I’m moving to Atlanta…day 3 of the #CvillePilgrimage solidified that for me. Someone tell my job I quit! Today, we were fortunate enough to spend an entire day in Atlanta, GA, visiting multiple sites that make up the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Park, in addition to a visit to the Center for Civil and Human Rights.
Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Park
The Martin Luther King, Jr. Historical National Park, Atlanta, GA.
In January of this year (2018), with legislation sponsored by Civil Rights legend and Congressman John Lewis, 45 * insert eye roll * signed a bill to transition the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site to a national park. The park consists of the visitor’s center; Historic Ebenezer Baptist Church; The King Center; Historic Fire Station No.6 and the King Birth Home. According to 45’s legislation, the park will now also include the Prince Hall Masonic Temple, which once served as the headquarters for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Park Superintendent Judy Forte greeted us with a warm welcome, and I appreciated her because when talking about the work done in the Civil Rights Movement she acknowledged the foot soldiers of the movement. The Civil Rights “Foot Soldiers” were the movement participants who put in the work, but didn’t have national notoriety; who went unknown in the images from those times. Following her was Atlanta District 2 Councilman Amir R. Farokhi. Councilman Farokhi welcomed us to Atlanta, but more importantly, he welcomed us to the Sweet Auburn District, a district that was once one of the wealthiest Black neighborhoods; a district that Farokhi says the city is working to restore the area to it’s peak in the 1930’s, an effort that’s not just about making it shiny in 2018. This was important to hear because, as we would learn later on that day, this is not an area that should succumb to the dangers of gentrification.
Sweet Auburn Historic District
The Childhood Home of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,located in the Sweet Auburn Historic District
The Sweet Auburn Historic District, the site of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s childhood home, was a thriving Black community which worked diligently to establish and maintain a cycle of wealth by keeping the Black dollar circulating within. The neighborhood would come about when the Atlanta race riots of 1906 pushed Black businesses away from the downtown area into their own space. The riots would ensue when whites in the city would gather and begin to attack and kill Black people because they believed that Black men were attacking and raping white women, a rhetoric that has managed to survive even to this day (i.e. Dylan Roof). Within the Sweet Auburn district, Black people were able to establish their own businesses, churches, entertainment scenes and social clubs. As time progressed, like many places of Black success, the district would decline as wealth and Black investment moved out of the neighborhood. It would have it’s chance at revitalization when the Historic District Development Corporation (HDDC) – co-founded by Coretta Scott King, Christine King Farris and John Cox sought to bring the area back to glory, starting with the houses closes to Dr. King’s birth home and continuing outward. What I liked most when learning about this area was how valued the concept of Black self-sufficiency was and still continues to be, even down to grooming successors for the running of businesses such as the HDDC or Sweet Auburn Works, Inc.
The Center for Civil and Human Rights
The Center for Civil and Human Rights, Atlanta, Ga
This is such an amazing center! I’ve been here twice, and have still only managed to get through one floor of it – the Civil Rights floor. The design of the floor allows for optimal impact as visitors travel from one room to another, becoming completely submersed in each topic. The highlight of this for me was the sit-in simulator. Tho I had done it before, I found myself still feeling jittery as I neared the front of the line. When you finally get to the counter you put your headphones on, put your hands flat down on the countertop, put your head down and close your eyes, completely shutting out your surrounding environment. It’s instantly like you step back into time. As I sat there and felt my chair being kicked, listening to hate-filled voices coming at me from both sides, and feeling heavy breathing up against my ears, I immediately started envisioning the people behind me, even tho no one was actually there. It was a scary feeling; however, at the end of it I was able to get up and walk away unscathed. I only had a small inkling of what sit-in participants went through with every segregated space they chose to integrate. This is why the “I’m not my ancestors” saying has always bothered me. While I’m a firm believer in the self-defense that Malcolm X, and later on the participants of the Black Power Movement advocated for, I will say it is a great display of strength to be able to resist the urge to retaliate against, and swing on those who are dragging you out of your seat, hitting you, taunting you, spitting on you, and pouring things on you.
Yesterday I discussed briefly the ways in which we have witnessed media negatively impact Blackness overtime; however, it would be irresponsible of me if I did not acknowledge how the leaders of the Civil Rights Movement learned how to successfully navigate the media themselves in order to counter the negative stories being passed on about them. Their efforts allowed them to have a say in the shaping of their stories that would be shared in future history books. This ownership was noticed heavily today in the film we viewed at the visitor’s center.
Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks became the Mother of the Civil Rights Movement when, on Dec. 1, 1955, she refused to give up her seat and move to the back of the city bus in Montgomery, Alabama. I know when I was in school, we were taught that Parks was merely a seamstress who was tired after a long days work and refused to move from her seat. In reality, this was not Rosa Parks’ first encounter with the Civil Rights Movement. Rosa Parks was an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), even serving as the secretary for the state NAACP. She had also attended the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee. It’s also important to note that Rosa Parks was not the first person in Montgomery who refused to give up her seat on the bus. On March 2, 1955, Claudette Colvin, a 15 year old student activist, refused to give up her seat and was arrested and charged with assaulting an officer. Because of Colvin’s age, as well as her pregnancy out of wedlock, she was considered unfit to become the face of the movement. Rosa Parks, on the other hand, was perfect to challenge the system being older, married, employed and of the middle working class. These factors made it easier to portray Parks as this meek seamstress who’s only crime was being tired from a hard days work.
“Sunday Best”
The notion of appearing “respectable” was crucial in efforts to maintain ownership in the media. When participating in the marches and protests, it was imperative that protestors were dressed nicely so as to be taken more seriously not by the police, but by those who would view the protests and sit-ins either in person, or on television. Dressing in ones “Sunday Best” also served to humanize the protestors when people watched marchers once nice clothing become stained with dirt and blood, ripped apart from being dragged or from dog bites, or become soaked from fire hydrants.
Bayard Rustin
Appearances were also the reason why Bayard Rustin is so often excluded from Civil Rights narratives. I remember the very first time I ever went to Historic Ebenezer. Walking down the steps from the main sanctuary, I noticed a painting featuring prominent figures of the movement. Imagine my surprise once I finally found Bayard Rustin in an almost unrecognizable place in the image. Rustin served as the advisor to Dr. King, providing him with the tools and tactics he needed to rise to fame and to get the non-violent movement it’s notoriety. He was very much into leading a pacifist life style, and was extremely influential in Dr. King becoming truly non-violent. He would go on to become on of Dr. King’s most trusted advisors, helping King to found the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC); and assisting with both the planning and execution of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, and the March on Washington where King delivered the now famous “I Have a Dream” speech. Rustin was revered as a brilliant strategist; however, Rustin was also an openly gay man with a criminal record, and therefore, a liability to the movement. Like the vast majority who were involved in Civil Rights, Bayard Rustin would be arrested time and time again for civil disobedience, but Rustin also spent time in jail for his refusal to enter into the draft. Rustin’s biggest downfall, in regards to his place in the movement, was the “morals” charge he received in 1953 after being caught engaging in sexual activity with 2 men in a car. While planning the March on Washington of 1963, Strom Thurmond, then a South Carolina Senator, used Rustin’s charges to dismiss the movement, utilizing his arrest records to paint him as a “communist, draft-dodger, and homosexual.” Going back to 1960, Dr. King and Bayard Rustin were planning demonstrations outside of both the Democratic and Republic presidential conventions. When Black congressman Adam Clayton Powell caught word of the plans, he bullied King into cancelling them by threatening to make accusations of a sexual relationship between King and Rustin. While this was in no way the case, Clayton got his way: King cancelled the demonstrations and Bayard Rustin resigned from his position. He would not reunite with King until the March on Washington.
White Compliance
It’s always frustrating when, at the peak of anger concerning the excessive beating, or death of another Black person because of state-sanctioned violence or white vigilantism, we have to hear from our white counterparts that the victim, “should have complied.” It’s especially confusing because, as history has shown us, the white race has never done well with the notion of compliance. From the decision to seek independence from Great Britain, to just the threat of the ending of slavery, there was push back and a lack of compliance. From the “official freeing” of enslaved persons, to the idea of including Blacks in the notion of “All men are created equal,” there was no compliance. The shutting down of businesses, transportation means and schools to avoid integration definitely demonstrated a lack of compliance. So what is it about whiteness that affords them the right to refuse and not comply? It’s superiority, obviously. Compliance, in this situation, is synonymous with inferiority; and it is the need to make Black people inferior that has been a major driving point in our nation’s history.
Having already left Atlanta to head to our next destination, I have to say sadly, goodbye Atlanta, for now. Until tomorrow.
