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Just to mention, I mistook the affordability part of the article to mean affordable to live there versus being affordable to visit there.

When you include the affordable part of the equation, it does make Birmingham more of an attraction over the more expensive places like Orlando & Opryland in Nashville.

I would consider Chattanooga in the same category & since I don't live in Chattanooga it would be my destination to visit versus a place where I already reside.

(01-02-2013 11:01 AM)legalblazer Wrote:  So because those horrible things happened it's okay to omit part of the story? A part of the story that I provided historical references for? A part of the story that shows that not everyone in Birmingham in the 1960s should be stereotyped as evil racists bastards? A part of the story that shows that Birmingham might (up to the individual to decide) have actually had more reasonable citizens than many other cities that history now gives a pass to 50 years later?

I even looked provided the reference for you... It's right there. King's strategist stated they knew things were changing, that Bull Connor was a lame duck and decided to provoke him for good public relations material while they still could. Again, up to the individual to decide what that means in context, but that opportunity should be theirs and not the author of a history book or the curator of a museum.

In the midst of Birmingham's shame, there was an example of cooperation that embodied Dr. King's ideals in his speeches - but we're not supposed to learn about or talk about that?

I agree with both sides. As an amateur historian myself, I think the entire body of information about a particular topic in history should be presented and the reader should interpret the facts for themselves. Every textbook, historical account, or museum has the biases of the author/creator woven into it.

I also agree that the political process to change Birmingham behind the scenes is something that is glossed over and/or outright hidden. This should be presented and given the light of day. I don't disagree with the actions that King and his followers took at all. However, the political actions that others took to try and change Birmingham behind the scenes should be brought to light as well. All the facts should be presented, and the interested parties should be able to interpret history for themselves, not have it lectured or dictated to them.

(01-02-2013 11:01 AM)legalblazer Wrote:  So because those horrible things happened it's okay to omit part of the story? A part of the story that I provided historical references for? A part of the story that shows that not everyone in Birmingham in the 1960s should be stereotyped as evil racists bastards? A part of the story that shows that Birmingham might (up to the individual to decide) have actually had more reasonable citizens than many other cities that history now gives a pass to 50 years later?

I even looked provided the reference for you... It's right there. King's strategist stated they knew things were changing, that Bull Connor was a lame duck and decided to provoke him for good public relations material while they still could. Again, up to the individual to decide what that means in context, but that opportunity should be theirs and not the author of a history book or the curator of a museum.

In the midst of Birmingham's shame, there was an example of cooperation that embodied Dr. King's ideals in his speeches - but we're not supposed to learn about or talk about that?

Bull Connor did not create Jim Crowe in the South. Bull Connor wasnt resposible for most of the deaths and lynchings that occured from 1882-1968. You're giving what people had started to do in the 1960s, the struggle for freedom started long before that my friend. The ONLY thing you have brought up was Dr.King and Bull Connor. Dr.King didnt get involved in the movement in Birmingham until 1963 which was years after the Birmingham movement started. Dr. King was called here by Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, Rev.Fred Shuttlesworth , and James Bevel. By that time Birmingham had several major incidents including The incident where students from Tennessee State University were kindnapped and beaten while they took part in the Freedom Riders Demonstration. Noone ever said that every white in Birmingham was racist but the entire reason that the movement started was that blacks were tired of being beaten, killed, and everything else.

(01-02-2013 01:30 PM)GreenHornet33 Wrote:  Bull Connor did not create Jim Crowe in the South. Bull Connor wasnt resposible for most of the deaths and lynchings that occured from 1882-1968. You're giving what people had started to do in the 1960s, the struggle for freedom started long before that my friend. The ONLY thing you have brought up was Dr.King and Bull Connor. Dr.King didnt get involved in the movement in Birmingham until 1963 which was years after the Birmingham movement started. Dr. King was called here by Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, Rev.Fred Shuttlesworth , and James Bevel. By that time Birmingham had several major incidents including The incident where students from Tennessee State University were kindnapped and beaten while they took part in the Freedom Riders Demonstration. Noone ever said that every white in Birmingham was racist but the entire reason that the movement started was that blacks were tired of being beaten, killed, and everything else.

What is your point?

My point is that the whole story should be told - not just select parts of it. Are you really arguing that should not be the case? I am in no way attempting to belittle the gravity of what occurred before the 1963 Birmingham march - those events were heinous. You may even believe that Birmingham deserved what it got when the scenes went national even though the government that was producing them no longer existed. But there were people in the Birmingham business community that also believed that things had to change. The march happened amidst unprecedented changes supported by that community - both white and black. Changes that had essentially stripped the bigot of power. The day Connor lost the election for mayor of the new government... that very day the marches started. It's historical fact that the Kennedy administration asked King to stay out of Birmingham to see the process through, and I provided a statement above (admittedly hearsay) where David Vann - a clerk on the US Supreme Court when the unanimous decision in Brown v. Board of Education was handed down, later a Birmingham mayor, and after that an adviser to Richard Arrington - said that Martin Luther King Junior's own strategist specifically stated that the marches were commenced on purpose because it was their last chance to use Bull Connor (a racist icon) to create a political spectacle. How is any of that not relevant to the history of the civil rights movement in Birmingham?

All you have responded with is anger about how bad Birmingham was historically - all of the terrible things that happened. I agree, but none of that has anything to do with the only point I have been trying to make and that is the whole story deserves to be told.

What was happening was extraordinary - real non-partisan, cross racial cooperation that resulted in a coup d'etat overthrowing a racist. If that spirit of cooperation had continued, I dare say Birmingham would be closer to the city that Dr. King envisioned than the one we have today with the city center isolated from the over the mountain fiefdoms.

I'm going to go to the Civil Rights Institute today before the UAB game. If that part of the story is omitted, then someone is missing an opportunity to rebuild a bridge that once existed but has been relegated to the junk pile of history along with, I'm afraid, Birmingham's hopes for ever overcoming the stigma and vestiges of its past.

It was the Nov. 1962 election that had two results that turned out to be contradictory. The people of the city voted to change the B'ham government from the City Commission to a Mayor Council form, and it reelected all three incumbents to the City Commission. Those City Commissioners took the position that since they had been elected to 4 year terms, the new government would not take office until 1967 when their terms expired. The new Mayor - Council folks sued in court for immediate change and it was during this period of embattled uncertainty that the Commission acted to preserve its power by doing what had been standard practice in Alabama (and other southern locations) for the past century. They used their "police powers" to counter the demonstrations that threatened their continued dominance. Wagner, Sr., Haynes, Sr. and Conner did what had been accepted power plays using the police and fire departments to attack what they labeled a "Communist threat" just as George Wallace used the State Troopers at the Edmund Pettus bridge on "Bloody Sunday" outside Selma the next year and a Sheriff in MS led a KKK mob in killing 3 civil rights workers ("MS BURNING"). All these governmental bodies failed to realize that the "same ole'-same ole'" was no longer going to be tolerated as it had been for almost 100 years.

Also, Don't forget that a white minister, Rev. James Reib, was bludgeoned in Selma during his participation in those demonstrations and no area hospital would dare to admit him so that he had to be brought by private car to B'ham's University Hospital for emergency treatment, but by that time it was too late to save him. That as late as 1965 a Black man, whose legs had been severed in an auto accident on Bessemer Road in the Central Park area, was denied city ambulance service due to his race so that he died from blood loss before a "Negro ambulance" could be summoned to the scene and then get him to the "Negro ER" in the Hillman Clinic. Side note: An "ambulance" in those days was a modified station wagon equipped with an oxygen bottle and attendants who had Red Cross "First Aid" training certification. The "Paramedics" of today came later.

BTW, The Civil Rights INSTITUTE doesn't use the term MUSEUM because it considers itself a current events teaching location for its specialty subjects. That is why you don't see that "M" word officially used in any of its literature.

Birmingham named a destination city for 2013, which, of course, wakes up the CAVE people (Joey Kennedy)
http://blog.al.com/jkennedy/2013/01/birm...er_default

(01-02-2013 12:30 AM)BlazerPhil Wrote:  If you are a motorcycle / classic car buff a trip to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum is well worth the price of admission, so I'm told.

Absolutely. I'm not even a motorcycle or classic car buff but I was blown away by the museum. It's worth the drive from Huntsville to Bham just to see it.

(01-02-2013 03:47 PM)hooverblazer Wrote:  

(01-02-2013 12:30 AM)BlazerPhil Wrote:  If you are a motorcycle / classic car buff a trip to the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum is well worth the price of admission, so I'm told.

Absolutely. I'm not even a motorcycle or classic car buff but I was blown away by the museum. It's worth the drive from Huntsville to Bham just to see it.

And there is a Hampton Inn motel there to provide a base for the Barber stuff, Bass Pro Shop and Grand River Mall shopping.

Oooh a Hampton Inn!!! See Birmingham is a destination spot.

(01-02-2013 03:01 PM)WesternBlazer Wrote:  Birmingham named a destination city for 2013, which, of course, wakes up the CAVE people (Joey Kennedy)
http://blog.al.com/jkennedy/2013/01/birm...er_default

Proverbs say the wicked flee when noone pursue, and out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.
I have found that the innocent looks forward to facing their accuser, while the guilty makes excuses to delay the truth.
Making excuses for hate is what the guilty do and fleeing is for the wicked.
Birmingham, Huntsville and Mobile arent viewed like the rest of Alabama. Reasonable, worldly metro/urban People, know their is a difference.
Its like North and South Florida, the further south you go in florida the less southern it is.
I believe Birmingham has a story to tell, and the telling of it is an ongoing living story, I am not ashame to say I am from Birmingham.
However, because of so much ignorance that abounds in this state, I sometime cant always say the same about Alabama.
So when asked I prefer to say I am from Birmingham. Usually you get a reply like Oh, you are from the HAM.

Birmingham is not looked upon by the state's population, and therefore its government the same as Mobile, Huntsville, Tuscaloosa, Anniston, Gadsden, or Montgomery. Had it been so equally perceived, there would not be the host of state laws that were passed during the 20th century to hobble or eliminate its growth for that century aimed specifically at Birmingham.

One has only to look at the list of industries the state has spent millions of dollars attracting and notice that NONE of them were for Jefferson County or Birmingham. Mobile? Gladly! Montgomery? Of course! Lincoln, Vance / Tuscaloosa, Huntsville? YES! ,Birmingham? Sorry 'bout that! It is the "B" in UAB that might well be the source of the antagonism with which the system BOT treats UAB as our school tries to build its athletic programs and they do anything and everything they can to hobble it.

(01-02-2013 12:18 AM)GreenHornet33 Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 06:32 PM)dfarr Wrote:  When I think of cities I'd like to visit, Birmingham isn't in my list. To me there's just not enough worth traveling for. No pro sports teams. Not a big military history. Sure, there's the civil rights stuff, but not too sure how many people would come from afar to walk through a museum that's bankrupt. I just don't see a big tourist draw.

Does the fact that the museum has fallen under financial hardship take away from the experience that tourist have there?

It probably does since if they operated in the black they could add other items or exhibits. The fact that it loses money shows that its not a top 6 tourist attraction. If it were that bug of a draw it would be able to function without city resources.

(01-02-2013 12:31 AM)GreenHornet33 Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 11:03 PM)dfarr Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 10:08 PM)the_blazerman Wrote:  Yep I did.

& I might have misspoke on the factual side part.

In my opinion, I believe it isn't a reason by itself to be considered a top 6 destination place globally.

Now, had they said top 6 historic places to visit in 2013, I would not have found any problems with it.

Saying it is one of 6 hot places to travel is a stretch, IMO.

I agree with you and I've been to the museum. If it was such a tourist attraction then they wouldn't have to beg for more money from the city like they did last year.

Interesting museum, sure. Top 6 tourist attraction it is not.

Because most of the museum's expenses paid through private donations and most groups attend the museum free of charge. The museum is free on Sundays and also on holidays such as MLK Day, Juneteenth, and etc. Would I consider it a top 6 spot yes! My grandparents and their siblings were apart of the movement and they lived though the civil rights era over in Birmingham, my parents witnessed it, my family had a direct impact on not only my family but the majority of black families in not only in Birmingham but all over the South, so it's a major destination for a lot of people. Can it be ran better as far as generating revenue? Yes!

Actually, the city pays for 60% of the museum, and that's before they begged for more money.

http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2010/09/birm...ergen.html

Its title is The Birmingham Civil Right Insitute, heres a clue , it is not a museum, heres is the difference, a Insitution is devoted to the promotion of a public cause, hence it's to promote a public cause, in this case the histor of intolerance, its not for profit.
So the Birmingham Civil Right insitute is fulfilling its mission to advance a public cause even if it doesn't make a penny, its contribution in promoting the public cause is invaluable, oh by the way, the Birmingham Musuem of Art is a Musuem.

(01-02-2013 06:22 PM)dfarr Wrote:  

(01-02-2013 12:31 AM)GreenHornet33 Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 11:03 PM)dfarr Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 10:08 PM)the_blazerman Wrote:  Yep I did.

& I might have misspoke on the factual side part.

In my opinion, I believe it isn't a reason by itself to be considered a top 6 destination place globally.

Now, had they said top 6 historic places to visit in 2013, I would not have found any problems with it.

Saying it is one of 6 hot places to travel is a stretch, IMO.

I agree with you and I've been to the museum. If it was such a tourist attraction then they wouldn't have to beg for more money from the city like they did last year.

Interesting museum, sure. Top 6 tourist attraction it is not.

Because most of the museum's expenses paid through private donations and most groups attend the museum free of charge. The museum is free on Sundays and also on holidays such as MLK Day, Juneteenth, and etc. Would I consider it a top 6 spot yes! My grandparents and their siblings were apart of the movement and they lived though the civil rights era over in Birmingham, my parents witnessed it, my family had a direct impact on not only my family but the majority of black families in not only in Birmingham but all over the South, so it's a major destination for a lot of people. Can it be ran better as far as generating revenue? Yes!

Actually, the city pays for 60% of the museum, and that's before they begged for more money.

http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2010/09/birm...ergen.html

I doubt the city of Birmingham is begging people in Opelka to help pay for the insitution, and by the way you used the word begging, it says alot.

I was only 20 when I joined the staff of the Birmingham Post-Herald, but I was filled with arrogant, unshakable self-confidence. One of my greatest frustrations was being forced to work with a photographer named Tommy. Tommy was an older guy, and pretty addled. His photos weren't very good, and he often seemed to have no clue where he was or what he was doing. I could not stand to have him shoot for my stories, because a crappy photo meant poor placement.

And then one day the photo editor called me into his office and gave me a copy of this:



"Tommy Langston bled for this newspaper. He can shoot pictures for me until the day he dies."

When they were done, they left Tommy for dead. But he'd palmed the film before they took his camera. Bill Ingram retrieved the film, Clarke Stallworth put it in the paper before Jimmy Mills could stop him, and one photo changed this country.

I never minded working with Tommy again. He later became my friend, and that was an immense privilege.

I knew Tommy, I knew Clarke, I knew David Vann and Duard LeGrand and many other white heroes of those days. They didn't risk their lives for their own families' sake, or their own future, or most of all not for a place in a museum, but for simple justice. They all supported the Institute and that's all I need to know.

No one has said it is a top 6 tourist attraction. There was a ranking of "top 6 places to visit in 2013" and it was listed because of the anniversaries. It was a subjective list.

(01-02-2013 06:12 PM)dfarr Wrote:  

(01-02-2013 12:18 AM)GreenHornet33 Wrote:  

(01-01-2013 06:32 PM)dfarr Wrote:  When I think of cities I'd like to visit, Birmingham isn't in my list. To me there's just not enough worth traveling for. No pro sports teams. Not a big military history. Sure, there's the civil rights stuff, but not too sure how many people would come from afar to walk through a museum that's bankrupt. I just don't see a big tourist draw.

Does the fact that the museum has fallen under financial hardship take away from the experience that tourist have there?

It probably does since if they operated in the black they could add other items or exhibits. The fact that it loses money shows that its not a top 6 tourist attraction. If it were that bug of a draw it would be able to function without city resources.

Does the Statue of Liberty use public funds? Mount Rushmore?

(01-02-2013 06:56 PM)58-56 Wrote:  I was only 20 when I joined the staff of the Birmingham Post-Herald, but I was filled with arrogant, unshakable self-confidence. One of my greatest frustrations was being forced to work with a photographer named Tommy. Tommy was an older guy, and pretty addled. His photos weren't very good, and he often seemed to have no clue where he was or what he was doing. I could not stand to have him shoot for my stories, because a crappy photo meant poor placement.

And then one day the photo editor called me into his office and gave me a copy of this:



"Tommy Langston bled for this newspaper. He can shoot pictures for me until the day he dies."

When they were done, they left Tommy for dead. But he'd palmed the film before they took his camera. Bill Ingram retrieved the film, Clarke Stallworth put it in the paper before Jimmy Mills could stop him, and one photo changed this country.

I never minded working with Tommy again. He later became my friend, and that was an immense privilege.

I knew Tommy, I knew Clarke, I knew David Vann and Duard LeGrand and many other white heroes of those days. They didn't risk their lives for their own families' sake, or their own future, or most of all not for a place in a museum, but for simple justice. They all supported the Institute and that's all I need to know.

That picture reminds me of the day the "Freedom Riders" bus came into Birmingham. The "word" was that "Bull" Conner had promised the KKK and its "goons" the first 15 minutes to do whatever they wished to those riders before the police would step in at all. During that 15 minutes the police used their energies to attack any photographers they saw and destroy their cameras and film. That is why there is so little photo evidence of that day in B'ham. Many of those same persons are voting to this day in the rural and municipal metro-areas of our city and surrounding counties.

Unlike most people who live in Bham, Im happy my home town is getting some positive publicity