Bridging Selma
Apr 26, 2015 | Stories
April 24, – Each year in April, a month after celebrating the voting rights victories achieved in Selma, the town hosts the Battle of Selma Re-enactment festivities. Thousands of people come to town to remember the April 1865 Civil War battle in which Selma’s Confederate Troops were defeated by Union troops. For some, the observance of this part of the town’s Confederate past honors the people who fought against the rights of black people, who now make up the majority of the town’s population. Abayomi Goodall, the director at the Slavery & Civil War Museum, leads a protest against the celebration of confederacy during the 150th Battle of Selma Re-enactment at the Edmund Pettus Bridge on Friday, April 24. Photo by Erin Irwin Allen Garner looks on during a demonstration honoring Black soldiers who fought in the Civil War. Photo by Benjamin McKnight III Alabama State Senator Hank Sanders greets Azali Fortier, a young protestor speaking out against the Battle of Selma reenactment on April 24. Photo by Benjamin McKnight III Fayatoure Rose points onlookers and fellow demonstrators in the direction of the Edmund Pettus Bridge. Photo by Benjamin McKnight III Doyle MaurerWVU...
Apr 28, 2015 | Stories
“We had more love and respect for people 60 years ago than we do today,” said Gary Johnson, a Sons of Confederate Veterans member who was at a Marion, Ala., cemetery on Confederate Remembrance Day Sunday. “Now, granted things weren’t equal back then. There were a lot of things that were wrong, no doubt. There’s things that were wrong yesterday that we hope to right today. We’re not perfect people.” Johnson spoke after the memorial ceremony, which involved a pledge of allegiance to the Confederacy, a rousing rendition of “Dixie” and a speech by H.K. Edgerton, an African American man dressed in Confederate soldier garb who spun a pre-war history of the south where slaves and their masters lived in happy harmony. (See related article “Civil War Reenactment: African Americans Join the Confederate Forces.) Johnson takes issue with the characterization of racism as a negative word. “I am a racist. I want my children to all be white. H.K.’s a racist. And we should be. But what we are not is bigots,” Johnson said. “We’re not that way. We’re loving people…this is the way we used to be.” Johnson, a Marion resident, lives in the house that once belonged to Confederate General and Ku Klux Klan Wizard Nathan Forrest. Forrest led the Rebel troops in the 1865 Battle of Selma and Johnson honors his legacy by serving as the commander of the local Sons of Confederate Veterans group called Gen. Isham W. Garrott Camp #764. Each year on April 26, the camp hosts a ceremony for the area’s Confederate Memorial Day, a holiday in honor of Confederate soldiers who...
Apr 29, 2015 | Stories
Dianne is a two time jail bird, but for the right reasons,” Joyce O’Neal says about her best friend Dianne Harris. Harris was jailed twice for activism during the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s in Selma. O’Neal, who was never arrested, was also an activist. The two women, who have been friends for almost 60 years, were teenagers at the time. O’Neal and Harris both lived on the same street as the Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church, which they attended, and which was at the center of the movement in Selma. It’s been almost 60 years since the two met. Joyce O’Neal, a former Director of the Food Assistance Program for the state of Alabama who is now a tour guide for Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church and Dianne Harris, an educator for almost 30 years, have been friends ever since. As teenagers, O’Neal and Harris attended separate high schools but still remained very close. At the time, schools were segregated. Students from R. B. Hudson High School, where O’Neal was a student, were coming to First Baptist church and to Brown Chapel A.M.E. Church to join and organize the marches. O’Neal, wanting to be involved, consulted her mother who advised her not to attend school rather than leaving in the middle of the day to join the march. Harris, who attended Alabama Lutheran Academy, remembers being involved in a different way. “We wanted to be part of history… All we needed was a little encouragement. We already had the thrill.” Harris recalls a young man from R. B. High School visiting her school and asking Harris and her classmates, including her younger brother, to participate in...
Apr 30, 2015 | Stories
Bill Gamble, 72, is a lawyer in Selma, Ala. His familyhas lived in Selma for generations. Family photos at Bill Gamble’s law office in Selma, Ala. ” I produced three very bright children,” Gamble said. “All of them are doing very well, but none of them are here.” Bill Gamble, 72, is a lawyer in Selma, Ala. His family has lived in Selma for generations. Attorney Bill Gamble’s family has lived in Selma a long time. His father Henry Gamble was a Selma lawyer and he and his brother followed in his footsteps, even working at the same firm. While in some ways, Bill and his family fit the rich, white lawyer stereotype, in other ways they do not. Bill, now 72, has been a member of Selma’s all-white Country Club since he first reached adulthood. While he enjoys spending some of his free time there, he doesn’t agree with some of the club’s policies. “Selma Country Club unfortunately is still segregated,” Gamble said. “It has no black members. I’m not proud of that at all.” Gamble said that not only was it “wrong” to not accept black members, but also “stupid.” Welcoming Community While some institutions in Selma have their problems, Gamble said that in many other ways, Selma is a very open and welcoming town. “It’s a wonderful community to live in,” Gamble said. “I find Selma to be an extremely accepting place.” By and large, Selma is a “friendly,” he said. “There are others who are not, but that’s going to be true anywhere,” Gamble. “But overall, I just love it here.” Gamble said this...
Apr 30, 2015 | Stories
The view of Selma’s main street, looking at the Bridge Beautiful, empty buildings line the streets. Recycling was cut off this week for the second time this year. The park used for the Bloody Sunday commemoration activities is already looking neglected–more empty lot than greenspace. Nature has begun to reclaim some downtown buildings. Time has done a number on this town. The buildings that surrounds the downtown park The central park abuts this alley The owners have cheerful blue paper behind the panes The most common sight in Selma’s downtown, a locked a shuttered store. Nature reclaims some shuttered businesses downtown Zero miles per hour: The remains of an exhibit and gallery The view toward Selma’s main street from the block behind The Alabama River, which the Edmund Pettus Bridge spans, is shifting the foundations of buildings and sidewalks in the downtown area. One rarely sees homeless people in Selma; churches tend to take in those who need shelter Flowers planted for the Bloody Sunday commemoration struggle on. A yellow, water-stained sign in the window of this shop bears the scrawl, “Closed due to illness.” The signs hint at a once-thriving business area A clothing shop, Teja’s, is open “by chance” on Mondays. William Scott runs a community and economic development company, Tristatz, and says all the restaurants around here close at noon because “supper time is family time and no one eats out.” One business that appears immune to economic depression Many downtown shops opened to sell knickknacks to tourists in town for Bloody Sunday commemoration. A hopeful storefront church An alley near the bridge Hand-painted signs still...
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