Sorrow was echoed throughout Birmingham on Thursday, September 15th, 2016. It was the 53rd anniversary of the bombing that took place in 1963 at the 16th Street Baptist Church. The bombing killed four young girls, 14-year-old Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley and Carole Robertson and 11-year-old Denise McNair, and injured many others. The event has left its mark on the civil rights history in Birmingham these past 53 years.
The church had a 10 a.m. service on Thursday morning to commemorate the anniversary and sounded the church's bells at 10:22 a.m. the time in which the lives of those four girls was taken and the boiling point of racial issues in Birmingham broke out.
I visited the church the day after the anniversary and was chilled by the silence that filled the holy place. The 16th Street Baptist Church and the areas surrounding it are something that every Birmingham resident should try to visit. It's a huge part of the city's history. The atmosphere is quiet and respectable, and the messages embedded because of the tragedy are powerful.
The Kelly Ingrim Park right across from the church is dedicated to the four girls who lost their lives and the civil rights history. Also located by the church, which I didn't get the chance to walk through, is the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute; a museum and research center built in 1992 dedicated to showing the grim civil rights history in Birmingham during the 1950s and 1960s. The Kelly Ingrim Park especially is filled with artistic statues centered on the fight against segregation and fight for liberty and justice. Pieces such as two statues cowering from the stone replicas of water hoses sent the powerful, dark message about a terrible part of our city's and nation's history.
Right before I left Kelly Ingrim Park, I was blessed by the beautiful sight of butterflies flying around flower beds and the statues of the four girls in front of the park. I know how cliché it may sound, but the dancing butterflies emphasized why the anniversary of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing is important. Those girls’ lives were precious, and their lives were taken away because of prejudice. When talking about the bombing, people always say that the girls were innocents at church. They did nothing wrong and lost their lives anyways. I hope Birmingham citizens celebrate the memory of Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Denise McNair every year and that the church bells echo the memory of them in our hearts.
