Letter from Birmingham
My Dear Barber Q,
In the spirit of Martin Luther King’s open Letter from Birmingham Jail, published in April 1963, I write to you having just returned from a weekend in the city made famous for its role in the 1960s civil rights movement. Unlike Dr. King’s letter, mine is drafted in the relative comfort of personal freedom and in a time when individuals, both black and white, are no longer risking their lives to end such egregious practices as segregation. Also unlike Dr. King's letter, mine is only intended to capture my reaction to a trip to your city that I took this past weekend in the company of Missy T and D-Man, whereas Dr. King’s powerful words dictated the philosophy behind non-violent direct action. Like Dr. King however, I write because I find myself in the south refusing to sit idly by while observing that injustice is still here.
Saturday afternoon, the three of us went to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, located right across the street from the 16th Street Baptist Church. (The church jumped into the national consciousness and became one of the most graphic images on display during the 1960s, when it was bombed by the Klu Klux Klan in September 1963 and killed 4 teenage girls inside). The CRI contains some of the most important symbols of the civil rights movement, including the door to Dr. King’s Birmingham jail cell and the front of a Trailways bus that was firebombed soon after it entered Alabama in 1961 while transporting Freedom Riders through the south.
While the museum was impressive, it served mainly to inform us of the imagery and historical context surrounding events that took place four decades ago. After leaving, we experienced first-hand how deep the roots of racial separation run in this city.
[Birmingham was founded 120 years ago in the wake of the civil war as an industrial mining town. Despite the fact that slavery had already ended, racial separation continued to permeate through the south, first by custom and then by law. The Birmingham mines were no different, with African Americans relegated to the dangerous and back-breaking menial work and whites appointed to supervisory positions. Socially, African Americans and whites also didn’t mix, especially in the wake of the white landowners’ resentment after the civil war. Because many white establishments refused to serve them, African Americans caught onto Birmingham’s fast paced development that earned the city its nickname the “magic city” by opening a slew of black businesses that served the African American community. Many of these businesses were located on Fourth Avenue, which is where we found ourselves soon after leaving the CRI. ]
Today, Fourth Avenue is still all black, featuring a row of African American barber shops, a theater famous for providing black entertainment, a well-known chicken wing joint and a funeral parlor. After walking out of a Montgomery barbershop last week with my first-ever mullet, I was in desperate need of another haircut, and I decided to take my hair and put it into your hands, Barber Q, when we entered the oldest black barbershop in Birmingham, Magic City Barbershop.
The music and conversation didn’t come screeching to a halt when we first walked in to your shop though we received some quizzical looks and side glances from the folks inside. No sooner had the three of us sat down before we started fielding questions asking what our names were, what we do, how old we are, etc…all trying to tactfully figure out how we managed to be the only three white customers on the entire block. By the time we left two hours later, however, we had broken through the color barrier and enjoyed friendly conversations, talking politics and bantering with everyone there. Though we couldn’t make it, we also appreciated your invitation to the shindig you were throwing in honor of your wife’s birthday. (The haircut was a drastic improvement also).
The next morning, the three of us found ourselves again to be the only persons not of color in attendance when we arrived for services at Birmingham’s historic Sixth Avenue Baptist Church. Having never attended a black Southern Baptist Church before, I’ve been looking forward to this experience since I arrived here. Now that I’ve had the chance to clap my hands and sing along with the spirited gospel music, say a few amens and shout out some hallelujahs, there’s no doubt in my mind that if I weren’t Jewish I’d be a southern Baptist. Surely Dr. King was aware of the similarities between Jews and African American Baptists, not only in their histories as a persecuted people, but also in their love of spirited singing and music in the prayer service.
Barber Q: I write today to say how much all three of us appreciated your openness and the openness of Birmingham’s African Americans to see beyond our skin color and to engage us in dialogue and welcome us into your community. Nevertheless, I leave Birmingham with a taste of extraordinary southern hospitality mixed with disappointment that though segregation is no longer practiced, separation still is. As I learned from spending time in your barbershop, attending church and even from dropping in at a black jazz joint on Saturday night, Birmingham still has miles to walk before reaching the plateau of race neutrality; before arriving at the day when the black leadership better represents its own constituency by demanding that the 73% of Birmingham residents who are African American practice their hard fought right to vote instead of letting it fall by the wayside; before the white leadership recognizes that equality can only be achieved with a judicial system that is not inherently biased against African Americans and that education only reinforces separation when both public and private schools are demographically lopsided.
Martin Luther King closed his Letter from Birmingham Jail by asking for “hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.” Those stars are certainly closer today than they were in Dr. King’s time, but we have yet to fully bask in their glow.
Yours,
Ariel Glasner
PS Grit Count = 3 Regular Grits, 2 Cheese Grits
In the spirit of Martin Luther King’s open Letter from Birmingham Jail, published in April 1963, I write to you having just returned from a weekend in the city made famous for its role in the 1960s civil rights movement. Unlike Dr. King’s letter, mine is drafted in the relative comfort of personal freedom and in a time when individuals, both black and white, are no longer risking their lives to end such egregious practices as segregation. Also unlike Dr. King's letter, mine is only intended to capture my reaction to a trip to your city that I took this past weekend in the company of Missy T and D-Man, whereas Dr. King’s powerful words dictated the philosophy behind non-violent direct action. Like Dr. King however, I write because I find myself in the south refusing to sit idly by while observing that injustice is still here.
Saturday afternoon, the three of us went to the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, located right across the street from the 16th Street Baptist Church. (The church jumped into the national consciousness and became one of the most graphic images on display during the 1960s, when it was bombed by the Klu Klux Klan in September 1963 and killed 4 teenage girls inside). The CRI contains some of the most important symbols of the civil rights movement, including the door to Dr. King’s Birmingham jail cell and the front of a Trailways bus that was firebombed soon after it entered Alabama in 1961 while transporting Freedom Riders through the south.
While the museum was impressive, it served mainly to inform us of the imagery and historical context surrounding events that took place four decades ago. After leaving, we experienced first-hand how deep the roots of racial separation run in this city.
[Birmingham was founded 120 years ago in the wake of the civil war as an industrial mining town. Despite the fact that slavery had already ended, racial separation continued to permeate through the south, first by custom and then by law. The Birmingham mines were no different, with African Americans relegated to the dangerous and back-breaking menial work and whites appointed to supervisory positions. Socially, African Americans and whites also didn’t mix, especially in the wake of the white landowners’ resentment after the civil war. Because many white establishments refused to serve them, African Americans caught onto Birmingham’s fast paced development that earned the city its nickname the “magic city” by opening a slew of black businesses that served the African American community. Many of these businesses were located on Fourth Avenue, which is where we found ourselves soon after leaving the CRI. ]
Today, Fourth Avenue is still all black, featuring a row of African American barber shops, a theater famous for providing black entertainment, a well-known chicken wing joint and a funeral parlor. After walking out of a Montgomery barbershop last week with my first-ever mullet, I was in desperate need of another haircut, and I decided to take my hair and put it into your hands, Barber Q, when we entered the oldest black barbershop in Birmingham, Magic City Barbershop.
The music and conversation didn’t come screeching to a halt when we first walked in to your shop though we received some quizzical looks and side glances from the folks inside. No sooner had the three of us sat down before we started fielding questions asking what our names were, what we do, how old we are, etc…all trying to tactfully figure out how we managed to be the only three white customers on the entire block. By the time we left two hours later, however, we had broken through the color barrier and enjoyed friendly conversations, talking politics and bantering with everyone there. Though we couldn’t make it, we also appreciated your invitation to the shindig you were throwing in honor of your wife’s birthday. (The haircut was a drastic improvement also).
The next morning, the three of us found ourselves again to be the only persons not of color in attendance when we arrived for services at Birmingham’s historic Sixth Avenue Baptist Church. Having never attended a black Southern Baptist Church before, I’ve been looking forward to this experience since I arrived here. Now that I’ve had the chance to clap my hands and sing along with the spirited gospel music, say a few amens and shout out some hallelujahs, there’s no doubt in my mind that if I weren’t Jewish I’d be a southern Baptist. Surely Dr. King was aware of the similarities between Jews and African American Baptists, not only in their histories as a persecuted people, but also in their love of spirited singing and music in the prayer service.
Barber Q: I write today to say how much all three of us appreciated your openness and the openness of Birmingham’s African Americans to see beyond our skin color and to engage us in dialogue and welcome us into your community. Nevertheless, I leave Birmingham with a taste of extraordinary southern hospitality mixed with disappointment that though segregation is no longer practiced, separation still is. As I learned from spending time in your barbershop, attending church and even from dropping in at a black jazz joint on Saturday night, Birmingham still has miles to walk before reaching the plateau of race neutrality; before arriving at the day when the black leadership better represents its own constituency by demanding that the 73% of Birmingham residents who are African American practice their hard fought right to vote instead of letting it fall by the wayside; before the white leadership recognizes that equality can only be achieved with a judicial system that is not inherently biased against African Americans and that education only reinforces separation when both public and private schools are demographically lopsided.
Martin Luther King closed his Letter from Birmingham Jail by asking for “hope that the dark clouds of racial prejudice will soon pass away and the deep fog of misunderstanding will be lifted from our fear-drenched communities, and in some not too distant tomorrow the radiant stars of love and brotherhood will shine over our great nation with all their scintillating beauty.” Those stars are certainly closer today than they were in Dr. King’s time, but we have yet to fully bask in their glow.
Yours,
Ariel Glasner
PS Grit Count = 3 Regular Grits, 2 Cheese Grits
posted by Ariel Glasner @ 5:01 PM
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