Civil Rights' most harrowing year

In 1963, racial tensions came to a head in Birmingham. The results changed the course of history.

Birmingham, 1963
(Image credit: The Associated Press)
Lauren Hansen
By
published
(Image credit: College student Dorothy Bell, 19, of Birmingham, Alabama, waits in a downtown lunch counter for service that never came. She was later arrested with 20 other demonstrators.)

(Image credit: Al Hibbler, right, leads a line of sign-carrying demonstrators downtown.)

(Image credit: A police officer frisks a demonstrator following his arrest for an attempted sit-in at a downtown lunch counter.)

(Image credit: A 6-year-old girl waits for a policeman to take her name before she is led away to a police truck. More than 450 school children were arrested for protesting against racial discrimination.)

(Image credit: Young demonstrators sit on the sidewalk with hands behind their heads as high-pressure hoses are turned on their backs during a demonstration.)

(Image credit: Police lead a group of young students to jail after they are arrested for protesting against racial discrimination near city hall.)

(Image credit: A 17-year-old civil rights demonstrator is attacked by a police dog.)

(Image credit: Teenage girls sit around in clusters in a building at the city fairgrounds where they are being held as wards of the juvenile court.)

(Image credit: A young woman is sprayed by a fireman's hose as an anti-segregation march is broken up by police.)

(Image credit: A stream of water from a high-pressure hose hits demonstrators as they protested segregation measures in the city.)

(Image credit: The blast from the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing damaged cars parked in the street and blew out the windows from the stores.)

(Image credit: The family of Carol Robertson, a 14-year-old girl killed in the church bombing, attend graveside services for her in Birmingham.)

Lauren Hansen
Lauren Hansen

Lauren Hansen produces The Week’s podcasts and videos and edits the photo blog, Captured. She also manages the production of the magazine's iPad app. A graduate of Kenyon College and Northwestern University, she previously worked at the BBC and Frontline. She knows a thing or two about pretty pictures and cute puppies, both of which she tweets about @mylaurenhansen.

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