16th STREET CHURCH BOMBING
By: Blake Martin
White people were racist in the 1900s
On Sunday, 15th September, 1963, a white man got out of a car and placed a box on the front steps of a colored only church. A little while afterwards at 10:22 in the morning the box exploded and killed four girls attending Sunday School. The blast also injured 23 other people. George Wallace the Alabama governor was originally accused because he said only a week before that to stop this civil rights movement that they needed "a few first-class funerals". A witness later said that Robert Chambliss was the one who set the box on the front porch of the church. Robert Chambliss was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan despised Blacks and killed and beat them to there death because they believed that white was the better race. Robert Chambliss was arrested for murder and possession of 122 dynamite sticks without a permit. Later he was not found guilty of murder and was senates to a 100 dollar fine and 6 months in prison. In November 1977 Chambliss was tried again and was found guilt. Now at age 73 he was sentenced to a life in prison.
Facts about the church
The church was a blacks only church. It was a meeting place for civil rights leads like Martin Luther KIng Jr. Ralph David and many others. There was lots of tension between the SCLC and CORE two groups who thought very differently about the equality of African Americans. African Americans tried to register as voters in Birmingham. Whites did't like this.