50 Years Forward Commemorative Events

The University of Alabama at Birmingham Fifty Years Forward

City of Birmingham Fifty Years Forward

Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

BESA Muslims Who Saved Jews in World War II

March 2, 2013 - June 30

The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute presents “BESA Muslims Who Saved Jews in World War II,” by photographer Norman H. Gershman. The exhibit, co-sponsored by the Birmingham Museum of Art and the Birmingham Islamic Society. The exhibit tells the story, buried for decades by a rigid Communist regime, of how Albanian Muslims saved thousands of Jews during World War II in a moving pictorial history.

Over a five-year period, Gershman visited Albania several times to record the stories and photographs of these heroic people and their families, documenting their unwavering vow, or besa, to protect their Jewish brothers and sisters. Besa is a code of honor by the Albanian people, stated Gershman. “It goes back probably thousands of years. It is more than just hospitality. If someone comes into their aura, they will lay their lives down for anybody.”

Although there were not too many Jews living in Albania at the time, many Jews fled to Albania in search of safety. During World War II, there were only two countries in Europe “that actively refused to cooperate with the Nazis: Denmark and Albania,” said Gershman. Through the efforts of the Albanians, more than 2000 Jews were saved.

Marching On: The Children's Movement at Fifty

March 12 - November 30, 2013

Drawing from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute's Oral History Project collection and other archival sources, this exhibit will tell the story of the seminal event of the Birmingham Movement - The Children’s Crusade - through the words of the “foot soldiers,” the young people of Birmingham in 1963, who made it happen.

Rosalie Turner Walk With Me

May 2, 2013, 6:30 p.m.

Commemorate the 50th Anniversary of Birmingham’s Children’s March at the Homewood Public Library with local author Rosalie Turner as she discusses Walk With Me, her historical novel about the Civil Rights Movement in Birmingham in the spring of '63. In this multicultural coming of age story, two girls, one black and one white, endure the pain and prejudice of segregation. After her book talk, there will be a book signing.

The 50th Anniversary of the Stand in the Schoolhouse Door

Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Click here to listen

Some images from the civil rights era are indelibly etched on our collective memory. For instance, the rubble left by the bombing of the 16th St. Baptist Church or the dogs and fire hoses set upon marching children in downtown Birmingham. Tuesday marks the 50th anniversary of a third -- Governor George Wallace’s stand in the Schoolhouse door.

George Wallace’s stand was not a spontaneous event. Wallace carefully choreographed the scene to keep a campaign promise to his political base, a promise to defy federal desegregation orders. After years of delay and many federal court orders, the Kennedy administration was determined that black students Vivian Malone and James Hood would attend the university. And they let Wallace know they were serious.

"Attorney General Robert Kennedy himself visited Gov. Wallace in Montgomery on April 15."

Culpepper Clark is a former dean at the University of Georgia. He’s author of The Schoolhouse Door; Segregation’s Last Stand at the University of Alabama. Clark says the Kennedy Administration wanted to avoid a repeat of the riot that killed two people at Ole Miss when that school was integrated the year before. When Robert Kennedy reached out to Wallace, he was taken aback by the Governor’s response.

True to his word, at about 10:30 on the morning of June 11,. Wallace blocked the entrance to Foster Auditorium where Malone and Hood were trying to register. Assistant Attorney General Nickholas Katzenback then took the students to their dorms and waited for the arrival of Federal troops. That afternoon a contingent arrived on campus. Brigadier General Henry Graham asked Wallace to step aside. After a brief speech, the governor drove off to the cheers of his supporters. That night President Kennedy spoke to the nation calling the civil rights movement a moral issue. But just past midnight in Jackson, Mississippi, an assassin killed civil rights activist Medgar Evers. Clark says that Wallace helped to create the atmosphere that fostered such crimes.

"When Dynamite Bob Chambliss and accomplices bombed the 16th St. Baptist Church, Wallace went out and apologized not for anything but blamed it on the African American Community itself."

The stand in the schoolhouse door helped propel Wallace to run for president 4 times. During a Maryland campaign stop on May 1972, Arthur Bremer shot the governor. That assassination attempt left Wallace to spend the rest of his life in a wheel chair.

The Effect of the Stand

It was Wallace’s success at attracting white working class voters that changed America’s political landscape.

"I think Wallace’s lasting legacy is the polarization that has made Alabama to this day not only the most conservative of American states but also most racially polarized."

Wayne Flynt is a former history professor at Auburn University and is the author of Alabama: The History of a Southern State.

"In the 2008 presidential election between Obama and John McCain Alabama had the most divided populace of any state in the United States. 98% of African Americans voted for Barack Obama and more than 90% of whites voted for John McCain."

Culpepper Clark believes the most consequential effect of Wallace’s stand was the shift in American political power.

And he carved out of the Democratic Party what would become known as Wallace Democrats. These Wallace Democrats would eventually become the Reagan Democrats of the Reagan revolution of the 1980s. Thus there’s a direct line between the drama that was taking place, the political theater. But behind it was a whole political sea change and the Democratic Party would lose its base for a long time to come."

George Wallace’s stand didn’t stop Vivian Malone. She graduated from the University in 1965. James Hood left the university in ‘63 but went on to earn graduate degrees from Michigan State and Cambridge University. By 1966, there were 400 black students attending classes on the 3 campuses of the University of the Alabama System. For WBHM, I’m Greg Bass.

~Greg Bass, June 11, 2013

Evolution: Eric Essix Debuts Selections from His Musical Diary of Birmingham’s Progress

Sept. 19, 2013, 7 p.m.

Birmingham native and Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame Inductee Eric Essix will perform songs from “Evolution” at UAB’s Alys Stephens Center. The artist’s landmark 20th recording is a musical diary that examines the progress of Birmingham over the past 50 years and into the future. A guitarist with intimate personal, family, and community connections to the subject matter, Essix has produced and recorded songs that have a direct connection to the Civil Rights Movement for more than a decade.

A More Convenient Season: World Premiere of a New Work of Hope & Healing by Composer Yotam Haber

Sept. 21, 2013, 8 p.m.

UAB’s Alys Stephens Center and philanthropist Tom Blount have commissioned internationally-known composer Yotam Haber to create this world premiere, calling on the healing power of the arts to commemorate an event that became a turning point for the entire world—the horrific bombing of The 16th Street Baptist Church Sunday, September 15, 1963 at 10:22 a.m. The historic composition draws its title from the text of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from a Birmingham Jail."

". . . who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a ‘more convenient season.’ "

The program will feature the Alabama Symphony Orchestra led by guest conductor Damon Gupton and the 16th Street Baptist Church Choir combined with children from across Birmingham led by guest choral director the Rev. Kevin Turner. It will incorporate historical sound recordings from the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute’s Oral History Project and will be digitally mastered by Philip White. Born in Holland, Haber grew up in Israel, Nigeria, and Milwaukee and completed a doctorate in composition at Cornell University. He is a 2005 Guggenheim Fellow and a 2007 Rome Prize Recipient. This will not be Haber’s first venture in composing works that explore issues of human rights and hope, as he has previously created three works that explore the culture and history of the Jewish Diaspora in Italy. Following its world debut at UAB’s Alys Stephens Center, a cultural center that unites UAB and the Birmingham community, “A More Convenient Season” will premiere on the West Coast with the Cal Arts Orchestra at the Roy and Edna Disney/CalArts Theatre (REDCAT).

The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963

October 19, 2013

Birmingham Children’s Theatre presents the Birmingham premiere of Christopher Paul Curtis’The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963, adapted by Reginald André Jackson, as its youth-centered contribution to the 50th Anniversary Commemoration of Birmingham’s impact on Civil Rights in 1963.

The play, based upon a hilarious and deeply moving story and characters depicted in the novel of the same title, chronicles a lengthy stay in Birmingham, Alabama, by the Watson family of Flint, Michigan, which coincided with a moment in world history: the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. Mr. Curtis' novel was both a Newbery and Coretta Scott King Honor Book, and a New York Times Review Best Book.

Birmingham Children’s Theatre will present the production October 7 to October 19, 2013, in the theatre at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex, BCT’s resident home stage. The play is recommended for third to eighth grade students and their families. Complimentary study guides and community-based educational activities will be offered to support the production.