The tour of Birmingham provided us with yet another oppurtunity to relive the harsh realities faced by the blacks of the 1960's. The oppression and segregation in Birmingham was thought to be even worse than most other cities, simply because it was one of the larger cities of the time period so everything done there was magnified and placed on a national scale. The bombing of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was finally enough to get things turned around for the minorities of Birmingham, not because the church was burned down, but due to the fact that four children were killed inside of the building and two others were murdered at the hands of white men. Before this it was not a rare occurence to see blacks doused with powerful firemen waterhoses or being mauled by vicious dogs while law enforcement stood aside and allowed these terrible acts to take place. The election of the first black mayor in the city of Birmingham, Richard Arrington, in 1979, was another win for minorities because he set off many programs and raised funds in order to help spear head the civil rights movement to where it is today.
Drake Alford
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