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Featured articleBirmingham campaign is a featured article; it (or a previous version of it) has been identified as one of the best articles produced by the Wikipedia community. Even so, if you can update or improve it, please do so.
Main Page trophyThis article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on April 10, 2013.
Article milestones
DateProcessResult
December 26, 2007Peer reviewReviewed
February 11, 2008Featured article candidatePromoted
On this day...Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on May 3, 2011, May 3, 2013, May 3, 2015, May 3, 2021, and May 3, 2023.
Current status: Featured article

Images for article

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Discussion about adding images for this article here, I hope. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Moni3 (talk • contribs) 15:13, 1 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Old discussion now archived here. New discussion is here. I've said there that discussion is best conducted here. We can go back there if needed later. Carcharoth (talk) 10:05, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
  • First up, the current image Image:Gaston motel 1963.jpg (should be cropped, really) has a tag saying "it is a work of the United States Federal Government". It is true that it is from an archive maintained by the US governemnt, but that is not the same thing as saying it is a work of the US government. The description page says "CREATOR: Trikosko, Marion S., photographer." and that this is part of the "U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection." (see U.S. News & World Report). It seems to me that this is a collection of news journalism, with one of the photographers being Marion S. Trikosko. The description page also says "RIGHTS INFORMATION: No known restrictions on publication." So we are probably OK there. The tag should be changed though. I'll have a look at that. Carcharoth (talk) 10:05, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
What we need is Commons:Template:PD-USNWR. I'll update the image and tags now. Carcharoth (talk) 12:40, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
It needed cropping, so I did that and uploaded the cropped image to Commons. Now replacing in this article. Carcharoth (talk) 12:52, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Now for your other examples:

You've linked to the temporary files, and the links no longer work (they may have only ever worked for you). You need to quote the Digital ID number and we can go from there. I've linked to what I think are the pictures. Can you confirm if these are the right pictures, please? Carcharoth (talk) 10:25, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

To summarise from the other page, the pictures are all B&W historic images from 1963, showing things related to, or part of, the struggle and campaigns for civil rights in Birmingham, Alabama, USA. The proximate source is the Library of Congress, which holds archives of such images. The original sources fall into three categories:

The last one is easy. It is indeed work by the US government (in this case the National Park Service). Our article says: "The permanent collection of HABS/HAER/HALS is housed at the Library of Congress. As a branch of the U.S. Federal Government, its created works are in the public domain." - so I'll upload that one now for Moni3's article. The others, I'll let others comment on. I think I've unearthed enough information for something definitive to be said. Carcharoth (talk) 11:50, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Carcharoth, thank you very much for helping me out on this. I have an excursion to attend today, but when I get back this evening, I will devote all my attention to the issue of the photos. There are quite famous photos associated with this event not on that list. I just don't know how to get them here. Thanks again.--Moni3 (talk) 12:39, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]


The links - sorry for posting the temp links, but the links you provided here are correct. I was actually thinking the 5th photo for the 16th Street Baptist Church.
I have to admit that I am really out to sea when it comes to the terms used for photo copyrights. I don't know which or how many photos to use, or what tags to use on the photos I can use. Does fair use mean I can use them? Must I contact the photography agency to get permission? I already contacted AP Images for some other photos, but they told me I would have to pay $500 for 5 years, and that's not possible. Can they be tagged as historic images that can't be replaced? --Moni3 (talk) 23:53, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
The short answer is that because Wikipedia tries to be as free as possible, it is not a case of getting permissions. The photos have to be completely released, and most newspaper photographers will not do that, so you have to wait for them to fall into the public domain, which takes a long time. There are exceptions, like those news agency photos that were donated to the Library of Congress (such as the Gaston motel explosion one). But most Library of Congress newspaper pictures aren't like that. The only way you will be able to use the photos above (apart from the HABS one, which is free) is under fair use. Yes, {{non-free historic image}} is the right tag to use, but it's not a case of finding lots of pictures and putting that tag on them. They have to be truly irreplaceable and essential to the article. The best way to decide that is to pick the most important one for the article, the most iconic, the most powerful imagery, the one that there is no free equivalent for. In other words, the ones that you can justify the most. What helps in cases like this is to find as many free images as you can find (I've found two more in the LOC archives), and to then see whether the article still needs any more photos. You should, in any case, link to the photos with descriptions, even if you can't use the actual photos themselves. Carcharoth (talk) 00:40, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
In this case, some of the most recognizable photos of the event are indeed iconic. Doing a very quick Google Images search, I've found four of the most famous. Of them, the one that has had the biggest impact in my memory is the second one. Numbers 1, 3 and 4 ran on the front page of The New York Times and The Washington Post. The second one ran in LIFE magazine and may have been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, but I need to confirm that with a source. Because the photos and video of the event actually became part of the event (national reaction to the marches), does that impact how they may potentially be used?
Oh, if they became iconic, then yes. But bear in mind that iconic and historic really, really, means iconic and historic. Think the Che Guevera picture, Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima, the Apollo pictures of the Earth from the Moon (which are free anyway). Having said that, these pictures are 44 years in the past, so we can make a stab at assessing iconicity and historicness, if you know what I mean. I'd advise you to pick one, two at most, and use those. And only use ones for which there are no free equivalents. There is an iconic picture of Chamberlain waving his piece of paper, but because there is a different, free picture, showing a similar moment, the preference is to show the free one. So if you have a free picture of the water hoses being used, that would be preferable to (say) a Pulitzer Prize-winning one. You should definitely still say in the article that the pictures generated huge media interest worldwide, and a Pulitzer Prize finallist, and still link to all of them. But the ones that actually get used should (as far as possible) be the free ones. Does that make sense? A comparison might help. If this was a book publishing firm with a large budget to spend on photos, you would have no restrictions on the choice or number of photos. But this is not a wealthy publishing company - this is Wikipedia. So we have to do things slightly differently here. Still, I think the house bombing and the memorial march photos do help in the articles I've used them in. I've also downloaded the very hi-res memorial march photo, and am cropping out a free version of the church bombing aftermath. Carcharoth (talk) 01:43, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I tried a free museum exhibition shot, but it's not having the right effect. You have to peer at the screen to see anything, and even then its not much. I think we will need to upload the iconic fire hoses and police dog images. I'll try and do that tomorrow. Carcharoth (talk) 03:23, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Reset indent. Photo No. 2 was taken by Charles Moore. "This picture of people being pummeled by a liquid battering ram rallied support for the plight of the blacks." That's from the page I linked the photo to. From my source McWhorter, about Photo 3 and Photo 4 (taken by Bill Hudson) it says in the caption for them that they: "shifted international opinion to the side of the civil rights revolution and branded the man responsible for the imagery, Public Safety Commissioner Bull Connor as the villain of the era." (photo spread p. 9)

In The Best of LIFE, pp. 38 - 39 show Photo 1 and Photo 2, both by Moore in a section described in the book as "an eloquent and graphic treasury of our times." (Time Inc, 1973) In McWhorter, Moore's and Hudson's reactions to the scene are described graphically. Moore, a former marine combat photographer was "jarred" and "sickened" by what he saw, and was hit in the ankle by a brick meant to hit the police from the crowd. Hudson said his only priorities in the melee were "making pictures and staying alive," and "not getting bit by a dog." Of Photo 4: the man getting bit by the dog is Walter Gadsden, a high school senior from Parker High School. He stepped out in front of Hudson, the officer grabbed Gadsden's sweater, the dog lunged, and Bull Connor chastised the officer for not bringing a meaner dog.

"Moore sensed (the film he shot that was on its way to New York) was likely to obliterate in the national psyche any notion of a 'good southerner.' The first shot he had gotten that day would grace the double-truck opening of Life's spread - firemen thrusting their hose in a common purpose that recalled another era-defining picture, of the Marines planting the American flag at Iwo Jima...The headline would be 'They Fight a Fire That Won't Go Out.' The dogs and fire houses dominated the evening news. The scene had been a cameraman's dream...(Huntley-Brinkley reporter) R.W. "Johnny" Apple Jr. would maintain that none of the many war zones he covered upset or frightened him as much Birmingham....Some of Hudson's hose-spray shots captured the "fair atmosphere" he had discerned before the K-9 Corps was called out. but one of them - the saintly calm of young Walter Gadsden in the snarling jaws of the German shepherd (Photo 4) - gave (AP Atlanta editor) Jim Laxon the same surge he had felt when he processed his first Pulitzer Prize winner, a shot of a woman jumping from an upper story window in Atlanta's Winecoff Hotel fire of December 1946."(McWhorter, pp 370-374)

Hudson's photo of Walter Gadsden ran across three columns above the fold in The New York Times on May 4, 1963. The K-9 Corps of Birmingham took its mystical place next to the bloodhounds chasing Eliza across the ice floes in Uncle Tom's Cabin.

(I swear I didn't make up that bit about Iwo Jima.) I feel like the best photos that have the most documentation of the most impact of the day are Photo 2 and Photo 4. --Moni3 (talk) 04:01, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

You've more than convinced me! :-) I'll try and upload those two later today and sort out non-free use rationales based on what you've said, unless you want to try doing that yourself. I'll probably do this in about 6-9 hours (it's Christmas shopping time here...). Carcharoth (talk) 11:45, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
If you load the photos and get the tags in order, I can add to their summaries the information here, complete with pretty citations. I really do appreciate your help very much. I also need to get the mall. I am lax in yule preparedness. Good luck. --Moni3 (talk) 14:11, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Pictures uploaded and tagged and placed in the article. Looking forward to seeing how they can be integrated into the text. Very happy to help out here, do let me know if I can help on any other articles. Carcharoth (talk) 22:15, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
1. You are awesome. 2. I shifted one to the top of the page because it needed something up there. The infobox for an historical event made the picture small and the caption font large - I didn't like the way it looked. I may delete the infobox altogether. --Moni3 (talk) 00:36, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Removing the infobox is fine - they are seriously over-rated. Often a good picture and lead section is better. Sometimes the infobox can be placed lower down if it will help some people. Oh, and you are awesome as well, and more so! :-) I've just read the Images of the day section, and it is a classic example of meeting all the criteria for using non-free content. If you don't mind, I'm going to note this over at WT:NFCC - we need more examples like this. Carcharoth (talk) 11:15, 24 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Church photo ready

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See Image:321037pv cropped.JPG. I'll put it in the article. Carcharoth (talk) 12:14, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I added it, but didn't realise it was not strictly part of the campaign. So I've added it to the bombing and church articles instead. Carcharoth (talk) 12:27, 22 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Two more photos

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The other two photos I found are not strictly central to this article, but I'll note them here in case you find a use for them.

  • (1) Image:03194v cropped.jpg: "Group of African Americans viewing the bomb-damaged home of Arthur Shores, NAACP attorney, Birmingham, Alabama" (5 September 1963) - see ppmsca 03194 - we don't have an article on Arthur Shores, but maybe we should? See his New York Time obituary from 1996.
  • (2) Image:04298v cropped.JPG: "Congress of Racial Equality conducts march in memory of Negro youngsters killed in Birmingham bombings, All Souls Church, 16th Street, Wash[ington], D.C." (22 September 1963) - see ppmsca 04298 - more the after effects, and more relevant to the articles about the bombings, but still, could be useful

I'll go and upload those now. Carcharoth (talk) 00:54, 23 December 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Copyeditor's comments

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Hi Moni3, I added an LoCE in-use tag to the top of the article a few moments ago, and I'm beginning my copyedit. If I get stuck or have questions, I'll post more comments here. Finetooth (talk) 18:57, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you. I'm around and should be able to answer fairly quickly. --Moni3 (talk) 19:13, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm watching as you go, and I have one comment so far. In the Commissioner of Public Safety Section, Klan members beat Freedom Riders in 1961. There is some speculation that the police department worked with the Klan to coincide the arrival of police 15 minutes after the riders announced when they would arrive in the bus station. For those 15 minutes, Klan members beat the Freedom Riders, with the knowledge of the police. So Connor did order police to intervene, but deliberately late. --Moni3 (talk) 21:25, 22 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I will go back to that tomorrow. Right now, my eyes have had it, and I need to get some sleep. I have been pretty heavy-handed in my editing, especially in re-writing the lead. I started to work on it at the beginning of my edit, then moved to the rest of the article before coming back to the lead. I thought its long paragraphs really needed to be broken up a bit and re-cast. I tried not to alter the sense of the original as I went, though I removed a few entire sentences and a couple of ideas. I removed Gandhi, for example, because he was mentioned in the lead but nowhere else. That violates MOS since the lead is to be a summary of the article proper, and I thought since you hadn't pursued the Gandhi idea, it probably would not be missed. You may notice other missing things or things not reasonably rearranged, and I'm sure it's not possible that I caught everything or that every one of my choices was spot on. I'll sleep on this and come back tomorrow for another shorter visit and perhaps catch the things I missed on the first round. We can discuss anything about the article at all. My changes aren't precious to me, and I mean them as suggestions rather than anything set in concrete. By the way, this is a most interesting article about a most interesting topic. Finetooth (talk) 05:04, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well, no lie. I'm impressed. I thought it would take you two hours at the most. You put quite a lot of time into it. I appreciate it very much! --Moni3 (talk) 13:03, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Hi again. I'm almost done with my second run-through. In the "After the campaign" section, I see a sentence that says, "By July, the desegregation laws were overturned, and some of the lunch counters in department stores complied with the new rules." The sense of this doesn't quite seem to fit the rest of the paragraph, and I'm wondering if the word "desegregation" really should be "segregation"? Finetooth (talk) 19:21, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

<undent>I think that's it except for the question noted above. I'm going to sign off on the LoCE copyediting form, and a proofreader may come along after me to look things over with a fresh set of eyes. Please post messages here or on my talk page if you have questions or comments. Good luck with the continuing process at FAC. Finetooth (talk) 19:43, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I think Dystopos did that quick edit (thank you) before I could. Thank you again, Finetooth. --Moni3 (talk) 22:48, 23 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

City government

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  • I don't have the references on hand to expand/rewrite this section, but the change in government was pushed through by progressive moderates (such as the Young Businessmen's Association) who were hoping that a more progressive government would defuse the escalating tension and (depending on your view) either usher in peaceful progress toward civil rights or help preserve some of the status quo without inviting violence or a showdown with the federal courts. The election proved that a majority citizens were uncomfortable with having the galvanizing personality of Connor in power. Many wanted to proceed as Albany and other cities had done before, quietly and on their own terms. It was in this context that the ministers wrote their open letter to King asking for the demonstrations to be delayed. King responded directly to that request in his Letter from Birmingham Jail. --Dystopos (talk) 21:24, 30 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I added some detail about this, with sources. --Moni3 (talk) 02:17, 31 January 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Recent changes by Brucehartford

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I'm primarily responsible for expanding this article and bringing it to FA - a very difficult and tedious process. I'm sure you know that anyone may add to the article, but much work is involved in keeping the high quality in featured articles. I would very much like to see it remain FA, so some of the changes you made to the article will have to be compromised. I hope you would consider reading the Featured Article process this article went through, which you can find at the top of the page under "Article Milestones".

  • Please keep "black" consistent throughout the article: lowercase.
  • Please expand the citations for the CMVets website, or use print references. As the citations stand now, they are insufficient. Try WP:CITE. I had to have an editor go through my print, magazine, newspaper and online citations twice to format them correctly.
<Response: I'm not sure if this is the correct way to respond to your comments, if it is not, please tell me how to do so. I am not clear what you mean by "expand the citations for the CMVets website." Please explain what I need to do. Brucehartford (talk) 18:35, 9 March 2008 (UTC)>[reply]
It's not usually necessary to provide "<Response:" prior to your comment. My primary concern with the CRMVets page you cited is that it may not be a reliable citation. The author of the text and the date of the text is essential to the citation, per the WP:CITE link I provided. If you did not write it first, who did? If it was originally the city ordinances of Birmingham, the ordinances should be cited instead. --Moni3 (talk) 21:26, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • Any term used "in quotes" must have a citation. This is why I removed the passage about keeping blacks "in their place". In fact, the population of Birmingham in 1963 will need a citation.
<Response: Obviously phrases like "in their place" and "southern way of life" are not quotes from specific individuals but rather quotes of common terms in the culture at the time. How should they be indicated if not by quotes? Italics? Brucehartford (talk) 18:55, 9 March 2008 (UTC)>[reply]
Articles should be literal to a fault. It's popular historical interpretation - almost common sense - that violence against a minority keeps them afraid and weaker. The article must provide concrete examples of this, however. Nothing can be taken as common perception. --Moni3 (talk) 21:26, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I had, at one point, the incident where Nat King Cole was attacked onstage in the article. However, an FAC editor objected to it, as it seemed an afterthought to the nearly 50 unsolved racially motivated bombings. I removed it again, as well as the grammatically incorrect passage about the individual who was kidnapped by the Klan. Those incidents will need citations.
<Response: I think that it is important to note the use of violence against blacks as a method of maintaining segregation beyond the bombings which were usually targeted at a black who had shown some overt action in regards to civil rights. The Nat King Cole incident is mentioned on his Wikipedia page (though I had never heard the "kidnapping" angle and I tend to distrust it). Since it was mentioned on that Wiki page I assumed that was sufficient attribution, is that not the case? I will add back that info and include citations from outside Wikipedia. But it is not clear to me if you are saying that the CRMVets website can, or cannot, be used as a cited source. Brucehartford (talk) 18:55, 9 March 2008 (UTC)>[reply]
If the information is better expanded in the CRMVets website, it may be used. However, if material on the CRMVets site was summarized from other published sources, it's better to use the published source. I understand the point of the editor who requested I remove the information about Nat King Cole. I wonder if information you add regarding violence against blacks maintaining segregation belongs in this article or others about the South before the Civil Rights era. --Moni3 (talk) 21:26, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • I removed information about the NAACP being banned from Alabama because once again, it is unsourced. Everything that mentions a statistic, a quote, or any information that may be disputed must be sourced with a reliable and verifiable publication.
<Response: Again I'm a bit confused because there is a Wikipedia article on the topic National Association for the Advancement of Colored People v. Alabama. Is it not sufficient source to simply link to that article? Brucehartford (talk) 18:55, 9 March 2008 (UTC)>[reply]
Articles should be verifiable independently from one another. This article stands alone from the September 1963 bombings of the 16th Street Baptist Church as it does from the Selma Marches. Anything claimed in the article as fact, even if it references another article, should be cited. Even if an article is a Featured Article, if it changes quality beyond was was accepted when it was promoted, it can go to Featured Article Review and be demoted unless someone maintains its integrity. I hope you understand my scrutiny. --Moni3 (talk) 21:26, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  • These changes can be added to the article if they are accurate. If you need assistance with the code, I can provide that. And please understand that I am not trying to keep you from making improvements to the article, but the rules on featured material are very strict. --Moni3 (talk) 14:38, 9 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Proposal to remove date-autoformatting

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Dear fellow contributors

MOSNUM no longer encourages date autoformatting, having evolved over the past year or so from the mandatory to the optional after much discussion there and elsewhere of the disadvantages of the system. Related to this, MOSNUM prescribes rules for the raw formatting, irrespective of whether or not dates are autoformatted. MOSLINK and CONTEXT are consistent with this.

There are at least six disadvantages in using date-autoformatting, which I've capped here:

Disadvantages of date-autoformatting


  • (1) In-house only
  • (a) It works only for the WP "elite".
  • (b) To our readers out there, it displays all-too-common inconsistencies in raw formatting in bright-blue underlined text, yet conceals them from WPians who are logged in and have chosen preferences.
  • (c) It causes visitors to query why dates are bright-blue and underlined.
  • (2) Avoids what are merely trivial differences
  • (a) It is trivial whether the order is day–month or month–day. It is more trivial than color/colour and realise/realize, yet our consistency-within-article policy on spelling (WP:ENGVAR) has worked very well. English-speakers readily recognise both date formats; all dates after our signatures are international, and no one objects.
  • (3) Colour-clutter: the bright-blue underlining of all dates
  • (a) It dilutes the impact of high-value links.
  • (b) It makes the text slightly harder to read.
  • (c) It doesn't improve the appearance of the page.
  • (4) Typos and misunderstood coding
  • (a) There's a disappointing error-rate in keying in the auto-function; not bracketing the year, and enclosing the whole date in one set of brackets, are examples.
  • (b) Once autoformatting is removed, mixtures of US and international formats are revealed in display mode, where they are much easier for WPians to pick up than in edit mode; so is the use of the wrong format in country-related articles.
  • (c) Many WPians don't understand date-autoformatting—in particular, how if differs from ordinary linking; often it's applied simply because it's part of the furniture.
  • (5) Edit-mode clutter
  • (a) It's more work to enter an autoformatted date, and it doesn't make the edit-mode text any easier to read for subsequent editors.
  • (6) Limited application
  • (a) It's incompatible with date ranges ("January 3–9, 1998", or "3–9 January 1998", and "February–April 2006") and slashed dates ("the night of May 21/22", or "... 21/22 May").
  • (b) By policy, we avoid date autoformatting in such places as quotations; the removal of autoformatting avoids this inconsistency.

Removal has generally been met with positive responses by editors. I'm seeking feedback about this proposal to remove it from the main text (using a script) in about a week's time on a trial basis. The original input formatting would be seen by all WPians, not just the huge number of visitors; it would be plain, unobtrusive text, which would give greater prominence to the high-value links. BTW, anyone has the right to object, and my aim is not to argue against people on the issue. Tony (talk) 12:34, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Go ahead, Tony. On all my FAs. --Moni3 (talk) 12:36, 30 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks, Moni! Tony (talk) 13:29, 11 August 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Shuttlesworth, King, and Bevel

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Hi. Thanks, Moni3, (or just Moni if I may?) for the quick look at my edits. The lede, wouldn't naming people who 'led' the campaign include Shuttlesworth and Bevel in addition to King? Shuttlesworth started most of the early actions, and worked Birmingham for a long time before SCLC came in. When King's, Walker's, and the groups direct action program didn't work, it was Bevel who came up with the idea to use the children, described the plan to King, who agreed, and then trained and used the children. King then tried to withdraw that use, but Bevel told him no, he would keep on using them and actually escalate. This action, the Children's Crusade, is what brought the Birmingham Movement its prominence. So wouldn't it be accurate to either name Bevel along with King, or to add Shuttlesworth and Bevel along with King in the lede, or just to remove names altogether in that particular sentence? I can put sources into the data, and expand the data as well, if needed. Thanks, and again, a very good article which covers almost everything except the March to Washington data, which would come close to completing it.Randy Kryn (talk) 23:33, 8 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]

When I first saw your edits to the lead, I imagined we might be compromising somehow. Per your talk page, you seem to have read on Bevel, which is good. In all the sources cited in this article none of them really emphasize Bevel's role as being as prominent as King's or any more important than Walker, Shuttlesworth, or Abernathy. In fact, most of them emphasize Shuttlesworth's role because he was the hometown guy asking the SCLC for assistance. He also seemed to disagree with King in some instances, and there was some notable tension, which is understandable with so much at stake. If you have sources that say his participation was as effective as King's, let me know and I'll check them out.
Otherwise, the obvious thing to do would be to add Walker, Shuttlesworth, and Bevel to the lead, but that begs the question of how to keep it short and to the point. Here's an idea of how that might be done:

When business leaders resisted the boycott, King, SCLC organizer Wyatt Tee Walker, and Birmingham native Fred Shuttlesworth began what they termed Project C, a series of sit-ins and marches intended to provoke mass arrests. After the campaign ran low on adult volunteers, high school, college, and elementary students were trained by SCLC coordinator James Bevel to participate, resulting in hundreds arrested and instantly intensifying national media attention on the campaign.

Thoughts? --Moni3 (talk) 02:40, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hi. You came up with a better addition to the lede, although I believe Project C was already in motion before King arrived in Birm. My thinking was that the sentence 'Organizers, led by MLK, used nonviolent direct action tactics. . ." actually overemphasizes King's role, as it implies King himself came up with some of the strategies, when his largest contribtion was standing up one day and going out to join the handful of adults who had been demonstrating. His arrest and his letter inspired the citizens to become more involved, but only a few actually joined in. So his personal strategy was to join an already organized, but small and ineffective, demonstration. Bevel, on the other hand, came up with the plan to ask the students to participate, trained them, and strategized what to do with them, all the while convincing King about the worth of the strategies and overcoming his hesitancy at several points in the Children's Crusade. King didn't really lead in this campaign except with his letter, nor did he lead Bevel, who worked on his own within SCLC per an agreement with King in 1962. Much of the data can't be included, personal research restrictions, but what I've added is backed up by my sources on the James Bevel page, my properly accredited published sources, and esp. look at my addendum in the Garrow published "We Shall Overcome Volume II" article for data about the March to Washington. This march, IMHO, is still the most interesting, although very little focused on, part of the entire Birmingham Campaign story. It's what led to the Civil Rights Act being offered to SCLC, just to stop Bevel's March to Washington which would have probably had hundreds of thousands of marchers as it neared D.C. Bevel and the students were going to march up the highway all the way to D.C., to talk to Kennedy about segregation, when Kennedy tried to get King to stop the children from participating in Birm. King had agreed to stop until Bevel told him no, gave King his reasoning, and then escalated the movement to include the next step: the March to Washington. Just looked at this long paragraph, enough for now. Thanks again, Randy Kryn (talk) 11:16, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
In the sources I read, King was, at least nominally, the leader of the SCLC and the operations in Birmingham. Coordination meetings were held in his hotel room daily with Walker, Bevel, and Shuttlesworth in attendance, among others. Depending on the source and who gave the interview, Walker, Bevel, and Shuttlesworth did varying organizational tasks while King gave his approval or talked them out of it. I do agree that he was famous by now and largely took credit for the in-the-trenches kind of work; not because he was egotistical, but it seems to me as if he was mutually decided upon to be the face, voice, and jail cell resident for the SCLC. It is my impression that he rarely left his hotel room unless it was to preach or motivate protesters. A rift developed between King and Shuttlesworth as I recall, as Shuttlesworth disapproved of King's distance from what was going on and his tendency to hesitate when very serious decisions needed to be made, such as whether to use children in protests.
I have access to We Shall Overcome by Garrow. I did not use it for this article, but I can certainly read its retelling of the Birmingham campaign. It would, however, be one source in several that describe the behind-the-scenes logistics of organizing the protests in Birmingham. Although Garrow is a respected historian his views would be placed along those who have also written about the Civil Rights Movement. At any rate, do you for the moment agree with the addition to the lead as laid out above? Or would you like to wait for me to read Garrow's book for further discussion? --Moni3 (talk) 13:50, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Hi, you're fast. The article in We Shall Overcome Volume II is "James L. Bevel, the Strategist of the Civil Rights Movement", by myself. The sources, quotations, and esp. the addendum, written esp. for Garrow's book, covers the March to Washington data. Your lede above, I think, works well because it contains more data per word and gives an important guide to who the main people were. My concern was with the emphasis in the lede, actually throughout the article, on Dr. King, who was a good and loving spokesperson and meeting chairman, but only one of three or four major players during the movement years. In Birmingham, for example, when SCLC came into the city at Shuttlesworth's request, King did not have the reputation he held a couple of months later, after Bevel and the students successfully overturned, in principle, much of segregation in America except for voting and housing. Bevel got to those soon afterwards, and actually ran the movement, if anyone can be called its leader, from the first day of the Children's Crusade until mid-1967, when King pulled out of the anti-war movement. Again, a long answer, I still enjoy talking about this data. Not to take all the space here, your talk page? Thanks again, Randy Kryn (talk) 14:50, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I will check out Garrow's book today, and I am eager to read your chapter. The standards for Featured Articles change over time. Wikipedia time is in comparison to academic time, frightfully short. This article was promoted in February of 2008, and it was my 2nd. As you have already commented on my talk page, I've written a few since then, hopefully improving with each one. The standards for writing and sourcing certainly have improved since then, so I can stand to go through this article and make a few improving edits here and there. Should this article ever appear on the main page, an intense amount of scrutiny and assault can occur within 24 hours, so it has to be as well-written and impeccably sourced as possible. --Moni3 (talk) 15:30, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Oops, to answer your question, commentary about problems or issues with the article can take place here. General banter or discussion about the Civil Rights Movement unrelated to the Birmingham campaign or the construction of this article can take place at my talk page if you wish. --Moni3 (talk) 15:32, 9 November 2009 (UTC)}::[reply]
Thanks, the article in Garrow's work may add source material, both in content and in the quotations gathered, as well as the list of books sourced. A 2005 paper published by Middlebury College (I believe that's the college, it's where James Ralph works, who did good work on the Chicago Movement) has some extended data which could be helpful in the Birm. article, just google the two names "Bevel" and "Kryn" and it should be at or near the top. I haven't read that one in a year or so, and should go back myself to prepare a 2010 update, after Bevel's death last December. Fun writing about this data. Again, the March to Washington is about the most underreported information in them, along with the 1962 Bevel/King agreement, which was, IMHO, the pivotal meeting and point in the entire '60s movement. I took the time and read the feature article review and discussion, and you had to fight them off with a sword on one hand and edit with the other. An impressive read, and it worked out very well. Thanks again. ('This User is a Gypsy')--Randy Kryn (talk) 16:05, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Featured article candidacy process is harrowing in the beginning. As the third one I went through (I had to archive my second) I found it arduous and taxing. Since then, however, they seem like a veritable stroll in the park. A lot of the stress is trying to figure out what is expected from the process vs. what various individuals want to see. It's not quite clear and there is a lot of trial and error involved. It's easier to simply go freakin' crazy and add every last thing you can possibly find, then add some more. Then beg editors who are nice to review the article. Over and over and over. There is a deceptive amount of work involved in getting an FA. James Bevel certainly is a worthy article to get there, though. --Moni3 (talk) 16:23, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
For what it's worth, Diane McWhorter's Carry Me Home portrays the movement in Birmingham as having been somewhat DISorganized, with various leaders seizing upon minor opportunities for action. Shuttlesworth had long been leading small-scale demonstrations testing the enforcement of federal court decisions. Once SCLC was brought in for planning a mass campaign there was a lot going on with King, Shuttlesworth and others variously feeling as if they'd been left out of critical decisions. The Children's Crusade was perhaps the biggest example of renegade action and ended up being the feather in Bevel's cap. Most critical for this discussion, however, is the theme of how the movement took care to give the media the picture of a more organized movement centered on King's personality. In McWhorter's book King is mostly a passive presence conducted in and out of the narrative with few examples of active leadership. Taylor Branch's biography suggests much the same reading. --Dystopos (talk) 19:26, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. McWhorter was one of several sources that gave me the impression of some jostling styles of activism, egos, and decisions made very quickly without much deliberation. Of the Children's Crusade, I got the impression that Bevel told King about his idea and King did not respond, so on his own, Bevel proceeded despite King's silence and the doubts expressed by other organizers such as Walker. King went out of town for the weekend shortly thereafter to come back and find children lined up and ready to go, still unwilling to tell Bevel to stand them down or really make any statement at all. I cannot remember who it was, but one activist was livid that King was eating a steak dinner in his hotel room while children were being arrested. The sources do not seem to attribute any clear accusation or blame on anyone in particular who said King was disorganized or weak, or Bevel was rebellious and acted of his own accord. I constructed the article to convey (adequately, I hope) the level of chaos and urgency that was expressed in the sources.
I have just checked out Vols. I and II of Garrow's books and I have McWhorter at home. I'll go through the other sources again if necessary. --Moni3 (talk) 19:38, 9 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
Like Monk says, "Here's what happened". In my HP, the most underreported (just me so far), unappreciated, little known but most important single event in the 1960s Civil Rights Movement occurred when Dr. King met with James Bevel in his office in Atlanta in 1962. Bevel had risen to become the most active student leader, and the only one who really was able to accomplish Gandhian movements. He had by that time participated in the Nashvlle sit-ins, had successfully directed the Nashville Open Theater Movement, helped in the Nashville continuation of the Freedom Rides (Diane Nash was the major person in that one) and, when riding the Freedom bus into Mississippi, called for the Mississippi movement along with Bernard Lafayette, and stayed in Ms. with Nash and Lafayette to help organize the state. SCLC and King needed someone who could "do" movement, and Bevel was the only person at that period in history who could. In their meeting Bevel and King agreed to work within SCLC to end segregation, to get the right to vote, and to open housing. They agreed that SCLC would not ask for funding unless the organization was doing a movement. They agreed to do these things, without compromise, until they were accomplished. Neither would be the other's superior, they would work together when needed but would not rule over the other. Two different tracks of action, and Bevel soon took the two titles, usually combined as one in writing about him, of SCLC's Director of Direct Action (!!!) and Director of Nonviolent Education (###!!), which pretty much say it all. Bevel told King what he would do in various movements, and they dialogued continuously about movement, and sometimes King agreed and sometimes he didn't, but King's agreement was not required for Bevel to act. In Birmingham, King did agree that Bevel could use and train children, but he didn't realize it would be so many (King was used to ten or twelve people, at most, going out with a willingness to get arrested). When the action started the Kennedy administration got word to King that they would withdraw their support unless "he" stopped using children. King asked Bevel to stop. Bevel told him "no", and immediately thought of the idea to march the students/children from Birmingham to Washington D.C. to confront Kennedy himself about segregation. King agreed, the children agreed, and they prepared for the march when Kennedy's people, who knew about the new march, came to SCLC and asked them "OK, what do you want in the Civil Rights Act?", and that was that. Instead of the march "to" Washington, SCLC and other groups chose to March "in" D.C. (Bevel didn't go, he was working to prepare the students for their experience when they entered the newly intergrated schools in Birmingham--the intergration of schools was the Shuttlesworth's group starting goal at the beginning of their campaign). And now you know. . .the rest of the story. (couldn't resist mixing Monk up with Paul Harvey Jr.) Thanks again, (This user eats lentils and rice) Randy Kryn (talk) 10:41, 10 November 2009 (UTC)[reply]
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Since the photographs in this article are mostly from 1963, there's a decent chance they are actually public domain now. Anything published in the US before 1964 only had a copyright term of 27 years unless the copyright was renewed, and most copyright renewals were just for books and films. Very few photographs, newspapers, or magazines were renewed. The trick is finding photographs that were actually published at the time, rather than later on in books. Usually you can look through newspapers from the era on microfilm to find some. Google books also has a thorough collection of Ebony and Jet magazines from the 1960s that often have photographs of civil rights actions. After some thorough digging, I was able to illustrate the Nashville sit-ins article with 100% public domain images. Kaldari (talk) 19:51, 31 January 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Edit of "Resolution" section

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Just made an edit on "Resolution" section to clarify that the Gaston Hotel/AD King bombing took place late at night, and the riot erupted in the early morning. Also described extent of riot: state troopers called in, state troopers defied by crowd, thousands on streets, numerous fires, several stabbings. Citations from Time magazine and Glenn T. Eskew's book. GPRamirez5 (talk) 01:31, 15 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed change to article

[edit]
Birmingham campaign
Part of the Civil Rights Movement
DateApril 3, 1963 – May 10, 1963[2]
Location
Birmingham, Alabama and Kelly Ingram Park
Caused by
Goals
  • End segregation in public facilities, restaurants, and stores
  • End racial discrimination in employment
MethodsSit-ins, Protest, Protest march, Boycott
Resulted in
Parties
Lead figures

City Commissioners

Chamber of Commerce

  • Sydney "Sid" Smyer, president of the Birmingham Chamber of Commerce
Casualties and losses
Deaths:
Injuries:
Deaths:
Injuries:
  1. ^ "Birmingham 1963". 100 Photographs that Changed the World. Life, reproduced in The Digital Journalist. Retrieved 2007-12-23. {{cite journal}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  2. ^ Charles D. Lowery, John F. Marszalek, Thomas Adams Upchurch, ed. (2003). "Birmingham Confrontation," The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Civil Rights: From Emancipation to the Twenty-first Century. Vol. 1 (Second ed.). Greenwood Press. p. 47. ISBN 9780313321719.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: editors list (link)

Please share your thoughts. Thanks.

Mitchumch (talk) 06:39, 29 September 2013 (UTC)[reply]

under: fire hoses and police dogs

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"set at a level that would peel bark off a tree or separate bricks from mortar" It doesn't matter the source the second part of that quote. It is not possible to peel mortar from bricks with high pressure water from a fire hose. Quotations should be limited to factual information not exaggerations or colorful descriptions. 108.206.18.197 (talk) 00:03, 30 October 2013 (UTC) L K Tucker[reply]

Article Somewhat Biased

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As a life-long resident of Birmingham, and growing up during the civil rights era, I practically had a front row seat at some of the incidents mentioned in this article. While it is a wonderfully written article and one can plainly see that an enormous amount of time went into it's writing, the flavor of the article leans to one side. There are several sources used that are not actually historically correct, but personal versions of the incidents... reference # 72 is a perfect example, however there are a dozen and a half or so references like it used in the article writing. The Birmingham Public Library has plenty of "authorized" books, magazines and newspapers with the true, unbiased versions, and someone should consider rewriting the article with true facts instead of "opinions". Roebuckjeffrey (talk) 12:08, 8 June 2015 (UTC)Jeff Roebuck, B'ham, AL[reply]

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