A KKK Church Bombing in Birmingham | History Traveler Episode 33
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- čas přidán 13. 09. 2024
- The struggle for African-Americans during the Civil Rights era was one fraught with violence. One of the most shocking acts of violence occurred in 1963 at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama when the KKK set off a bomb that killed 4 little girls. This episode visits the location of that tragic act.
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It's now July 7, 2024... Anthony is still at the park. I went by the church at the end of June and as I walked to the front of the church from the parking lot on the side of the church, I heard a voice say "hi there!". He was standing at the end of the park. He walked on across the street and began the conversation with "you are at the 16th St Baptist Church...". He started there (I recorded) and eventually took me through the different stations there at the park. He's a Veteran and is very knowledgeable about the church, the area, and his city! Stop by and say hi to him. He's very friendly although he uses a walker now, he's still in good spirits!!!
Thanks for the video!!!
Wow!
What an awesome video!
Thank you.
Sad. How great you ran into this gentleman. Kudos to him for not being camera shy and able to help with your tour. RIP girls.
That man was cool as heck. I really enjoyed my time with him. He really takes a lot of pride in showing people around and keeping the place clean. Thanks for watching!
Tammy Crawforc - I didn’t have my checkbook on me so I gave him cash. His time & knowledge were valuable to me. But to assume that I wouldn’t compensate him for his time because I’m white seems....I don’t know. I can’t find the word. It starts with an R.
Love this man’s voice!❤️❤️❤️
You ain't resting in peace, they are resting in PIECES after the DEMOCRATS Blew them up to SMITHEREENS 😊
@@chrismorgan7902Just like those things in Ruby Ridge 😊😊
Very good documentary on such a horrific event.
I will NEVER understand this level of hatred, nor do I want to. 😥
That's yt ppl culture
Just so sad 😞 God Bless these little Angels 😇 ❤
Im so annoyed that I'm just now finding this channel. Binge all your videos. Very well done sir.
Heartbreaking.
The 4 spirits sculpture is beautiful. It was very thoughtful of the designer to include Addie Mae Collins sister Sarah in the inscription. Most folks forget about Sarah simply because she survived but she was right there with her sister and their 3 friends, getting ready to go upstairs for church service.
Sad.
Thank you, I learned a lot
Awesome! Thanks!
Man, Anthony needs to use his voice on stuff. I could listen to him talk all day.
I was just here on my way to Florida and saw all this on a civil rights tour. It was the most thought provoking tour I ever have been on. Your segment brought me right back here. This is such a must see for everyone. Thank you
I wasn't even born yet when this happened!
Me neither.
@@TheHistoryUnderground Yes but it happened 3 years before I was born, you? LOL! Because I am OLD!
This bombing happened on my dad's 15th birthday and 5 days after my grandfather died.
Isn't it crazy that people are passing laws that make it illegal to even say "kkk" in schools? Thus stories/history like the incident in this video can't truly be discussed. Thanks for the video.
Great episode. So neat that you ran into someone that was there then and remembers. Have to remember the people and events, that's very important.
Thanks. That dude was awesome. I wish that I would have recorded everything that he showed me. And he kept that park immaculately clean too. Thanks for watching!
My grandmother grow up in 16th street baptist church and is was because of this bombing my great grandfather and great grandmother made the decision to move their family to the Midwest. My grandmother moved to Detroit when she was 10 years old.
Oh wow. I’ll bet they had some stories.
I read a book about this church bombing. It was very sad what happened to those girls
Sadly, Americans have still not learned what hate and ignorance can do.
Thomas Blanton Jr., the last living perpetrator of the bombing, finally died in prison today (6/26/20). Good riddance to him and I hope he rots in hell!
Interesting. Hadn’t heard that.
No lie I started tearing up with this video, it is terrible how we humans can be cruel to one another. Thank you for showing the compassion in telling of their story.
Especially the White man👴Who loves playing GOD..and grew up thinking he's superior to ALL😒😈😈
Ain’t no we humans. Say white folks. Own your heritage.
Still catching up. You do such a great job! Thank you!
Brian Vawter 🙏🏼
60 years gone next Friday, 9/15/2023.
RIP to the girls: may we know peace in our lifetime .
I knew the son of one of the 16th Street Baptist Church Bombers. He was so disgusted with his father's Klan affiliation and subsequent behavior that when his Dad bragged about killing those girls the 14 yo son hitchhiked to his older sister's house in CA and was busking in the street with his guitar to feed himself. By the 70's he ended up in Austin where he played in the bands of both Blaze Foley and Townes Van Zant. I played with him until his death 3 years ago. He didn't talk about it much but when he did it was astounding to me that he survived it at all.
Oh my gosh. I don’t even know what to say. Thanks for sharing that.
Thank you for educating people about this
Glad to do it. Thanks for watching. Feel free to share it out so that others can learn about this place as well :)
To commit such an act of terror a person must have a great deal of hate in them. Thanks for all your excellent vids. We need to learn such important history. Looking forward to more from you.
Thanks for the kind words. I agree with everything that you said. It’s a terrible chapter in our history which makes it necessary to learn.
Thanks for sharing and educating. This is something that should never be forgotten!
An educational and touching story. We learn something new from every one of your videos. Thank you for that.
Perry J. - Thanks. I’ve learned a lot from making and posting them.
I saw Spike Lee’s documentary and I must admit I had nightmares. I wanted to know more about this event so I’ve been watching as many videos as possible. Thank you for sharing. Rip Birmingham 4 🙏🏽
🙏🏼
Awesome video
Glad you enjoyed it
imagine the children of Wales donating their pennies. I am proud that my mother in Canada gave some money to the church.
How do you live with yourself after finding out you’ve taken the lives of four young innocent girls? A church is suppose to be a safe haven, to this day safe havens like that in America are being disrupted by violence. I’ve prayed myself many times that these acts of violence will stop, but I lose my fate in prayer unfortunately when the next day I find out another heart of evil has carried out another attack on innocent people who by any means didn’t deserve to have there life taken like that.
One important thing we can do to try to end these violent attacks is teach the history, educate each other so maybe history won’t repeat itself anymore and love will win.
I wanna go there now, so much history. Shout out to Birmingham Alabama from Baltimore ❤🙏🏽
Shout out to Birmingham ?
Love, love, love this channel and your videos. This video and the Malmedy Massacre are by far the 2 most fascinating. I'm still making my way thru all your videos. Keep em coming.
Zachary Lazard -Thanks! So glad that you are enjoying them🙂
The amount of cruelty and suffering all those cowards inflicted upon all those innocent people during that time is absolutely disgusting and sickening and a disgrace to humanity absolutely no one deserves to be ostracized,singled out,and punished because of their race.. racism is such a disgusting disease it’s so heartbreaking to know that so many innocent people had so much suffering and cruelty wrongly inflicted on them for nothing !! Can we please stop hating on one another and put an end to racism because there isn’t a separate line to wait in to get into heaven and there isn’t a separate section within heaven
Stopped by the Church today to pay my respects for such a sacrifice.... my heart was heavy. We will never forget!
🙏🏼
The guy name is I think is Walter Gasden who was being held while the dog appeared to be biting him. What really happened is that
Gasden kneed the dog in the jaw fracturing the dog’s jaw. Gasden was not part of the March but was a passerbyer.
It's shames me to say that my great grandpa was a KKK higher up. 3 generations later I have taught my children that there is so much hate in the world with race, gender and orientation that we don't need to be a part of that hate.
It is beautiful that you were able to rise above the hatred that your grandfather promoted and teach your children better!!
This was so hard to watch!
Very much so. Awful how hateful people can be.
Indeed
THE KLAN DON'T PLAY!!!!
Thanks for sharing this heartfelt video.
My pleasure. Hope that people are able to get something from it.
I've been to America many times and yours is a young country by comparison to mine, the UK, but I have always been struck by how much history is being recorded and displayed and like your CZcams channel it will be invaluable in years to come. We have vast amounts of history in the UK, we're trippong over it to be honest, but through no fault of our own we have also lost so much to the raviges of time, but doing what you're doing now is history for the future.
PS Loved the episodes on the Normandy beaches
I love American history and I am an Aussie, but then I also love our military history.
Margaret Sands - I need to try and get down to your part of the world one of these days to visit and film some content. Thanks for watching!
@@TheHistoryUnderground If you google The Bombing of Darwin, it will tell you all about Darwin's military history. If you also watch the movie "Australia", it is loosely based on the bombing. I f you require anymore information, please feel free to ask.
@@terrelljohnson4411 Thank you for your thoughts. Yes, I do believe in climate change.
I absolutely love when you are able to hear from witnesses and those who “lived the history”.
A friend and I are planning a trip to Alabama in a little over a month. We are going to be visiting the 16th Street Baptist Church, the Freedom Riders monument, and the Selma to Montgomery trail, among others.
Quite the place.
Watching from Canada. What a great video!
Awesome! Thank you!
Deep into the minds of minalta
I really enjoyed this episode! Once again it impressed upon me the inhumanity with which we treat people! Great job!
Glad you enjoyed it!
Really tragic event, thank you for shining a light on this. The story of how the doves symbolize the six souls ascending heaven made me tear up.
If you are still in the Central Alabama area I am located about an hour outside of Birmingham and I'd love to show you some more local history. I can also bring my drone along and shoot some aerial footage if that'll help your program. Either way, I love what you're doing and always look forward to the next video
Tech Minded - Aw crud. Unfortunately, I’ve already passed through. I may reach out the next time I’m down there though. Lots of interesting history in that part of the country. Thanks for the kind words.
@@TheHistoryUnderground please do, I'll be glad to help out. I'm a pretty big American history nerd so I've enjoyed binging your videos. I'm sure wherever you're headed we'll make for some great content
Thank you for sharing it, I didn’t even know about that horrible episode !!!
Hard to believe how evil can be the human being !
That man should be a tour guide and speaker, passion and knowledge is a mighty powerful combination.
I grew up during this era. Was in Memphis when Martin Luther King was shot. We were all asked to stay inside. The military were marching down the street. A very sad time. He represented peace through Jesus.
That gentleman well educated in his cities history. Kudos to him.
👍🏻
Please don’t refer to blacks as African Americans the majority of us are offended by it.
I’m not offended by it. We are African-Americans as far as I’m concerned.
Love the black man telling the story ❤💪🏾
This video made me wanna cry so bsf i was tearing up😢😢😢😢
Another excellent vlog....Thanks...
Thanks!
This guy needs to keep these videos coming forever.
Favorite channel! Great video!
Thanks! 🙏🏼
Sad how skin can lead to so much hate ! And till this day African Americans will never be the same constant fear constant anxiety not feeling good enough so much damaged was done that now we hurt and hate each other i wish someone who was pro racism can explain why was Black so bad ? Sweet little baby girls how can skin be enough for that they say Blacks are aggressive but how can we not be !! Of course whites are more chill they didn't experience decades of torture its just skin rest up beautiful girls
Well done. I didn't know about the two young boys. Had never heard about them.
An amazing video.
Can you talk about what is now in the basement that they prohibited you from filming?
(Great job as always by the way!)
it is a museum as well as the place where 4 young girls died
There’s a nice little museum down there that goes through the Civil Rights movement in Birmingham. You also see where the bomb went off from the inside and a clock that stopped at the moment that it detonated.
I really wanted to film a few things down there but my understanding was that a tour bus company filmed down there awhile back and then was using the footage to promote their business. After that, they just banned all filming down there. It’s worth stopping there and seeing everything though.
@@TheHistoryUnderground thanks for your job for all yours videos . i m french and it s a fantastic job. come in verdun and ww1 " tranchee des baionettes"
@@aurelienfora3382 - Desperately want to see Verdun. Thank you!
@@TheHistoryUnderground my home is in normandy we say the american sacrifice
Once again another fine job. What's really great about your videos is that not only are you taking me on location and giving me information, that your typical fact collector would be interested in, but what's most important is the human side of it. Real people were affected by this event. There is one thing to bear in mind ... this is history, yes, but it's also about what real people went through a short time ago.... there are many people still alive who have this still within their living memory. We must always treat these events with respect. You do a great job with that. Without any doubt the greatest respect any of us can show, which is what you do with every video, is to find out more about it and understand that this happened to people just like you and I. Thanks again JD. See you later!
Alexander Patrick - Thanks. The human side of history is always what fascinates me the most. Especially when it involves some sort of struggle to overcome.
Well done.
Thanks! I really appreciate you watching. Got a follow up next week that you might like as well.
Saw the church,civil rights museum and park so moving
The church bombing happened on my dad's 15th birthday and 5 days after my grandfather passed away from cancer. RIP to them all 🙏
Why all this evil i dont get it😢 the world would be a much better place if people just loved one another❤ love your videos m8 started to Watch them all again ❤️ the world just keeps making the same mistakes again and again, what a Nice and friendly man in the video ❤️
Love the vids man !!! Jesus loves you ! ❤️🙏🏻
Appreciate that! Thank you.
interesting vlog ... tyvm
Thanks! Appreciate that. Got a follow up next week that you might find interesting as well.
Great video. I love watching your videos. I’m a history fan myself. My real name is Tom Nixon. I found out 10 years ago when my dad died that we were related to Reverend E.D. Nixon. Now you may not have heard of him, but you know if his work. He was actually the organizer of the Montgomery bus boycott. He groomed Rosa Parks to do what she did, she was actually the 4th choice to do this. The legend is Rosa was tired from a long days work and refused to give up her seat, but it was all planned. Rosa parks was actually the secretary for my distant relative. It’s a very interesting story, maybe one day you’ll cover it on your channel. I don’t have much contact with my dads dude if the family because he was the only Nixon born to my grandma before she got married to another person. And both my dad and grandma have passed away. So I’m still researching when I can to find out more info. Just thought you may find that story interesting. Have a good day brother.
Recovering Fatboy56 - Holy smokes! What a cool story. I’ll confess that I’m unfamiliar with E.D. Nixon but won’t be for long. Thanks for sharing that and thanks for watching. Always learning something.
Awesome to walk in the steps of history and to meet a man who has such an in depth love of the history is amazing. You can't get that from a book, you have to be there with someone who knows it intimately. Thank you for posting this video.
It was really fortunate that I got to meet him. You never know who you might run into.
A truly moving story, it's tragic that we haven't come much further, especially when you see the dogs ordered to attack the peaceful protestors.
Beautiful and so very sad! What a wonderful man to help us understand this history, thank you!
Ballad of Birmingham...heard it as a child in the 60's...heartbreaking
I've never heard it, but I will try to look it up
I cry all over for the four little girls. It's like I know them, or saw them somewhere. I am so dissatisfied with life when it comes to them. Great video. Please keep up the good work.
What a treasure you meet your new friend..amazing!!
Yeah, that ended up being my favorite part of the visit.
Born and raised in East Lake as a poor white boy. Shout out to Robinson Elementary 1990
A view from the UK. For those that do not know the word "Fodder" is a generic word used by livestock farmers here in the UK to describe the feed - either hay, silage or straw - given to their herds.
Outstanding, I was stationed at Ft McClellan in 1993
May their souls rest in peace May the guys that killed him go to hell
The world needs more Anthonys!
Agreed.
Great lesson. You mentioned the 2 boys who were shot but didn't mention the details. Who shot them and why? Thanks again for a great lesson.
I actually didn't know enough about those two boys at the time that I filmed this to say anything, but learned a bit since.
Johnny Robinson was killed from a shotgun blast by a police officer. The story on what exactly happened is a bit hazy. Virgil Ware was killed by two 16 year old boys named Michael Farley and Larry Sims who said that Ware and his brother had thrown rocks at them . Sims is the one who actually fired the shot. They were both given a suspended sentence of 7 months and released on probation.
I went there back in 2014 when I was in AmeriCorp NCCC. I didn't go into the church because it was closed but did go through the park and the civil rights institute. I was impressed about the institute and the memorial of the girls. It is sad what horrible people can do
I'm a old white guy from NY i don't even want to travel down south for these reasons and whats come upon us now so sad
If you pardon the slight pun here, you’d think a church would be Sacred enough when people claiming themselves to be christian(which they aren’t) to be bombed.
Makes the whole thing even more disgusting.
@Sue Taft Exactly. Sadly, people today don't really understand that the sins of the father do not make the son guilty. People are only responsible for their own actions, not the actions of another.
@Poetic Bliss That’s not the entire story actually. The reason why they took him there is not because he was white they took them there because the facilities the police department had were not equipped to hold someone long-term. While the shooter himself was a racist psychopath come out the police taking him to Burger King to get food when they didn’t have facilities for food in their jail cells is not evidence of racism.
I sure hope you keep doing this cause our younger generation needs to know and changes to happen stop repeating over and over and over again by dumb people who don't know any better cause I don't see any changes I see us going backwards they don't want our younger generation to get educated nor do they want to have job's or gun's are getting worse hunger is to God Bless everyone
The younger generation is exactly why I created this channel. Hope that people are sharing the content. Thanks for watching!
Well done video I'm still in Alabama been here for 55 yr if you come back I know some history of Alabama you might be interested in
Wish there was a "LOVE" icon to press instead of just a "LIKE".
👊🏻
Me and my family went to visit the church today and Anthony gave us a detailed explanation of the history in Birmingham
That is awesome! Super knowledgeable guy. Glad that you could meet him.
How people can hurt the innocent is beyond me. May those little girls rest in the Lord's grace for all of eternity and may those that were responsible forever be in hell.
Sad story for sure.
At 8:18, there is an audio tour number on the board with the picture of the police dog. Its not the same as actually being there but it is interesting to call it and listen.
...and the choir kept singing of freedom
Please tell me you got his info so he can show us around lol
I didn't mention this in the video, but he was homeless and lived right there around the park. Somebody needs to hire him though.
Whoa, the stories Mr. Anthony could tell. You can read history but to hear a first hand account adds a whole different element.
I met this great man when I visited family in Alabama and gave me a great tour.
I love to see white people educate themselves on slavery so they can pass it down to their kids 💯❤️👏
I love to see people of any color educate themselves. That's how we all grow. Thanks for watching.
Agree, I was born on September 15 and wanted to know what happened then . I had no idea about the tragedies in the US. Thanks for sharing tragic history.
Another great episode that almost brought me to tears. I can't imagine someone planting a bomb to purposely hurt children. Scripture is very clear that "children are a heritage from the Lord," - Psalm 127:3. Another great but difficult episode!
@Fuert Neigt Your answer is pathetic. "None of the southerners were racist." What a freaking joke of a quote? That answer alone makes me question your education level. By the way, there is no such thing as the "Confederate flag." There were several Confederate flags that were used. I take it you are referring to the Confederate Battle Flag. Even if the South was not fighting for the right to maintain slavery, it is pretty clear that the Confederates would not have freed them if they had won the Civil War.
You and the gentleman that you interviewed about the 1963 Birmingham Bombing are both the "real McCoy" I had to do some background internet surfing to fully appreciate your video as being a native of California, only know a little about the bombings. I do know about both the Rodney King Riots of 92 and the Watts Riots of 65, but the evil that you portrayed about here surpasses both of those. I was involved with protecting a business in 92. Good video and thanks for making me learn something more then I knew yesterday!
Thanks! Appreciate that. I learned quite a bit while putting this one together as well.