“truly the most important thing you can do with your time while in Tuscaloosa”

I just wanted to give another round of thanks for today's tour. It truly meant a lot to both of us to be able to attend. Recently, Erica and I have struggled with the seeming absurdity of today's political and social climate. The context given through today's tour brought us face to face with both our history as Southerners and the fight for the civil rights of all Americans. You gave a more realistic (albeit, haunting) understanding of not only our past but also of where we are now and of the things we are still fighting for. I attended the University here from 2015-2019 and since have found a home in the Tuscaloosa community. All the while, I had never heard of the Stand At The Schoolhouse Door, or of Bloody Tuesday and the violence that ensued. I have had many lunches upon the rocks of the Capitol building, ran many times over the sidewalks in which men and women were beaten and bloodied. The tour today was nothing short of illuminating. I think that growing up, particularly at my age and in the South, we are confronted with a portrait of civil rights and Alabama history that has been tailored, washed, and set neatly alongside concepts such as the Revolutionary War, or the settling of the North America--as finished, completed pieces of a distant history. For someone as young as I, it is too easy to brush off current concerns for equality under the guise that we are already there or that the work has already been done. Again, finished. It is too easy to forget there are people, like Maxie Thomas, that are still living and that the horrors of the past have not all been banished, are not lingering in some dark alley, but instead are still allowed to walk proudly through the streets and are still being protected and proliferated in the same convoluted legislature that allowed such horrors to flourish some 60, 100, 300 years ago. These are things that weigh heavily on my mind. In my experience thus far, it is rare to find a space in the South in which this history can be discussed, openly and honestly, and for these reasons, I truly value both your and Maxie's time today.