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Carver Theatre (Birmingham, Alabama)

1935 establishments in AlabamaBuildings and structures in Birmingham, AlabamaHistorically African-American theaters and music venuesJazz clubs in the United StatesPerforming arts centers in Alabama
Theatres completed in 1935Tourist attractions in Birmingham, Alabama
Carver Theatre, Birmingham, Alabama LCCN2010637006
Carver Theatre, Birmingham, Alabama LCCN2010637006

The Carver Theatre, now formally known as the Carver Performing Arts Center, is a theater located in downtown Birmingham, Alabama. In its days as a motion picture theater, it was best known as a place where African-Americans could see first-run movies; during that time, only whites were allowed in most theaters because of segregation laws. The Carver is now a live performance venue which seats 527, and is also the home of the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Carver Theatre (Birmingham, Alabama) (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Carver Theatre (Birmingham, Alabama)
17th Street North, Birmingham

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Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 33.514888 ° E -86.811849 °
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SW Corner of 17th St N & 4th Av N

17th Street North
35203 Birmingham
Alabama, United States
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Carver Theatre, Birmingham, Alabama LCCN2010637006
Carver Theatre, Birmingham, Alabama LCCN2010637006
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Hugo L. Black United States Courthouse
Hugo L. Black United States Courthouse

The Hugo L. Black United States Courthouse is a United States courthouse of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Alabama. Located at 1729 North 5th Avenue in Birmingham, Alabama, it was completed in 1987, and named in honor of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Hugo Black on November 10, 1987, through legislation introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Representative Ben Erdreich of Alabama.Funds for the construction of a new courthouse in Birmingham were appropriated by Congress in December 1982, and the following June, the General Services Administration chose the Birmingham architectural firm of Kidd/Ploaser/Sprague Architects Inc to design the building. A location for the courthouse not yet having been determined, the City of Birmingham proposed a lot diagonal to the federal courthouse in use at the time, as part of an effort to promote the downtown area. In 1984, it was reported that the building would be nine stories and 184,000 square feet, with construction to begin in April 1985 and end in February 1987. A 1987 evaluation of work in the city by the architects noted of the building that it "has all of the right monumental materials, but they are organized in a carnival of geometry that fits irregular spaces in a familiar context", further describing it as "a kind of geometrical sculpture of reflective glass atop a stone pedestal that both respects and reflects the two monumental buildings (old US Courthouse and Federal Reserve Bank) across the street".In June 2020, vandals protesting a nearby Confederate monument threw rocks that damaged windows of the courthouse, prompting officials to note that this was a federal offense. In June 2023, Joran van der Sloot was arraigned at the courthouse for the murder of Natalee Holloway.

Kelly Ingram Park
Kelly Ingram Park

Kelly Ingram Park, formerly West Park, is a 4 acres (1.6 ha) park located in Birmingham, Alabama. It is bounded by 16th and 17th Streets and 5th and 6th Avenues North in the Birmingham Civil Rights District. The park, just outside the doors of the 16th Street Baptist Church, served as a central staging ground for large-scale demonstrations during the American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Reverend James Bevel of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference directed the organized protest by students in 1963 which centered on Kelly Ingram Park. It was here, during the first week of May 1963, that Birmingham police and firemen, under orders from Public Safety Commissioner Eugene "Bull" Connor, confronted the student demonstrators, almost all of them children and high school students, first with mass arrests and then with police dogs and firehoses. Images from those confrontations, broadcast internationally, spurred a public outcry which turned the nation's attention to the struggle for racial equality. The demonstrations in Birmingham brought city leaders to agree to an end of public segregation and helped to ensure the writing and then the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The park was named in 1932 for local firefighter Osmond Kelly Ingram, who was the first sailor in the United States Navy to be killed in World War I. In 1992 it was completely renovated and rededicated as "A Place of Revolution and Reconciliation" to coincide with the opening of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, an interpretive museum and research center, which adjoins the park to the west. The park is the setting for several pieces of sculpture related to the civil rights movement. There is a central fountain and commemorative statues of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, and some of the other heroes of the civil rights movement, as well as three installations by artist James Drake which flank a circular "Freedom Walk". They bring the visitor inside the portrayals of terror and sorrow of the 1963 confrontations. A limestone sculpture by Raymond Kaskey depicts three ministers, John Thomas Porter, Nelson H. Smith, and A. D. King, kneeling in prayer. The Four Spirits sculpture was unveiled at Kelly Ingram Park on September, 2013 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing. Crafted in Berkeley, California by Birmingham-born sculptor Elizabeth MacQueen and designed as a memorial to the four girls killed in the bombing (which occurred on September 15, 1963), it depicts the four girls in preparation for the church sermon at the 16th Street Baptist Church in the moments immediately before the explosion. The youngest girl killed in the explosion (Carol Denise McNair) is depicted releasing six doves into the air as she stands tiptoed and barefooted upon a bench as another barefooted girl (Addie Mae Collins) is depicted kneeling upon the bench, affixing a dress sash to McNair; a third girl (Cynthia Wesley) is depicted sitting upon the bench alongside McNair and Collins with a book in her lap. The book depicts the refrain of William Butler Yeats poem "The Stolen Child". The fourth girl (Carole Robertson) is depicted standing and smiling as she motions the other three girls to attend their church sermon. At the base of the sculpture is an inscription of the name of the sermon the four girls were to attend prior to the bombing—"A Love that Forgives." Oval photographs and brief biographies of the four girls killed in the explosion, the most seriously injured survivor (Sarah Collins), and the two teenage boys shot to death later that day also adorn the base of the sculpture.Additional monuments honor Pauline Fletcher, Carrie A. Tuggle, Ruth Jackson, Arthur Shores, Julius Ellsberry, and the "foot soldiers" and other "unsung heroes" of the Civil Rights Movement. The park hosts several local family festivals and cultural and entertainment events throughout the year. The Civil Rights Institute provides audio-tour guides for the park which feature remembrances by many of the figures directly involved in the confrontations. Urban Impact, Inc. also provides guided tours by appointment.

Birmingham Civil Rights District
Birmingham Civil Rights District

The Birmingham Civil Rights District is an area of downtown Birmingham, Alabama where several significant events in the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s took place. The district was designated by the City of Birmingham in 1992 and covers a six-block area.Landmarks in the district include: 16th Street Baptist Church, where the students involved in the 1963 Children's Campaign were trained and left in groups of 50 to march on City Hall, and where four young African American girls were killed and 22 churchgoers were injured in a bombing on September 15, 1963. Kelly Ingram Park, where many protests by blacks were held, often resulting in recrimination by Birmingham police, including the famous 1963 scenes of policemen turning back young protesters with fire hoses and police dogs. News coverage of the riots in this park helped turn the tide of public opinion in the United States against segregationist policies. Several sculptures in the park depict scenes from those police riots. The Fourth Avenue Business District, where much of the city's black businesses and entertainment venues were located; the area was the hub of the black community for many years. The business district includes A. G. Gaston's Booker T. Washington Insurance Co. and the Gaston Motel, a meeting place for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights during the early 1960s. Carver Theatre, once a popular motion picture theater for blacks in Birmingham, now renovated as a live-performance theater and home of the Alabama Jazz Hall of Fame. Birmingham Civil Rights Institute, a museum which chronicles the events, struggles, and victories of the Civil Rights Movement, opened in 1993.On March 21, 2016, Rep. Terri Sewell introduced to the United States House of Representatives H.R. 4817, a bill that would designate the Birmingham Civil Rights District as a National Park. On March 28, 2016, the bill was referred to the Subcommittee on Federal Lands. However, a portion of the district was designated by executive order by President Obama as the Birmingham Civil Rights National Monument on January 12, 2017.