Ronetta Jenkins is a summer intern for West Wind Education Policy. She will be a Junior this fall at Iowa City High. This is part 1 of a 2 part blog.
Starting my journey off on June 8th to go back down south I thought to myself, why am I going again? I feel like I know it all already after going on this trip for the 4th time. I didn’t know enough. The day I left and I arrived at the first stop in Memphis, Tennessee I remember why I wanted to do this again. There’s no such thing as learning to much, but there’s a thing as not learning enough. This trip wasn’t just for experience; it was a chance to be put back in the past and relive the moments just by stepping in the places of these heroes who made change.
First stop to the Slave Haven house. Every time I step in the Slave Haven house it’s something that just touches my heart. Seeing what slaves had to go through just to get to freedom. The Slave Haven house was owned by a man name Jacob Burkle. Jacob was white. Slave masters never knew Jacob was against the slave movement but was helping the slaves get to freedom. At night Jacob would let the slaves go but it was on them not to get caught going to the Mississippi River. I learned that the slaves had secret codes to communicating with each other. For an example, they would beat on drums and they could tell what one another were saying miles and miles apart. This made me realize that cell phones today aren’t everything like we perceive them to be. Back then they didn’t have anything so they had to think real long and hard about how they could talk to each other and how they would do it without getting caught.
The Second stop was Birmingham, Alabama. At this time I felt I was being moved just driving past the historic land marks & knowing what they had to go through for me to be here right now. The second day in Birmingham we got to visit 16th Street Baptist church. I learned about the four girls who were bombed in the church on September 15, 1963. Bobby Frank Cherry, Thomas Blanton, Herman Frank Cash, and Robert Chambliss, members of United Klans of America, planted a bomb underneath the church right next to the girls’ bathroom. The four girls happened to be in there getting ready for Sunday school, there was a 5th girl but she happened to be in the bathroom at the time, the other four were in the open area. The 5th girl didn’t die but she did get hurt badly and lost one of her eyes. People were rushed outside, forced out of the church. This day became Bloody Sunday. Across the street kids were getting attacked by dogs, shot by waterhoses, and beaten badly. But they never fought back they just sang and kept on singing because they knew what they stood for and what they had to do to get the job done for equal rights.
This opened my eyes and made me question today: Why do blacks fight each other when back then we were taught to fight together. We have to learn how to appreciate one another. Too often we take the things around us for granted. Education: We fought so hard to get equal education in now we don’t even like to go to school or take school seriously. Somebody died to get you that education; someone got their hand cut off to get you that education; and someone got beaten and whipped to get you that education. I figured out being lazy and not being dedicated gets you nowhere whatsoever. If you want something you have to go out in get it.
Part 2 will be posted next week.