The Civil Rights Memorial is an American

memorial A memorial is an object or place which serves as a focus for the memory or the commemoration of something, usually an influential, deceased person or a historical, tragic event. Popular forms of memorials include landmark objects or works of ...

Montgomery, Alabama Montgomery is the capital city of the U.S. state of Alabama and the county seat of Montgomery County, Alabama, Montgomery County. Named for the Irish soldier Richard Montgomery, it stands beside the Alabama River, on the Gulf Coastal Plain, coas ...

, created by

Maya Lin Maya Ying Lin (born October 5, 1959) is an American designer and sculptor. In 1981, while an undergraduate at Yale University, she achieved national recognition when she won a national design competition for the planned Vietnam Veterans Memoria ...

. The names of 41 people are inscribed on the granite fountain as martyrs who were killed in the

civil rights movement The civil rights movement was a nonviolent social and political movement and campaign from 1954 to 1968 in the United States to abolish legalized institutional racial segregation, discrimination, and disenfranchisement throughout the Unite ...

. The memorial is sponsored by the

Southern Poverty Law Center The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal advocacy organization specializing in civil rights and public interest litigation. Based in Montgomery, Alabama, it is known for its legal cases against white ...

Design

The names included in the memorial belong to those who were killed between 1955 and 1968. Those dates were chosen because in 1956 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that

racial segregation Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into racial or other ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crime against humanity under the Statute of the Intern ...

in schools was unlawful and 1968 is the year of the

assassination Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have ...

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister and activist, one of the most prominent leaders in the civil rights movement from 1955 until his assassination in 1968 ...

The monument was created by

, who is best known for creating the

Vietnam Veterans Memorial The Vietnam Veterans Memorial is a U.S. national memorial in Washington, D.C., honoring service members of the U.S. armed forces who served in the Vietnam War. The site is dominated by two black granite walls engraved with the names of those ...

in Washington, D.C. The Civil Rights Memorial was dedicated in 1989. The concept of Lin's design is based on the soothing and healing effect of water. It was inspired by a passage from King's "

I Have a Dream "I Have a Dream" is a public speech that was delivered by American civil rights activist and Baptist minister, Martin Luther King Jr., during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom on August 28, 1963. In the speech, King called ...

" speech "...we will not be satisfied "until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream..." The quotation in the passage, which is inscribed on the memorial, is a direct paraphrase of Amos 5:24, as translated in the

American Standard Version The American Standard Version (ASV), officially Revised Version, Standard American Edition, is a Bible translation into English that was completed in 1901 with the publication of the revision of the Old Testament. The revised New Testament had ...

of the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus ...

. The memorial is a

fountain A fountain, from the Latin "fons" (genitive "fontis"), meaning source or spring, is a decorative reservoir used for discharging water. It is also a structure that jets water into the air for a decorative or dramatic effect. Fountains were ori ...

in the form of an asymmetric inverted stone

cone A cone is a three-dimensional geometric shape that tapers smoothly from a flat base (frequently, though not necessarily, circular) to a point called the apex or vertex. A cone is formed by a set of line segments, half-lines, or lines con ...

. A film of water flows over the base of the cone, which contains the 41 names included. It is possible to touch the smooth film of water and to alter it temporarily, which quickly returns to smoothness. As such, the memorial represents the aspirations of the civil rights movement to end legal

Tours and location

The memorial is in downtown Montgomery, at 400 Washington Avenue, in an open plaza in front of the Civil Rights Memorial Center, which was the offices of the Southern Poverty Law Center until it moved across the street into a new building in 2001. The memorial may be visited freely 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The Civil Rights Memorial Center offers guided group tours, lasting approximately one hour. Tours are available by appointment, Monday to Saturday. The memorial is only a few blocks from other historic sites, including the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church, the

Alabama State Capitol The Alabama State Capitol, listed on the National Register of Historic Places as the First Confederate Capitol, is the state capitol building for Alabama. Located on Capitol Hill, originally Goat Hill, in Montgomery, it was declared a National H ...

, the

Alabama Department of Archives and History The Alabama Department of Archives and History is the official repository of archival records for the U.S. state of Alabama. Under the direction of Thomas M. Owen its founder, the agency received state funding by an act of the Alabama Legisla ...

, the corners where Claudette Colvin and

Rosa Parks Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American activist in the civil rights movement best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. The United States Congress has honored her as "th ...

boarded buses in 1955 on which they would later refuse to give up their seats, and the

Rosa Parks Library and Museum Rosa or De Rosa may refer to: People *Rosa (given name) * Rosa (surname) * Santa Rosa (female given name from Latin-a latinized variant of Rose) Places * 223 Rosa, an asteroid * Rosa, Alabama, a town, United States * Rosa, Germany, in Thuringia ...

Names included

"Civil Rights Martyrs"

The 41 names included in the Civil Rights Memorial are those of: *

Louis Allen Louis Allen (April 25, 1919 – January 31, 1964) was an African-American businessman in Liberty, Mississippi, who was shot and killed on his land during the civil rights era. He had previously tried to register to vote and had allegedly talked ...

* Willie Brewster * Benjamin Brown * Johnnie Mae Chappell *

James Chaney James Earl Chaney (May 30, 1943 – June 21, 1964) was one of three Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) civil rights workers killed in Philadelphia, Mississippi, by members of the Ku Klux Klan on June 21, 1964. The others were Andrew Goodman an ...

* Addie Mae Collins *

Vernon Dahmer Vernon Ferdinand Dahmer Sr. (March 10, 1908 – January 10, 1966) was an American civil rights movement leader and president of the Forrest County chapter of the NAACP in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. He was murdered by the White Knights of ...

Jonathan Daniels Jonathan Myrick Daniels (March 20, 1939 – August 20, 1965) was an Episcopal seminarian and civil rights activist. In 1965, he was killed by a special county deputy, Tom Coleman, who was a construction worker, in Hayneville, Alabama, while i ...

Henry Hezekiah Dee ''Mississippi Cold Case'' is a 2007 feature documentary produced by David Ridgen of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation about the Ku Klux Klan murders of two 19-year-old black men, Henry Hezekiah Dee and Charles Eddie Moore, in Southwest Missi ...

* Roman Ducksworth Jr. *

Willie Edwards Willie Edwards Jr. (November 13, 1932 – January 23, 1957) was a 24-year-old African American, husband and father, who was murdered by members of the Alabama Ku Klux Klan. He is buried at New Pleasant Valley Cemetery in Letohatchee, Alabama. ...

Medgar Evers Medgar Wiley Evers (; July 2, 1925June 12, 1963) was an American civil rights activist and the NAACP's first field secretary in Mississippi, who was murdered by Byron De La Beckwith. Evers, a decorated U.S. Army combat veteran who had served i ...

* Andrew Goodman * Paul Guihard * Samuel Hammond Jr. *

Jimmie Lee Jackson Jimmie Lee Jackson (December 16, 1938 – February 26, 1965) was an African American civil rights activist in Marion, Alabama, and a deacon in the Baptist church. On February 18, 1965, while unarmed and participating in a peaceful voting righ ...

* Wharlest Jackson *

Bruce W. Klunder Reverend Bruce W. Klunder (July 12, 1937 – April 7, 1964) was a Presbyterian minister and civil rights activist, born in Colorado, United States. He died when he was run over by a bulldozer while protesting the construction of a segre ...

* George W. Lee * Herbert Lee * Viola Liuzzo *

Denise McNair The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was a white supremacist terrorist bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on Sunday, September 15, 1963. Four members of a local Ku Klux Klan chapter planted 19 sticks of dynam ...

* Delano Herman Middleton *

Charles Eddie Moore ''Mississippi Cold Case'' is a 2007 feature documentary produced by David Ridgen of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation about the Ku Klux Klan murders of two 19-year-old black men, Henry Hezekiah Dee and Charles Eddie Moore, in Southwest Mississ ...

* Oneal Moore * William Lewis Moore *

Mack Charles Parker Mack Charles Parker (1936 – April 24, 1959) was an African-American victim of lynching in the United States. He had been accused of raping a pregnant white woman in northern Pearl River County, Mississippi. Three days before he was to stand tria ...

* Lemuel Penn *

James Reeb James Joseph Reeb (January 1, 1927 – March 11, 1965) was an American Unitarian Universalist minister, pastor, and activist during the civil rights movement in Washington, D.C. and Boston, Massachusetts. While participating in the Selma to ...

* John Earl Reese *

Carole Robertson The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was a white supremacist terrorist bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on Sunday, September 15, 1963. Four members of a local Ku Klux Klan chapter planted 19 sticks of dynami ...

Michael Schwerner Michael Henry Schwerner (November 6, 1939 – June 21, 1964), was one of three Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) field workers killed in rural Neshoba County, Mississippi, by members of the Ku Klux Klan. Schwerner and two co-workers, James C ...

* Henry Ezekial Smith *

Lamar Smith Lamar Seeligson Smith (born November 19, 1947) is an American politician and lobbyist who served in the United States House of Representatives for for 16 terms, a district including most of the wealthier sections of San Antonio and Austin, as ...

Emmett Till Emmett Louis Till (July 25, 1941August 28, 1955) was a 14-year-old African Americans, African American boy who was abducted, tortured, and Lynching in the United States, lynched in Mississippi in 1955, after being accused of offending a whi ...

Clarence Triggs Clarence Triggs (1943 – July 30, 1966) was a married African-American bricklayer and veteran, who was murdered on July 30, 1966 in Bogalusa, Louisiana, about a month after participating in a civil rights march for voting. Two white men were arre ...

Virgil Lamar Ware Virgil Lamar Ware (December 6, 1949 – September 15, 1963) was an African American eighth-grader shot to death after the Birmingham church bombing. Personal life Growing up in Pratt City, Alabama, Ware was the third of six brothers. He was ...

Cynthia Wesley The 16th Street Baptist Church bombing was a white supremacist Terrorism in the United States, terrorist bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, on Sunday, September 15, 1963. Four members of a local Ku Klux Klan cha ...

Ben Chester White Ben Chester White (January 5, 1899 – June 10, 1966) was an African-American caretaker, uninvolved in the civil rights movement, shot down by the KKK. This was likely in an attempt to move focus away from James Meredith’s March Against Fea ...

Sammy Younge Jr. Samuel Leamon Younge Jr. (November 17, 1944 – January 3, 1966) was a civil rights and voting rights activist who was murdered for trying to desegregate a "whites only" restroom. Younge was an enlisted service member in the United States Nav ...

"The Forgotten"

"The Forgotten" are 74 people who are identified in a display at the Civil Rights Memorial Center. These names were not inscribed on the Memorial because there was insufficient information about their deaths at the time the Memorial was created. However, it is thought that these people were killed as a result of racially motivated violence between 1952 and 1968. * Andrew Lee Anderson * Frank Andrews * Isadore Banks * Larry Bolden * James Brazier * Thomas Brewer * Hilliard Brooks * Charles Brown * Jessie Brown * Carrie Brumfield * Eli Brumfield * Silas (Ernest) Caston * Clarence Cloninger * Willie Countryman * Vincent Dahmon * Woodrow Wilson Daniels * Joseph Hill Dumas * Pheld Evans * J. E. Evanston * Mattie Greene * Jasper Greenwood * Jimmie Lee Griffith * A. C. Hall * Rogers Hamilton * Collie Hampton * Alphonso Harris * Izell Henry * Arthur James Hill * Ernest Hunter * Luther Jackson * Ernest Jells * Joe Franklin Jeter * Marshall Johnson * John Lee * Willie Henry Lee * Richard Lillard * George Love * Robert McNair * Maybelle Mahone * Sylvester Maxwell * Clinton Melton * James Andrew Miller * Booker T. Mixon * Nehemiah Montgomery * Frank Morris * James Earl Motley * Sam O'Quinn * Hubert Orsby * Larry Payne * C. H. Pickett * Albert Pitts * David Pitts * Ernest McPharland * Jimmy Powell * William Roy Prather * Johnny Queen * Donald Rasberry * Fred Robinson * Johnny Robinson * Willie Joe Sanford * Marshall Scott Jr. * Jessie James Shelby * W. G. Singleton * Ed Smith * Eddie James Stewart * Isaiah Taylor * Freddie Lee Thomas * Saleam Triggs * Hubert Varner * Clifton Walker * James Waymers * John Wesley Wilder * Rodell Williamson * Archie Wooden

References

External links

Official Site

Civil Rights Martyrs
{{Authority control 1989 establishments in Alabama 1989 sculptures Buildings and structures in Montgomery, Alabama Fountains in Alabama History of civil rights in the United States History of Montgomery, Alabama Monuments and memorials in Alabama Monuments and memorials of the civil rights movement Southern Poverty Law Center Tourist attractions in Montgomery, Alabama