Montgomery, Alabama

 

Leaving Mississippi, Baby Beluga turned northeast,  and bit a triangle out of Alabama.  We wanted to walk a Volksmarch in its capital-- Montgomery.  Without that incentive we wouldn't have gone there.  We had vague ideas about Montgomery's  Civil Rights history, but mostly -- yeah -- we mostly wanted to add  another capital city to our list, and we did.  

Once we walked that Volksmarch, we knew our blog would dedicate a whole post to Montgomery. 

Beginning at the end of the Volksmarch:  Pretty capitol building,  inside and out, and friendly enough folks in it.  No tours, but a nice gift store.  Our trek through the city had left us good and hungry by the time we got there,  and no restaurants were open.  Still holiday hours evidently, so we bought some southern pecans in the capitol and ate on a bench in the building.

 The Volksmarch brought some of the civil rights struggle relative to current times into perspective. We knew Martin Luther King, Jr. was from Montgomery and this photo is of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church-- King's home church.   I thought it ironic that the stair case design in the front is known as a 'sheltering arms' design.

We know the courageous story of Rosa Parks   but didn't know she was from Montgomery.  Embarrassingly, I thought she was from Birmingham. 

 Here is Ms. Parks memorialized on the corner where her actions started the Montgomery Bus Boycott.  In Montgomery.  She stands in front of her own museum, but it was closed that day. (For a quick refresher, we can recommend  the movies The long walk home and Boycott),

Montgomery slapped us in the face.  Evidently it is widely accepted as the birthplace of the  Civil Rights Movement.  We are Americans, so it seems shameful that we didn't know its intricacies like the backs of our hands. We think we should have been more shaped by them than we were in our time.    

Back to the beginning of our day there:   our Volksmarch directions began by sending us along a beautiful park.  Bill commented that he expected the city to look more like Jackson, Mississippi than it did.  It was in fact, a lovely city and a lovely walk (Sorry, Jackson).   The park featured a beautiful working community garden along the Tallapoosa River and a Wright Brothers Airplane, permanently lifted into the sky by supporting poles.   Turns out Wilbur and Orville taught early aviation in Montgomery.  

Next came a lovely stroll through a pretty neighborhood of old houses called Cottage Hill that brought us to an intersection and face to face with civil rights history.  The intersection was of the round-about type, and in its center is a very shiny sculpture.  It turned out to be impossible to photograph because  its highly polished stainless steel surface reflected its surroundings,  no matter what I tried.  In reality the only thing there was the shape:   

The impact of this thing came from its description:  This particular intersection was called Five Points and described as the Intersection of History and Humanity.  It is at this intersection that the College Hill neighborhood met the Five Points Neighborhood -- evidently a convergence of races, cultures and backgrounds.  And it is a place where, in 1965, folks took part in the voting rights march from Selma to Montgomery. This intersection is now part of the National Park's Service National Historic Trails.

Around the next turn,  we came upon the back (note the Volkmarch route did NOT take us to this place, but it surely should have) of  The National Monument for Peace And Justice. Curiosity led us in.    It is a national memorial for lynching victims in the United States.   It is as powerful a place as the Holocaust Museum or the Vietnam Memorial. 

An introductory sculpture of chained men, women and children leads into a structure that has about six-foot high rectangular boxes hanging on poles, each inscribed with a US state and county, followed by a list of people who are documented to have been lynched there.  There are about 5,000 names in all and those only represent documented lynchings. There were so many more.  It is confrontational, raw, inspirational.   Travel magazine, according to the Monument's website, stated:  "The Genius of the Memorial is that it makes us grieve in broad daylight." Absolute truth.  This place truly holds sacred space for reflection on racial terrorism and its legacy in this country.  Any one who has a chance should visit there.

There are more legacy sites in Montgomery that we didn't get to see.  Montgomery itself should be honored.  It has seemingly moved itself along a continuum from our preconceptions which we guess we may have shared with others, to the reality of this city honoring what is not a past to be proud of, and on to be seemingly focused on the future, at least a little bit.    We are so glad we went there, and glad that, even in our old-age, we can be reminded of the age we have lived in and while we don't need to be reminded of changes that the US needs to make, we can be reminded of why.

Retirement Lesson:  We aren't too old to be awe-struck.  We aren't too old to learn and re-learn.  

Voyaya