The Weight of Birmingham

Some places you visit for the scenery. Birmingham was a trip I felt I owed to history. I had been reading about the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church and Dr. King’s Letter from Birmingham Jail, and reading was no longer enough. I needed to stand there.

Downtown, grand old office towers and theater marquees told the story of a city that once built big. But I spent most of my time in Kelly Ingram Park, where the sculptures are not symbols. They show what Birmingham actually did to its Black citizens. In 1963, the city turned police dogs and fire hoses on children who were marching for their rights, and it filled its jails with them. In the park, those dogs lunge from stone walls, and those children stand in bronze. Across the street, the church still stands.

The sculptures are a testament to what happened here and a reminder of what Dr. King understood: hate is too great a burden to bear.