4 Memphis and to Little Rock

Day 4 – Today the Civil Rights Tour really began. Here we were in Memphis – a place that will be burned into our minds and history of the civil rights struggle. This was the place where Dr. Martin Luther King was taken from this earth in the most difficult of years for the US – 1968.

And this is the city where the tour should begin. It is the home of the National Civil Rights Museum, housed in the Lorraine Motel where Dr. King was assassinated. It was an easy walk from our hotel, which is central to everything. On this beautiful with 80 degree day, we walked along the treed part of Main Street, past the Gibson guitar factory which gives tours, and started to notice another side of Memphis we hadn’t see on our last visit – a lot of renovations being done on many of the old buildings in the city. Many of the pictures you will see from this day tried to capture some of the local city flavor – a street here or there or an unusual artful sight.

Rounding a corner, we saw an old hotel sign up ahead – the Lorraine Motel – not the sign we’re too familiar with, but a sign on the corner of an aging old hotel. As we neared the hotel, however, around the next corner, we could see the old sign that was too familiar to us – so often in the news years ago – and a sentinel to the memorial for Dr. King and National Civil Rights Museum. The hotel looked right out of the 50’s or 60’s, frozen in time from April 4, 1968. Even the old drive way had been preserved and blocked off. Old cars of the period were parked in the lot below the balcony. In the newly paved part of the lot were printed tables that told of the civil rights struggle – not just in Memphis, but from city to city. You simply had to read or press audio and hear the historical commentary.

Memphis was one of many cities that symbolized the civil rights movement. Dr. King was called to Memphis to help catalyze support for equal rights/pay for the sanitation workers. This was the focus of his meetings and marches when he was killed that April night.

There are two parts to the museum: the part in the Lorraine Hotel and across the street through a tunnel to the boarding house where James Earl Ray sighted the assassination. We started in the Lorraine Hotel. Upon entry, we were greeted by artist Michael Pavlovsky’s bronze sculpture, a tribute to the unknown millions who fought for civil rights. The story of course began with an exploration of the slave business - and the resistance to it – prevalent throughout the south from 1619-1861. The history of the Jim Crow laws followed, covering the period from 1896 - 1954. The Jim Crow laws were put in place throughout the South, and were the statutes that legalized segregation between blacks and whites. The name comes from a character in a popular minstrel song.

As we moved through the museum, the history of the civil rights struggle unfolded before us: Brown v. Board of Education 1954, Montgomery Bus Boycott 1955-1956, Student sit-ins at the Woolworth lunch counter in 1960, Strategies for Change, Freedom Rides 1961, Organizing in Mississippi 1945-1963, Albany Movement 1961-1963, Birmingham 1963, The March on Washington 1963, Mississippi summer Project 1964, Selma voting Rights Campaign 1965, The Voting Rights Act of 1965, Black Pride 1968-1975, Memphis Sanitation Strike 1968, King’s Rooms 306 and 307 and his last hours, Legacy Exhibits, and the Freedom Award Wall. We spent 4 ½ hours in this part of the museum – and it was not enough time to read and absorb it all. It was so powerful and an excellent start to our civil rights trip.

By this point we were mentally exhausted and hungry so we walked a couple blocks through the neighborhood to Gus’s Fried Chicken. There were many art galleries, antique stores, and renovated buildings along the way. We even saw a painted piano on a loading dock outside a yet-to-be-restored warehouse. This side of Memphis called SOB (South of Beale) felt like an up-and-coming vibrant neighborhood, although there were many empty buildings.

We finally reached our destination, a small hole-in-the-wall fried chicken restaurant that had been highly recommended. Of course there was a line outside and a 20 minute wait, during which we talked to an airline stewardess who had also received a tip on the place. We finally got our table, sat down and ordered a plate of chicken, cole slaw and baked beans – a classic meal. The chicken was DELICIOUS. (still dreaming about it). Denise happened to engage a man sitting behind her who was rooting for the Chicago Cubs (this was MLB playoff season, after all). The woman sitting with him joined into the conversation and we learned she was from Newton, MA! It turns out that she and her husband (also at the table) claimed to be part owners of the Miami Heat . (What a small world!)

After lunch, we returned to explore the other side of the museum. This was a shorter section (about 45 minutes). After going through Legacy Exhibits and the Freedom Award Wall, we went into the boarding house where James Earl Ray had rented a room from which he shot of Martin Luther King, across the street in the Lorraine Hotel. Like rooms 306 and 307 of the Lorraine Hotel, Ray’s room had been preserved from his stay there in 1968. We learned that there are still many questions on how Ray had been able to assassinate King, on his own. For example, where did he get the money to undertake this killing and then to flee to Europe? Why were the black police taken off the MLK police guard duty the evening of King’s assassination? Etc. Too many questions.

Soberly we walked back to the hotel, got into our car and departed for Little Rock. The trip to Little Rock took us across the Memphis- Arkansas Bridge and into the lowlands of the Mississippi and farmlands of Arkansas, as the sun was setting. As you can imagine, we stopped a few times along I-40 to catch the setting sun.