The Wheels of the Birmingham Civil Rights Movement is the title of a self-published book by Donald Crawford (no relation) about his father, Worcy Crawford, an African-American owner of a bus company in Alabama during the turbulent 1960s and 1970s.
The elder Mr. Crawford died in July, 2011 "leaving a graveyard of decaying buses behind his house on the outskirts of Birmingham," according to this article in today's New York Times. The NYT article highlights the materiality of transportation in Civil Rights-era political protests.
"Knowing the width and depth of segregation this is something that was very, very necessary if black people were to move from poit A to point B in any semblance of numbers," Dr. [Horace] Huntley [of the University of Alabama at Birmingham] said.
The full NYT article is available here.
The Birmingham Civil Rights Institute holds an oral history given by the elder Mr. Crawford. AI.com has a short video here produced by Bernhard Troncale of the Birmingham News. The video shows Mr. Crawford talking about driving a bus to one particular rally in 1959 held by Martin Luther King, Jr.
Thank you for this, Bridget.
Posted by: Alfred Brophy | March 20, 2011 at 10:55 AM