Summary Of Birmingham Bombing

Said Martin Luther King Jr. after the Birmingham Bombing (“16th Street Baptist Church”). The 1963 Birmingham Church Bombing was a devastating event. Lives were lost and you were defined by your skin color.

On the early morning of Sunday, September 15th 1963 in Birmingham, Alabama four members of the KKK planted a minimum of 15 sticks of dynamite under the steps of the 16th Street Baptist church, close to the basement. At 10:22 a.m. the 16th Street Baptist Church received a phone call from an anonymous man who simply said “Three minutes,” before hanging up. Less than a minute of the call, the bombs exploded as there were five children present within the basement of the church. Out of the 5 children who were in the basement 4 of them died from the explosion 14 year old Addie Mae Collins, Carole Robertson, Cynthia Wesley, and 11 year old Carol Denise McNair. More than 20 other additional people were injured in the explosion, one of them being Sarah

In 1977 former Ku Klux Klansman Robert "Dynamite Bob" Chambliss was indicted in the murder of all four girls, tried and convicted of the first-degree murder of Denise McNair, and sentenced to life in prison. He died eight years later in prison. Thomas E. Blanton, Jr. was tried in 2001 and found guilty at age 62 of four counts of murder and sentenced to life in prison.

In 1963, a month after Martin Luther King’s I have a dream speech rang harmonies of freedom and equality throughout the United States, Klan members set off dynamite in the sixteenth Baptist Church. The resulting explosion and compromise in the integrity of the building killed four girls. These girls, Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Denise McNarr were the victims of this atrocity. The events that followed furthered the bloodshed. Thousands of black protestors flooded the streets in protest of the horrific acta that took place in the sixteenth Baptist street church [2]. It was not until 2001 and 2002 when some of the men responsible for the crimes would be prosecuted and eventually convicted. Though the intent of the bombing was to instill fear and panic into the black community, what came about was unity and a call to action.

After all, the book The Watsons Go To Birmingham-1963 was only historically accurate in the end because the author focused on the fictional part of this historical fiction story. While the author did talk about the bombing on the 16th Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama in 1963, he didn’t really tell anything other

In April and May of 1963, Birmingham, Alabama was a focal point for the civil rights movement. Birmingham was home to one of the most violent cells of the KKK and violence against black people was so commonplace (especially in the form of explosives) that it was referred to as “Bombingham.” It was these conditions that lead Martin Luther King to arrive and organize a series of non-violent protests in the city. These protests were relatively low key and weren’t very well attended. This was due to the fact that political rivalries between King’s organization, the SCLC, and other civil right’s organizations like CORE and the NAACP. However, the Birmingham protests soon became headlines due to the response of the city’s police

Terry Nichols received life in prison. “Until September 11, 2001, the Oklahoma City bombing was the worst terrorist attack to take place on U.S. soil.”A bomb carried in a Ryder truck exploded in front of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City at 9:02 a.m. on April 19, 1995. “The blast killed 168 people, including 19 children. More than 500 people were injured.Timothy J. McVeigh and Terry L. Nichols were convicted of the attack.” Just because, one person messing around caused an accident, this wasn’t supposed to happen. This accident was so bad we have lost many people. It’s very upsetting to the people that was lost the members and i’m sure were very angry.

Martin Luther King Jr. also seeks to further his point logically by explaining to the people of Birmingham that most places in the United States aren’t segregated to the extent that Birmingham is. He also makes a point to say Birmingham’s “ugly record of police brutality is known in every section of the country” and that “it’s unjust treatment of Negroes in the courts is a notorious reality“ (King 233). King also states “there have been more unsolved bombings in Negro homes and churches in Birmingham than any city in this nation” (King 233). By making the statements that no other city treats African Americans as badly as Birmingham and that the injustice that is taking place in Birmingham is a reality that everyone throughout the country is aware of, King

"Pictures of the bravery and determination of the Birmingham children as they faced the brutal firehoses and vicious police dogs were splashed on the front of every newspaper across America." Says Marian Wright Edelman, founder and president of the Children's Defense Fund. Time Magazine had an entire article with pictures covering the event. This exposed the issue to the media and made the people of the nation realize what needed to be done about it. In the article Birmingham Children's Crusade by Kim Gilmore it states, "Later that year, in September 1963, four little girls were killed by a bomb planted by white supremacists at the 16th St Baptists Church... The horrific bombings sent shock waves through the nation." The events following the crusade only pushed the people further and the Civil Rights Movement was back on its

In the two texts, “The Watsons Go to Birmingham,” by Christopher Curtis and “16th Street Baptist Church Bombing,” by Jessica McBirney the authors both use the church bombing event to develop their own central ideas. In the text, “The Watsons Go to Birmingham,” by Christopher Curtis the central idea focuses on how the event affected a few families personally, and the whole community in a different way. This is shown when the main character Kenny thinks his sister was killed in the bombing, though she was not. In the text, “16th Street Baptist Church Bombing,” by Jessica McBirney the central idea focuses on that the bombing didn’t just affect the girls, but the entire nation leading to the signing of the civil rights act by President Lyndon

The 16th Street Baptist Church Bombing on September 15, 1963 has been one of the most historic bombing in the African American community. Since then, the Spike Lee’s Four Little Girls film and the poem, Ballad of Birmingham, have been created to commemorate the event and the loss of the four beautiful young girls. Both have received awards for their outstanding and thoughtful works that both artist put into their projects. The movie, Four Little Girls, was a very stimulating movie because it was not your typical scripted play. It was a documentary of all the family, friends, and community that were affected by this event. On the other hand, the poem, Ballad of Birmingham, was very eye opening because it put a new perspective of the church bombing.

Additionally, Birmingham and other southern urban areas had been the scenes of bombings coordinated at African Americans and social equality nonconformists. “One of the tragedies of the struggle against racism is that up to now there has been no national organization which could speak to the growing militancy of young black people in the urban ghetto (Carmichael).” One of the tragedies of the battle against bigotry is that up to now there has been no national association which could address the developing militancy of youthful dark individuals in the urban ghetto. This shows how even today things have curved in a good way because of leaders who stood ground and believed that this was not the right way.

On June 12th, 2016 in the nightclub in Orlando Florida visitation when it 's one of the deadliest mass shooting by a single gunman in the history of the United States. This tragedy happened inside an Orlando nightclub called paws which happen to be a gay nightclub in Orlando Florida. The individual who assaulted helpless nightclub was 29-year-old American security guard Omar meteen. People believe that Omar was acting and a terrorist mindset. This is also called the second deadliest terrorist attack since September 11th attack in 2001. This malicious Act has also considered a hate crime being that this was a gay nightclub in Orlando as well as it was hosting a Latin night which Reports say that most of the victims were Hispanic. 50 people died during this horrible shooting spree as well as 53 people injured some which were critical. This level of attack has never been seen in US history being a single gunman. Being armed with a Sig Sauer MCX semi-automatic rifle and a 9 millimeter Glock 17 semi-automatic pistol Omar was estimated to fire over 202 rounds inside that nightclub. Even though Omar was legally allowed to purchase these weapons after this horrible mass shooting congress has been at constant war debating whether stricter gun control laws could have prevented this attack on American soil.

In 1963, four children were killed in the bombing of Birmingham’s Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. Martin Luther King and Eugene Patterson both delivered eulogies after the deaths of Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Cynthia Diane Wesley, and Carole Robertson. The death of these children were not in vain. They aided Congress to pass the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Both eulogies have sentiments of hope and responsibility and use repetition.

These are the four little girls that had died in the bombing of The 16th street Baptist church. Their names were Addi Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Carol Denise.