President Obama on Thursday, last month, sitting on the actual bus on which Rosa Parks refusal to give up her seat to a white man sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
Unfortunately, that bus isn't in Montgomery, where it all happened. It's in Detroit. Years back some smart people from that city (carpetbaggers?) came here to Alabama and located the bus rusting in a field..brought it up and snagged an amazing artifact of the Civil Right's Movement. There is a replica of the bus in the Rosa Parks Museum in Downtown Montgomery. But for the real thing, The president had to go to Michigan. Still, a cool photo.
[UPDATE: The sketch below is from Rosa's trial in Montgomery. It shows where she was sitting on December 1, 1955 when she was arrested...so the President is at least on the wrong side of the aisle. Hard to tell for sure from the shot which row he's in...but I think it is the correct one. There's a popular photo of Ms. Parks on a bus, and it shows her in the same side as the President, so either the court exhibit or the photo is wrong.]
What do you mean, the President is on the wrong side? Then you say he is probably in the very same seat where she was, so many years ago.
ReplyDeleteOn Thursday the Washington National Cathedral dedicated a small carving of her. Not sure exactly where it is situated.
Two other Alabamians, Helen Keller and Martin Luther King, are also memorialized with stone carvings. HK is buried in the Cathedral crypt.
I see what you mean now. The photo may have been reversed, although I don't think so. I think the drawing is incorrect.
ReplyDelete