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September 15, 1963, should have been a typical Sunday at the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. In the church basement, children busily prepared for youth Sunday. Five little girls, ranging in age from 11 to 14, were in the women\u2019s bathroom, changing into choir robes and fixing their hair when an explosion rocked the church. Glass shattered. The church\u2019s rear wall crumbled. The girls flew through the air. Upstairs, the adults panicked. They ran for their children. Four little girls died that day. There wasn\u2019t much of a question as to who\u2019d done this. For years, the KKK had bombed Black churches and Black people\u2019s homes. They\u2019d done so with little to no punishment from authorities. But surely they wouldn\u2019t get away with killing children in church.
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\nAnd now for a note about our process. For this episode, Kristin read a bunch of articles, then spat them back out in her very limited vocabulary. We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the real experts who covered these cases.
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\nIn this episode, Kristin pulled from:
\n\u201cThe Birmingham Church Bombing: Bombingham,\u201d by Mark Gado for Crime Library
\n\u201cTrial of bombing suspect begins,\u201d by Jay Reeves for the Associated Press
\n\u201cAlabamian guilty in \u201863 church blast that killed 4 girls,\u201d by B. Drummond Ayres Jr. for the New York Times
\n\u201cChambliss guilty,\u201d Associated Press
\n\u201cBirmingham bomber Bobby Frank Cherry dies in prison at 74,\u201d by Yvonne Shinhoster Lamb for the Washington Post
\n\u201cBirmingham bomb case goes to jury,\u201d by Howell Raines for the St Petersburg Times
\n\u201cGhosts of Alabama: The prosecution of Bobby Frank Cherry for the bombing of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church,\u201d by Donald Q. Cochran for the Michigan Journal of Race and Law
\n\u201c60 years ago, Alabama church bombing killed 4 girls and catalyzed a movement,\u201d by DeNeen L. Brown for the Washington Post
\n\u201cCongress honors victims of infamous Alabama church bombing,\u201d by Debbie Elliott for NPR
\n\u201c50 years after the bombing, Birmingham still subtly divided,\u201d by Debbie Elliott for NPR
\n\u201cAlabama Gov. apologizes to surviving \u20185th girl\u2019 of 1963 KKK bombing,\u201d by Vanessa Romo for NPR
\n\u201c16th Street Baptist Church bombing,\u201d National Park Service
\n\u201c16th Street Baptist Church bombing,\u201d entry on Wikipedia
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