WEBVTT - The Foot Soldier of Birmingham 0:00:15.356 --> 0:00:22.636 Bushkin Before we begin, a warning this episode contains material 0:00:22.756 --> 0:00:27.116 that may be upsetting to some listeners. Not long ago, 0:00:27.396 --> 0:00:32.636 I drove from Atlanta, Georgia to Birmingham, Alabama. It's a 0:00:32.676 --> 0:00:35.716 straight shot west on I twenty one hundred and fifty 0:00:35.756 --> 0:00:39.276 miles of rolling hills and piney woods. I got off 0:00:39.316 --> 0:00:42.196 the freeway on the downtown exit, just before what the 0:00:42.236 --> 0:00:46.036 locals call the Malfunction junction, and drove a few blocks 0:00:46.076 --> 0:00:49.516 south until I came to Kelly Ingram Park, which covers 0:00:49.516 --> 0:00:52.116 a full city block right in front of sixteenth Street 0:00:52.156 --> 0:00:55.716 Baptist Church. I wanted to see a statue that stands 0:00:55.756 --> 0:01:01.316 in the park, a famous statue. I've always loved statues. 0:01:01.796 --> 0:01:05.356 I find them moving. Don't know why. Maybe it's because 0:01:05.596 --> 0:01:08.196 they're a representation of something that we have chosen to 0:01:08.236 --> 0:01:14.356 take seriously, to memorialize in a permanent form. With a statue, 0:01:14.596 --> 0:01:17.276 you're saying to the future, this is what I want 0:01:17.316 --> 0:01:23.636 you to remember about my generation. The statue I came 0:01:23.676 --> 0:01:25.876 to see is at one end of Kelly Ingram Park. 0:01:26.556 --> 0:01:30.716 It's of a police officer, big guy menacing heavy pair 0:01:30.756 --> 0:01:33.756 of sunglasses. He is a dog on a leash, A 0:01:33.796 --> 0:01:38.116 big german shepherd, and the dog is lunging huge fangs 0:01:38.196 --> 0:01:40.996 bared at a young black boy who's leaning back, hands 0:01:41.036 --> 0:01:45.516 to his sides, almost like he's sacrificing himself. It's called 0:01:45.596 --> 0:01:50.356 foot Soldier. It looks simple, but that statue is not 0:01:50.476 --> 0:01:58.316 what you think. Trust me. My name is Malcolm Gladwell. 0:01:58.676 --> 0:02:02.116 You're listening to Revisionist History, my podcast about things overlooked 0:02:02.116 --> 0:02:08.556 and Misunderstood. This episode is a second in what are 0:02:08.556 --> 0:02:10.596 going to be a few episodes this season on race 0:02:10.636 --> 0:02:18.956 and civil rights. On race in the United States, I'm 0:02:18.996 --> 0:02:22.996 an outsider. I'm Canadian. My family is half West Indian, 0:02:23.156 --> 0:02:25.796 which is a very different cultural experience than being an 0:02:25.796 --> 0:02:29.236 African American. My mom had a friend, a Jamaican, who 0:02:29.236 --> 0:02:31.996 went down to Georgia once in the nineteen seventies. When 0:02:32.036 --> 0:02:34.756 she came back, she said, the racism there cut like 0:02:34.796 --> 0:02:38.196 a knife. I couldn't have been more than eight or nine, 0:02:38.556 --> 0:02:42.316 and that phrase startled me. It seems so visceral. But 0:02:42.396 --> 0:02:44.876 then I moved to the US as an adult, and 0:02:44.956 --> 0:02:47.396 it seemed like the way race was discussed didn't cut 0:02:47.436 --> 0:02:54.436 like a knife at all. What I saw around race 0:02:54.436 --> 0:02:58.956 in the United States was evasion and euphemism. The subject 0:02:58.996 --> 0:03:02.476 of my last episode was the Brown Decision. For half 0:03:02.516 --> 0:03:05.356 a century, the integration story has been told with all 0:03:05.436 --> 0:03:09.836 the suffering taken out. Why is it really necessary that 0:03:09.876 --> 0:03:13.116 every grand civil rights narrative be turned into a fairy tale? 0:03:14.076 --> 0:03:17.396 Which brings me to kelly Ingram Park and its statue 0:03:17.436 --> 0:03:20.356 of the police officer and the dog and the boy. 0:03:21.476 --> 0:03:23.636 There's a nice and tidy story you can tell about 0:03:23.676 --> 0:03:30.756 that statue, but the real story is much different. Last 0:03:30.756 --> 0:03:32.596 summer I got a call from a man who was 0:03:32.636 --> 0:03:35.116 friends with the widow of the police officer depicted in 0:03:35.116 --> 0:03:38.356 that statue. I'd written about the officer and the dog 0:03:38.396 --> 0:03:41.196 in my book David and Goliath, but she wanted to 0:03:41.236 --> 0:03:43.716 tell me the rest of the story, so I met 0:03:43.716 --> 0:03:46.756 with her. Then I went back to Birmingham a second 0:03:46.756 --> 0:03:48.956 time to look for the boy in the statue, and 0:03:48.996 --> 0:03:52.756 then a third time to Tuskegee, two hours south of Birmingham. 0:03:53.356 --> 0:03:57.036 And there, on a long, lazy afternoon, I sat in 0:03:57.076 --> 0:04:00.156 the town museum with an artist named Ronald McDowell. 0:04:00.636 --> 0:04:04.036 I mean, I'll cool Jane Me and James Brown. 0:04:03.876 --> 0:04:10.996 And Ronald McDowell is an extraordinary man. Spidery and fine featured. 0:04:11.436 --> 0:04:14.236 He showed me his portfolio and told me in his 0:04:14.436 --> 0:04:18.116 urgent confessional whisper about how he was once walking down 0:04:18.236 --> 0:04:21.956 Sunset Boulevard years ago and ran into Louis Armstrong's nephew 0:04:22.316 --> 0:04:25.236 who took him to see Michael Jackson, who wanted McDowell 0:04:25.276 --> 0:04:27.916 to teach him art, which led in turn to McDowell 0:04:27.956 --> 0:04:29.436 helping out on the album Thriller. 0:04:29.876 --> 0:04:31.956 Yeah. I did the sketches for Michael Thriller. 0:04:32.156 --> 0:04:32.676 Oh wow. 0:04:32.996 --> 0:04:35.916 I was trying to make him into Black Superman. And 0:04:35.996 --> 0:04:37.756 on the back of this piece of paper is it 0:04:37.876 --> 0:04:40.916 drawing Michael da for me? When we were working on Trump. 0:04:41.236 --> 0:04:47.196 That's Michael's art work one. He did several pieces for him. 0:04:48.116 --> 0:04:51.116 Richard Arrington, who was the first black mare of Birmingham, 0:04:51.436 --> 0:04:54.956 used to call Ron McDowell Mack, which suits him perfectly. 0:04:55.596 --> 0:04:58.036 He has an air of mischief about him, which we'll 0:04:58.036 --> 0:04:58.356 get to. 0:04:59.636 --> 0:05:03.836 That Pictures of Man Johnny Cochrane Spy Lean Natalie Cole 0:05:04.516 --> 0:05:06.796 that's in the state capital, the first African American painting 0:05:06.836 --> 0:05:09.476 hanging in the state of Alabama to Bosa Parks. Governor 0:05:09.516 --> 0:05:10.756 Seglement commission me to do that. 0:05:12.436 --> 0:05:15.636 Mack did the statue in Kelly Ingram Park. He's the 0:05:15.636 --> 0:05:25.796 one responsible. Birmingham is a strange and beautiful place. It 0:05:25.876 --> 0:05:28.756 was a steel town like Pittsburgh was, and at the 0:05:28.796 --> 0:05:30.796 height of the steel industry, there was a lot of 0:05:30.836 --> 0:05:34.076 money there. There's an enormous hill on the south side 0:05:34.116 --> 0:05:37.196 of town, Mountain Brook, with a gorgeous country club and 0:05:37.316 --> 0:05:41.756 graceful pre war homes. That's the wealthy white part of Birmingham. 0:05:42.516 --> 0:05:45.636 Down the hill is the other Birmingham, where blacks and 0:05:45.636 --> 0:05:49.556 whites lived in uneasy proximity. They used to call Birmingham 0:05:49.756 --> 0:05:54.596 the Johannesburg of the South, or Bombingham, because bombs were 0:05:54.596 --> 0:05:56.956 a weapon of choice for white supremacists who wanted to 0:05:57.036 --> 0:06:00.756 keep black people in their place. There's an old joke 0:06:00.796 --> 0:06:03.436 from that period that tells you all you really need 0:06:03.476 --> 0:06:06.316 to know. A black man in Chicago wakes up one 0:06:06.316 --> 0:06:09.036 morning and tells his wife that Jesus had come to 0:06:09.196 --> 0:06:11.996 him in a dream and told him to go to Birmingham. 0:06:12.396 --> 0:06:15.676 His wife is horrified. Did Jesus say he'd go with you? 0:06:16.476 --> 0:06:22.396 The husband replies, he said, it go as far as Memphis. 0:06:23.556 --> 0:06:26.116 Birmingham was where Martin Luther King staged one of the 0:06:26.116 --> 0:06:29.796 most dramatic protests of the civil rights movement, and King 0:06:29.956 --> 0:06:33.796 chose Birmingham for a good reason. He wanted to strike 0:06:33.876 --> 0:06:37.476 at the symbol of racial oppression, to get ordinary Americans 0:06:37.556 --> 0:06:40.556 to understand just how bad things were for black people 0:06:40.596 --> 0:06:43.716 in the South. So through the long spring of nineteen 0:06:43.796 --> 0:06:47.796 sixty three, King and his people organized sit ins to 0:06:47.876 --> 0:06:53.476 protest segregation, then boycott's, then marches. They called it Project 0:06:53.636 --> 0:06:58.236 C for Confrontation. They were trying to provoke the Birmingham 0:06:58.356 --> 0:07:02.156 Chief of Police, a trogolite named Bull Connor, into doing 0:07:02.196 --> 0:07:05.676 something so outrageous that it would turn the tide of 0:07:05.676 --> 0:07:09.596 public opinion in their favor. And that's exactly what happened. 0:07:14.476 --> 0:07:19.396 May third, nineteen sixty three. King's people start at sixteenth 0:07:19.396 --> 0:07:23.156 Street Baptist Church, right next to kelly Ingram Park. They 0:07:23.196 --> 0:07:26.316 come out in waves, marching alongside the park and then 0:07:26.356 --> 0:07:30.876 continuing on through downtown Birmingham. There are huge crowds, tons 0:07:30.876 --> 0:07:34.436 of police in the middle of everything. A photographer named 0:07:34.436 --> 0:07:37.676 Bill Hudson takes a picture of a white police officer 0:07:37.716 --> 0:07:41.076 with dark sunglasses and a big german shepherd. The dog 0:07:41.156 --> 0:07:44.276 is lunging at a young black teenager. The next day, 0:07:44.596 --> 0:07:47.796 The New York Times publishes the photograph above the fold, 0:07:47.796 --> 0:07:50.636 across three columns on the front page of its weekend paper, 0:07:51.036 --> 0:07:54.676 as does basically every other major newspaper in the country. 0:07:55.796 --> 0:07:59.076 President Kennedy is asked about the photo and he's appalled. 0:07:59.756 --> 0:08:02.916 The Secretary of State says, it will quote embarrass our 0:08:02.996 --> 0:08:07.236 friends abroad and make our enemies joyful. It's discussed on 0:08:07.276 --> 0:08:11.316 the floor of Congress, Trials are written, people have debates 0:08:11.356 --> 0:08:15.476 about it. It's exactly what King wants, something to show 0:08:15.516 --> 0:08:17.756 the rest of the world, just how bad things are 0:08:17.756 --> 0:08:21.756 in the South, and the tide turns. A year later, 0:08:22.236 --> 0:08:24.796 Congress passes the Civil Rights Act, one of the most 0:08:24.836 --> 0:08:28.476 important pieces of legislation in the history of the United States. 0:08:29.356 --> 0:08:38.316 The Civil Rights Act, people always say was written in Birmingham. 0:08:38.756 --> 0:08:40.796 Kelly Ingram Park is now a shrine to the events 0:08:40.796 --> 0:08:43.996 of nineteen sixty three. The first black mayor of Birmingham, 0:08:44.156 --> 0:08:47.836 Richard Errington, takes office in nineteen seventy nine and decides 0:08:47.876 --> 0:08:50.116 to fill this little patch of history with sculptures that 0:08:50.156 --> 0:08:52.956 tell the story of the movement. He commissions one of 0:08:52.996 --> 0:08:56.196 Martin Luther King, another of Fred Shuttlesworth, who is a 0:08:56.276 --> 0:08:58.876 key leader of the Birmingham Protests. It is one of 0:08:58.876 --> 0:09:01.756 the four little girls killed when white supremacists bombed the 0:09:01.756 --> 0:09:07.076 Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in September of nineteen sixty three. Finally, 0:09:07.196 --> 0:09:10.556 Errington turns to the photo, the famous photo, for one 0:09:10.596 --> 0:09:14.116 final statue, and he calls up Mac McDowell, who has 0:09:14.196 --> 0:09:17.996 moved out to Tuskegee from California and transformed himself into 0:09:18.036 --> 0:09:20.196 a kind of house artist for the Civil rights movement. 0:09:21.636 --> 0:09:24.636 He said, I gotta get a statue done right because 0:09:24.756 --> 0:09:27.476 people at Marshton and movement are complaining about the children 0:09:27.556 --> 0:09:30.916 don't look like them. The children had white features with 0:09:30.996 --> 0:09:33.516 black hair, and there were a lot of complaints. And 0:09:33.516 --> 0:09:35.796 he said, I need you to do a design of 0:09:35.876 --> 0:09:40.076 this image, this photograph of this boy and this police 0:09:40.116 --> 0:09:42.996 officer and the dog attacking him. 0:09:43.276 --> 0:09:45.916 The other artists with sculptures in Kelly Ingram Park are 0:09:45.916 --> 0:09:51.036 big names, white men with impressive resumes. Mac a kid 0:09:51.036 --> 0:09:55.116 from the projects of Oakland, entirely self taught. He had 0:09:55.156 --> 0:09:58.236 in fact never done a sculpture before, a detail that 0:09:58.316 --> 0:10:01.836 he conveniently failed to tell Richard Arrington. The marriage just 0:10:01.876 --> 0:10:04.636 wants Mack to do some sketches provide a guide. 0:10:05.156 --> 0:10:07.636 This look on his face was a look of frustration, 0:10:07.876 --> 0:10:10.316 like nobody's doing what I want. They're not getting it, 0:10:10.396 --> 0:10:12.116 none of the sculptures. And I was like, I can't 0:10:12.156 --> 0:10:15.676 say no to him because he's powerful. Where it's a 0:10:15.676 --> 0:10:17.316 great odd you know of Birmingham. 0:10:17.476 --> 0:10:19.996 The next thing, you know, Max doing the whole thing. 0:10:20.556 --> 0:10:22.516 And I started sculpting it in three hours later I 0:10:22.556 --> 0:10:24.596 was complete, and I took it to Arrington about I 0:10:24.676 --> 0:10:26.316 wanted to think. I did it a quick side, waited 0:10:26.356 --> 0:10:27.836 a week and took it to him and he said, 0:10:27.916 --> 0:10:31.516 you got the commission? How much? And so the rest 0:10:31.636 --> 0:10:32.956 is history. 0:10:34.236 --> 0:10:37.036 It was unveiled in a special ceremony in May nineteen 0:10:37.076 --> 0:10:40.116 ninety five. It's called foot Soldier because that was the 0:10:40.196 --> 0:10:42.676 term used to describe the people who marched in Martin 0:10:42.756 --> 0:10:46.636 Luther King's army. On a statue's granite base, it reads, 0:10:47.276 --> 0:10:50.076 this sculpture is dedicated to the foot Soldiers of the 0:10:50.076 --> 0:10:53.876 Birmingham Civil Rights Movement. On a little plaque next to 0:10:53.916 --> 0:10:56.876 it is the famous photo on which the statue was based. 0:10:57.516 --> 0:10:59.036 If you want to see a picture of it, we 0:10:59.156 --> 0:11:04.236 have one up on revisionististory dot com. 0:11:04.316 --> 0:11:05.876 And the first you want to say. It was Stevie 0:11:05.876 --> 0:11:08.796 Wanders and Emmettiel's mother. And what I didn't know at 0:11:08.836 --> 0:11:11.316 the time I did the statue. When you're doing bronze, 0:11:11.316 --> 0:11:13.956 you have to smooth everything. Because I was untrained, I 0:11:13.956 --> 0:11:16.636 didn't smooth the rocks. So Steve was filling the rocks 0:11:16.636 --> 0:11:20.396 and he cut his hand and one of the men 0:11:20.436 --> 0:11:22.316 in the parks was there and he told me, he 0:11:22.356 --> 0:11:24.916 saying I'm getting blood on my hand because Stevie wanted it. 0:11:24.956 --> 0:11:25.716 I was like, oh my. 0:11:25.596 --> 0:11:30.316 God, it's it's almost it's almost biblical. It's almost like 0:11:30.396 --> 0:11:32.836 he's blessing the park with his blood. 0:11:33.036 --> 0:11:36.316 Yeah, Stevie got cut on those rocks that I folked. 0:11:36.316 --> 0:11:36.396 It. 0:11:38.436 --> 0:11:41.836 Foot Soldier is the most powerful sculpture in kelly Ingram Park. 0:11:42.396 --> 0:11:45.956 Nothing else comes close. And maybe that's where the trouble starts. 0:11:49.356 --> 0:11:51.716 The name of the police officer in the photograph was 0:11:51.836 --> 0:11:55.796 Richard Middleton. Everyone called him Dick. His best friend on 0:11:55.836 --> 0:11:59.236 the force was Bobby Hayes. Big guy lives near a 0:11:59.236 --> 0:12:02.236 golf course outside Birmingham. Must be in his eighties by now. 0:12:02.876 --> 0:12:06.356 Hayes and Middleton started as police officers in Birmingham right 0:12:06.436 --> 0:12:09.076 at the moment when the civil rights movement was asserting itself. 0:12:10.036 --> 0:12:12.516 The police department was all white and all male back then, 0:12:12.996 --> 0:12:15.876 but in the streets the balance of power was shifting. 0:12:16.676 --> 0:12:20.636 When integration came to the Birmingham school system, Hayes remembers 0:12:20.676 --> 0:12:21.716 it as bewildering. 0:12:22.676 --> 0:12:28.876 If you were a cop, nobody really liked you because 0:12:30.756 --> 0:12:33.276 we were carrying the black kids in the school. That's 0:12:33.316 --> 0:12:35.276 what we were ordered to do, and they were going 0:12:35.356 --> 0:12:37.956 to get in. That's just the way it was. We 0:12:38.036 --> 0:12:42.716 had no choice. The black people didn't like you because 0:12:42.756 --> 0:12:45.996 you were a policeman. The white people didn't like you 0:12:46.036 --> 0:12:48.796 because you're protecting the black kids and carrying the men 0:12:48.956 --> 0:12:55.156 where the crowd the goofies didn't want them to go. 0:12:56.116 --> 0:13:00.596 In nineteen sixty three, King's protest campaign was headquartered in 0:13:00.676 --> 0:13:04.116 sixteen Street Baptist Church, which is an old red brick 0:13:04.156 --> 0:13:07.676 building on the northwest corner of kelly Ingram Park. The 0:13:07.716 --> 0:13:10.836 protesters would come out in the afternoon march around the 0:13:10.836 --> 0:13:14.156 park on their way downtown. They were trained in nonviolence, 0:13:14.596 --> 0:13:18.436 marched according to a strict schedule. It was a military operation. 0:13:19.236 --> 0:13:21.796 Crowds of people would gather to see the spectacle. The 0:13:21.836 --> 0:13:25.316 police were supposed to keep the protesters and the crowd apart. 0:13:26.836 --> 0:13:30.116 The protests get bigger and bigger, the crowds get bigger 0:13:30.156 --> 0:13:32.916 and bigger. It's late spring, so it's starting to get 0:13:32.956 --> 0:13:36.916 really hot. The police chief Bull Connor starts locking up 0:13:36.956 --> 0:13:40.316 everyone he can. Then Connor says, to how with it, 0:13:40.676 --> 0:13:42.116 bring in the dogs. 0:13:42.916 --> 0:13:46.356 Of course, there's a lot of noise, a lot of 0:13:46.436 --> 0:13:49.636 tension in the air, a lot of people yelling and screaming. 0:13:50.476 --> 0:13:56.196 Bricks started coming in, you know, throwing bricks. It got 0:13:56.236 --> 0:14:00.716 to be a really ugly slight real quick, real quick. 0:14:01.796 --> 0:14:04.796 Dick Middleton, the cop in the photo, was a member 0:14:04.836 --> 0:14:08.036 of the city's canine unit. He had a German shepherd 0:14:08.156 --> 0:14:11.036 named Leo. He and the other members of the tactical 0:14:11.116 --> 0:14:14.476 unit were posted behind a barricade, a row of wooden 0:14:14.636 --> 0:14:18.276 saw horses running parallel to the curb. There's a line 0:14:18.276 --> 0:14:20.716 of cops and dogs in a kind of no man's 0:14:20.796 --> 0:14:23.876 land between the bystanders and the protesters. 0:14:25.116 --> 0:14:29.236 He was inside the barricade. The crowd was on the 0:14:29.276 --> 0:14:33.276 other side, and they were taunting the police, and of 0:14:33.356 --> 0:14:35.716 course all we could do is just stand at the police. 0:14:35.836 --> 0:14:39.316 All they just stand there. At that time, Dick was 0:14:39.356 --> 0:14:43.276 well back the way. He told me he was ten 0:14:43.916 --> 0:14:48.716 yards maybe back of the barricades, and the guy came 0:14:48.836 --> 0:14:51.716 round a barricade. 0:14:52.036 --> 0:14:54.596 So here we have a foot soldier in the middle 0:14:54.636 --> 0:14:57.476 of all the mayhem, cutting through the no man's land 0:14:57.516 --> 0:15:02.316 towards the sidewalk, and Middleton's German shepherd, Leo, lunges at him. 0:15:02.796 --> 0:15:06.116 That's the moment Bill Hudson captures in his famous photograph, 0:15:06.436 --> 0:15:10.476 and Ron mc dowell captures in his statue the confrontation 0:15:10.676 --> 0:15:14.396 between the innocent foot soldier and the snarling face of 0:15:14.556 --> 0:15:19.596 racial oppression. Bill Hudson's editor says later that he picked 0:15:19.596 --> 0:15:22.276 that particular photo out of the many taken that day 0:15:22.636 --> 0:15:26.276 because he was riveted by the saintly calm of the 0:15:26.316 --> 0:15:29.276 young man and the snarling jaws of the German shepherd. 0:15:33.436 --> 0:15:35.996 Here's where the story starts to get complicated. 0:15:37.676 --> 0:15:42.036 This is an interview today on Saturday, May twenty fifth, 0:15:42.156 --> 0:15:46.196 nineteen ninety six at the Birmingham Service Answer Too, with 0:15:46.476 --> 0:15:52.196 mister Walter Gaston of Atlanta, Georgia. Okay, how did you 0:15:52.236 --> 0:15:53.996 get involved in the civil rights movement? 0:15:55.356 --> 0:16:00.916 Now, that's one thing that I always had a problem with. 0:16:02.156 --> 0:16:04.756 I never did get involved with the civil rights movement. 0:16:05.556 --> 0:16:08.556 Walter Gadsden is the boy in the photograph, the one 0:16:08.596 --> 0:16:12.556 bitten by Leo. He's a mysterious figure. He was interviewed 0:16:12.556 --> 0:16:15.076 at the time of the photograph by Jet magazine back 0:16:15.076 --> 0:16:19.196 in nineteen sixty three, but only briefly. From time to time, 0:16:19.596 --> 0:16:21.596 other people have come forward to say that they were 0:16:21.596 --> 0:16:24.516 the one in the photograph, not Gadsden, but those claims 0:16:24.516 --> 0:16:29.556 seem dubious. Meanwhile, Gadsden disappears, people try and find him 0:16:29.556 --> 0:16:33.276 in can't. All that seems to exist is this oral 0:16:33.356 --> 0:16:36.116 history that you're hearing done in honor of the unveiling 0:16:36.116 --> 0:16:41.116 of Ron McDowell's statue. And the interview is strange because 0:16:41.156 --> 0:16:43.636 it doesn't go the way the interviewer thinks it's going 0:16:43.676 --> 0:16:48.516 to go. She starts with the obvious question, you were 0:16:48.556 --> 0:16:51.396 a foot soldier. Tell me how that came about? And 0:16:51.436 --> 0:16:53.596 he says, I wasn't a foot soldier. 0:16:53.996 --> 0:16:58.596 But the fact is, the day of that movement, I 0:16:58.636 --> 0:17:01.836 was supposed to have been in school, but a friend 0:17:01.916 --> 0:17:05.996 of my acquaintance of mine had told me that earlier 0:17:06.076 --> 0:17:08.676 that Martin Luther Gaine was him down that day and 0:17:08.916 --> 0:17:14.396 he was going to be there. And I said I 0:17:14.436 --> 0:17:16.516 wanted to be there too. I wanted to come and 0:17:16.596 --> 0:17:18.236 thrit out what it was all a battle. 0:17:18.876 --> 0:17:23.276 Walter Gadsden is a bystander. The famous statue in kelly 0:17:23.436 --> 0:17:26.916 Ingram Park foot Soldier is not in fact of a 0:17:26.956 --> 0:17:29.956 foot soldier. It gets stranger, okay. 0:17:29.996 --> 0:17:32.876 And when you go to school? Where did you come downtown. 0:17:33.876 --> 0:17:37.276 To the park area? The kelly Ingram Park over there. 0:17:37.716 --> 0:17:42.236 So we started walking toward the activity, and as I 0:17:42.316 --> 0:17:45.756 approached and got closer, they turned and looked with me, 0:17:45.956 --> 0:17:49.036 and I saw it coming toward me, so I turned 0:17:49.036 --> 0:17:49.676 to lee. 0:17:50.396 --> 0:17:53.596 He was walking down the street with the protesters coming 0:17:53.676 --> 0:17:56.316 towards him. So he veers off to get out of 0:17:56.356 --> 0:18:00.316 their way and rejoin the spectators on the sidewalk. Duckson 0:18:00.396 --> 0:18:03.756 behind the row of sawhorses, where he runs into officers 0:18:03.796 --> 0:18:05.116 Middleton and Leo. 0:18:06.276 --> 0:18:08.436 So as I turned and started to walk away, I 0:18:08.516 --> 0:18:08.916 was great. 0:18:09.636 --> 0:18:12.556 And the rest of it are about the policeman Gray 0:18:12.636 --> 0:18:15.876 about the policeman and yank toward him. 0:18:16.156 --> 0:18:19.276 Does that happen? The dog bits you there? 0:18:19.276 --> 0:18:21.796 As I can remember that that happened simultaneously. 0:18:23.396 --> 0:18:23.796 Did you go. 0:18:25.276 --> 0:18:28.116 The policeman gray at me? I don't remember what hand, 0:18:28.196 --> 0:18:30.996 but the dog the gray at me with one hand. 0:18:32.956 --> 0:18:35.636 It happened so fast there was nothing to do except 0:18:35.716 --> 0:18:37.556 throw up the leg and try to protect usself. 0:18:37.676 --> 0:18:41.316 And as I was doing that, there I went. Yeah. 0:18:43.676 --> 0:18:47.596 If you look at the famous photo, Gasden's explanation makes sense. 0:18:48.556 --> 0:18:52.156 Leo is lunging. The bite is a millisecond away. But 0:18:52.236 --> 0:18:55.836 Gaston and Middleton just look startled, the way people do 0:18:55.876 --> 0:18:59.396 if they unexpectedly bump into each other. Gaston has his 0:18:59.476 --> 0:19:02.636 knee up as a reflex and his hand on Middleton 0:19:02.716 --> 0:19:06.396 as if to steady himself. Middleton has one hand on 0:19:06.516 --> 0:19:10.836 Gadsden and his other arm is flexed. He's yanking back 0:19:10.876 --> 0:19:14.276 on the leash. Leo has freaked out and he's trying 0:19:14.276 --> 0:19:19.796 to restrain him. Leo whoa. Middleton's colleague, Bobby Hayes made 0:19:19.796 --> 0:19:23.516 the same point to me. Middleton's not letting Leo loose 0:19:23.596 --> 0:19:25.596 on Gadsden. Quite the opposite. 0:19:25.876 --> 0:19:28.716 If you look at the picture, you can tell he's 0:19:28.716 --> 0:19:33.836 holding the dog back the lion's taunt the dog feeder 0:19:33.916 --> 0:19:37.436 in the air the best I recall, and Dick got 0:19:37.516 --> 0:19:41.596 him here. He's holding that line. He don't only invite 0:19:41.676 --> 0:19:42.156 that guy. 0:19:45.596 --> 0:19:48.236 Now, what does Gadsden say about all this. Does he 0:19:48.316 --> 0:19:51.476 think he's been the victim of police brutality? Not at all. 0:19:52.036 --> 0:19:55.316 In fact, he can't seem to understand why everyone makes 0:19:55.316 --> 0:19:57.356 such a big deal out of what happened to him 0:19:57.356 --> 0:19:57.756 that day. 0:19:58.356 --> 0:20:03.236 How does your family members react to your participation, Well, 0:20:03.236 --> 0:20:07.036 they were angry because I didn't attend school that day. 0:20:07.956 --> 0:20:11.596 He appears in an image that transfixed the world, and 0:20:11.636 --> 0:20:15.076 his parents are mad that he skipped school. The interviewer 0:20:15.196 --> 0:20:18.156 then tries to get at Gadsden's connections to the struggle 0:20:18.196 --> 0:20:19.196 for civil rights. 0:20:19.436 --> 0:20:22.596 Okay, well, the church where your parents or your family 0:20:22.636 --> 0:20:25.556 members were attending, were they involved in the civil rights 0:20:25.556 --> 0:20:26.476 movement during that time? 0:20:26.636 --> 0:20:29.956 You know they never told me of it. Okay. 0:20:30.836 --> 0:20:35.156 What benefits do you your family in the community realize 0:20:35.196 --> 0:20:37.756 as a result of that movement? 0:20:38.636 --> 0:20:40.876 None. 0:20:41.716 --> 0:20:44.716 In answer to the question what benefits did your family 0:20:44.756 --> 0:20:49.156 receive from the civil rights movement, he answers none. He's 0:20:49.196 --> 0:20:53.476 not having any of it. Gadsden's interview, in fact, just 0:20:53.756 --> 0:20:54.756 gets weirder. 0:20:55.516 --> 0:20:56.436 Okay, if you were. 0:20:56.316 --> 0:20:59.996 In control of an organization or a movement of such 0:21:00.716 --> 0:21:03.476 and could go back and change some things, what would 0:21:03.516 --> 0:21:04.956 you change? 0:21:05.236 --> 0:21:05.676 Okay? 0:21:06.196 --> 0:21:12.476 The things that would change would be a more careful 0:21:12.676 --> 0:21:19.196 choice of people involved. 0:21:19.996 --> 0:21:25.756 In all of those movements. There are too many, well 0:21:25.836 --> 0:21:32.076 the big just blunt, crooked people. Many of the people 0:21:32.156 --> 0:21:35.916 that were involved and had no abiety became too crooked. 0:21:38.516 --> 0:21:41.556 The most famous photograph of the Civil rights movement is 0:21:41.596 --> 0:21:45.436 of a startled cop trying desperately to hold his dog 0:21:45.596 --> 0:21:49.316 back from biting a bystander who wasn't that much of 0:21:49.356 --> 0:21:50.676 a fan of the civil rights movement. 0:21:51.116 --> 0:21:55.036 I'm wondering, Steel, why mean, because I've never had any 0:21:55.076 --> 0:21:56.956 notoriety whatsoever. 0:21:56.516 --> 0:21:59.596 Concerning that picture. That picture was in the paper, but 0:21:59.876 --> 0:22:04.116 many other people were too, Yes, many other situations. 0:22:04.236 --> 0:22:09.236 Plus it's Bonnie, yes, but they chose to use a 0:22:09.276 --> 0:22:11.956 lip boy at fifteen of that statue. 0:22:11.676 --> 0:22:13.796 The little boy in aves put up a little boy 0:22:13.836 --> 0:22:14.396 in size. 0:22:15.756 --> 0:22:18.556 Are you surprised when you found out about it? 0:22:19.076 --> 0:22:21.876 I was totally flabbergas cause I don't know who to thin. 0:22:23.596 --> 0:22:27.476 And Gadsden's main objection he's light skinned, he says, The 0:22:27.516 --> 0:22:29.236 statue makes him look dark skinned. 0:22:30.196 --> 0:22:33.636 That statue doesn't look like me. It looks like a 0:22:33.716 --> 0:22:36.516 totally different boy. That looks like an African boy. 0:22:38.836 --> 0:22:40.636 What do you feel about it looks like African boy? 0:22:40.836 --> 0:22:44.636 It looks like an African boy. 0:22:45.556 --> 0:22:49.996 Uh, the color of the features, the features, the lips, 0:22:50.356 --> 0:22:51.156 the size. 0:22:52.596 --> 0:22:54.836 You take a look at the pictured air and the 0:22:54.876 --> 0:22:59.356 statue air the boy short. I was tall for my ads. 0:23:00.236 --> 0:23:02.876 If you listen to the whole interview, it nearly goes 0:23:02.876 --> 0:23:06.076 off the rails. At this point, the interviewer expected to 0:23:06.116 --> 0:23:10.116 find a heroic civil rights veteran. Instead, she's getting a 0:23:10.156 --> 0:23:12.836 grumpy old man still wedded to some of the oldest 0:23:12.916 --> 0:23:14.956 and most awkward of black prejudices. 0:23:15.836 --> 0:23:18.556 We're very proud of it, and I hope you will 0:23:18.596 --> 0:23:21.756 be too. And now that we know who you are, 0:23:21.916 --> 0:23:26.916 we can add a name under there. But you with 0:23:27.076 --> 0:23:29.676 the young boy, let's comet tore used. 0:23:32.596 --> 0:23:41.196 Well, M, I'm still wondering why after all the information 0:23:41.356 --> 0:23:45.836 that I had given, and and and all that, all 0:23:45.956 --> 0:23:49.996 that established me as being a young African boy, which 0:23:49.996 --> 0:23:50.276 I'm not. 0:23:54.956 --> 0:23:57.276 You prefer being called a negro. 0:23:58.236 --> 0:24:00.796 I prefer being called what I am, a colored? 0:24:00.996 --> 0:24:03.116 Oh oh, you prefer you were colored? 0:24:03.596 --> 0:24:04.556 I am? 0:24:04.036 --> 0:24:15.356 Okay, okay, euphemism and evasion. At the beginning, I said 0:24:15.396 --> 0:24:17.396 that what I object to is the way so many 0:24:17.436 --> 0:24:21.716 stories about race get cleaned up, sanitized, so the brown 0:24:21.756 --> 0:24:25.356 decision becomes a fairy tale in which black people triumph 0:24:25.436 --> 0:24:29.916 without effort. Well, here's the flip side. When we stop 0:24:29.996 --> 0:24:34.636 evading and just listen, it gets complicated. Our hero, Walter 0:24:34.716 --> 0:24:38.516