The Children’s March 1963,1964

Birmington, Alabama was known as the most segregated city in the US. It was also the most vicious and violent city, nicknamed ‘Bombingtom.’ The person in charge of the city, Bull Connor, didn’t follow the laws and kept the whites separate and above the blacks. A lot of the blacks were afraid, while the whites were happy, and knew how to play the system. Things weren’t working for Dr. King, so they used radios to get kids interested. The blacks could legally order food, but the whites would rip them off their stools, violently. However, since they were taught by Dr. King, they didn’t respond with violence. The next day, King invited everyone to go to jail the next day, and no one volunteered except the kids. Then the DJs had code words so that the kids knew when to start the march. The arrived at 11:00. Kids came out of windows and doors. There were 1000 kids at first, but more and more came. They walked 19 miles to go to St. Baptist church to meet, then they started. A leader said, “whos gonna get arrested today?”, and they all cheered. Everyone started coming out at noon, in waves of 50. Within an hour, they started using school buses instead of wagons to get the kids to jail. by 3:00, about a thousand black kids were in jail. Everyone said that day 2 was going to be worse, though. The next day, they brought out fire hoses and sprayed the kids with water- HARD water. When the water was over 10 kids remained. They were singing the word ‘FREEDOM’. The police threw rocks, and balls, and brought out dogs that bit. On Day 2, over 1000 were arrested. When John. F. Kennedy saw the pictures, they made him sick. However, day 3, over 4,300 were arrested. In jail, meanwhile the girls were kept in one room, and boys in another. they would take turns singing songs to each other. When the jail was full, they started putting kids in barns. The whites didn’t know what to do, the kids just kept coming. Finally, Bull Connor was removed after 7 terms. The kids were slowly removed from jail. Kennedy went on TV and said: “This is the end of segregation.” Kennedy was killed 5 months later, but his civil rights act was passed in 1964. Dr. King continued his work until his assassination 5 years later. I think its interesting that two of the men who were big parts of the kid’s march were assassinated. Later, the church where everything began was bombed. The police/fire dept. was beat by the children, because they didn’t expect the kids to do anything.

I learned that it was the kids, of everyone, that changed history for the better. Kids can do something.