awakened I was in the backseat of a car, and my 14-year-old sister was next to me, crying. She had been beaten and needed 18 stitches."

Alabama's civil-rights "trail," a collection of cities spread across the state--including Birmingham, Selma, Montgomery and Tuskegee--offers a wealth of opportunities for a hands-on history lesson. Many of the Movement's integral players are still living in the South and are eager to share its history. Bland is the organizer of Selma's Footsteps to Freedom tour and one of many who lead tour groups. It was thrilling to visit landmarks where history was made less than 50 years ago and then talk with people who were there.

FIRST STOP, BIRMINGHAM

We began our three-day journey in Birmingham, once known as Bombingham because of the many Ku Klux Klan-instigated explosions that rocked the city in the 1960's. At the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute on Sixteenth Street (see sidebar), I found a burned-out bus, a replica of the claustrophobic jail cell where Martin Luther King, Jr., wrote his famous "Letter From a Birmingham Jail," and documentary footage of King's 1963 "I Have a Dream" speech. As I watched the film, I felt part of the crowd. And when King boomed, "Thank God Almighty, we're free at last!" tears came to my eyes.

In Birmingham we learned that The Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth, a veteran of the struggle, would be joining us on our tour. The 81-year-old founded the Alabama Christian Movement for Civil Rights in 1956 after Alabama outlawed the NAACP. It was Shuttlesworth who invited Dr. King to Birmingham. He also survived the bombing of his own home by the KKK and shared his remembrances of that night with our group: "The bomb shattered the springs under my mattress and the house came down around my head, but we all escaped. No one was hurt." When a policeman warned him to leave town, Shuttlesworth said, he balked: "I told him, 'If God could keep me through this, I'm here for the duration.'"

We also met Carolyn McKinstry, who gave us a tour of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, where the four little Black girls were killed by a KKK bombing in 1963. McKinstry, a lifelong church member, escaped death that day by running to safety. During the tour I learned that 19 sticks of dynamite were placed under the church's outdoor staircase and that 22 other worshipers were injured that day.

MONTGOMERY MOMENTS

At our next stop, Montgomery, we visited the Rosa Parks Museum and Library and viewed Parks's fingerprints on the original arrest record and other artifacts. The museum stands next to the bus stop where she was arrested. Exhibits include a full-size replica of the bus Parks rode on. We also discussed the role of the church in the Movement and listened to recordings from the night the bus boycott was planned at Hold Street Baptist Church. Many of us were shocked to learn that Parks was sitting in the "Colored" section when she was asked to gave up her seat. While in Montgomery, we also attended a service at the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Church, where Dr. King first preached.

WALKING IN SELMA

Our tour ended in Selma, where I was riveted by Joanne Bland's tales and participated in a reenactment of the march over the Edmund Pettus Bridge, scene of the Bloody Sunday showdown. This time, the Alabama state troopers were there to guard our safety.

The trip renewed my pride and respect for our past. Textbook knowledge is fine, but seeing these places for myself made them real.

ALABAMA'S FREEDOM ROAD

Here's a partial list of African-American cultural sites. For more information, call (800) ALABAMA, or visit touralabama.org. For the Footsteps to Freedom tour, call (334) 418-0800.

BIRMINGHAM

Birmingham Civil Rights Institute View interactive exhibits and profiles of activists at bcri.bham.al.us, or call (205) 328-9696.

Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame See exhibits featuring jazz legends like Nat "King" Cole, Lionel Hampton and Sun Ra; (205) 254-2731 or jazzhall.com.

Sixteenth Street Baptist Church This is the infamous site of the 1963 bombing that killed four little Black girls; (205) 251-9402.

MONTGOMERY

Civil Rights Memorial It stands outside the Southern Poverty Law Center; (334) 956-8200 or splcenter.org.

Rosa Parks Museum and Library This museum is dedicated to one of the Movement's seminal figures and the Montgomery bus boycott she inspired; (888) 357-8843 or tsum.edu/museum.

Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church Martin Luther King, Jr.'s first church served as headquarters for many civil-rights events; (334) 263-3970 or dexterkingmemorial.org.

SELMA

National Voting Rights Museum and Institute Besides displaying exhibits on the fight for voting rights and for the inclusion of Blacks in government, this museum holds an annual Bridge Crossing Jubilee to commemorate the 1965 March for Voting Rights; (334) 418-0800 or votingrightsmuseum.org.

Slavery and Civil War Museum Multimedia exhibits explore early history that laid the groundwork for the Civil Rights Movement; slaveryandcivilwar.org.

Selma to Montgomery National Historic Site This is the actual route marchers took in 1965 while demanding voting rights; civilrightstrail.com.

TUSKEGEE

George Washington Carver Museum You can view exhibits about his life, art, science experiments and the many uses he discovered for peanuts; (334) 727-3200 or nps.gov/tuin/index.htm.

Tuskegee Airmen National Historical Site Located on Moton Field, where the airmen trained, the site includes photos, audio exhibits and planes piloted by these brave men; (334) 724-0922 or nps.gov/tuai/index.htm.

Daniel "Chappie" James Center for Aerospace Science and Health Education Visitors can view photos and artifacts of the Tuskegee Airmen and explore the history of Black pilots and astronauts; (334) 727-8011 or tuskegee.edu.

Tuskegee Human and Civil Rights Multicultural Center This museum chronicles the controversial Tuskegee Syphilis Study, in which Black men were unwitting participants in a 40-year study of the disease and were refused treatment. The scandal led to an apology from President Clinton; (334) 724-0800.

Kalin Thomas is a freelance travel writer in Atlanta.

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