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EXHIBIT
A Partnership Effort of Faculty and Community Researchers in Black Belt of Alabama to Document the Contributions of the Foot Soldiers of the Voting Rights Movement: Who: Richard Burt, Keith S. Hébert, Elijah Gaddis – Auburn University; Robert White – Alabama State University; Veronica Pitts – Selma High School; Facilitator; Dr. Cleve Webber, Alabama State University When: Beginning April 13th and Throughout Remainder of April Where: The Visual Arts Gallery in Lela Barlow Theater Building; Alabama State University
IDENTIFICATION
Ben Alpert was there!
On March 7, 1965, more than 600-foot soldiers crossed Selma’s Edmund Pettus Bridge with plans to march to Montgomery to petition Alabama Governor George C. Wallace for the right to vote. What initially began as an effort to protest the death of Jimmie Lee Jackson morphed into an all-out assault on the nation’s racist practice of voter suppression. Alabama State Troopers, the Dallas County Sheriff's Deputies and deputized private citizens assaulted the unarmed and peaceful demonstrators with clubs and tear gas in an event that became known as “Bloody Sunday.” That night television stations across
the nation broadcast videos showing uniformed law enforcement officers beating unarmed protestors. “Bloody Sunday” played an important role in galvanizing support behind the 1965 Voting Rights Act and sparked the birth of the global effort to merge the civil rights movement with the global effort to liberate oppressed people around the world.
The conflict that occurred on the southern end of the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama on March 7th, 1965 triggered a significant turning point in the American Civil Rights Movement. On that day approximately 600 voting rights marchers led by John Lewis and Hosea Williams were violently confronted by Alabama State Troopers and Dallas County Posse-men & Deputies.
However, what might be unique among conflict sites is the amount of contemporary visual evidence available in the form of film and photography. Historic photographs have been obtained from several archival sources including the Alabama Department of Archives and History, Alabama Law Enforcement Agency and the Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas. A multidisciplinary team of architectural and Civil Rights historians, and surveyors have embarked on a multi-year endeavor to bring the events that occurred on that day to life using the historic site as the anchor for the narrative. The team has collected 3D digital data of Selma’s extant structures and combined with evidenced based digital reconstructions using photogrammetric analysis of several hundred contemporary photographs provided enough data to produce a plan of the site as it was on March 7, 1965. As the team started to map the position of the marchers on the plan, it soon became evident that a comprehensive list of marchers did not exist.
FINDS HIS PLACE IN HISTORY
JOHN PETTWAY
A public history initiative involving three academic institutions in Alabama, with support of community groups in Selma was set up to put names to the faces on the hundreds of photographs the team has obtained the rights to use for this endeavor. A numbering system for identifying the marchers position in the column was established, beginning with John Lewis as the first marchers. Where the position of marchers could not be identified, such as when they are photographed either assembling or marching, they were assigned a group identifier such as A1. Groups of students at Auburn and Alabama State University and Selma High School were charged with identifying individual marchers. Focused methods involved using names in contemporary reports, high school yearbooks and media stories to match names to faces. Where surviving marchers or their relatives were identified, oral history interviews were conducted
In order to gather the widest exposure both locally and nationally, the team engaged in local events in Selma and used social media to reach a national audience. After gaining the support of the city council for the project, the team attended local events and worked with the Selma Public Library to display materials. A Facebook site was also established to engage participants outside the local area and media support was enlisted (https://www.facebook.com/selmabloodysundayfootsoldiers/). In addition, a website was created to provide resources and references materials regarding this project and other projects of group members. www.highway80.org. A portion of our research has also been published in the book Highway 80; A drive through Alabama’s Civil Rights Corridor.
This is a wonderful opportunity for the public especially grade school and college students to come and witness these extraordinary photos. In addition, schools can request that the exhibit be made available to them as well. It is our hope to make these available for our young people to study and absorb the civil rights movement, which makes for a valuable piece of human history.
For more information about the ASU exhibit, please email rwhite@alasu.edu or call 334-202-6991.
Presentations.
Selma City Council (twice)
Selma Rotary Club
Smithsonian Institution (Washington, D.C.)
Georgia Tech
Discover Auburn Series
8th US Army Command
Hawaii Alabama Historical Association
Conservation Fund Auburn University Digital Working Group
National Park Service
African American Historic Sites Preservation Network
Alabama Historical Commission
Zion Methodist Church
Marion, Alabama
Montgomery City Council
