"Selma is Now": How the past parallels the present

Amelia Boynton was 50 years old when she marched for voting rights for African Americans in Selma, Alabama, in 1965. The insurance salesman was instrumental in establishing a group that registered Black residents to vote in Dallas County, which includes Selma.

As the march began, over the Edmund Pettus Bridge, police violently cracked down on the peaceful protestors in what would eventually be known as "Bloody Sunday." A photograph of Boynton, laying on the ground unconscious, is among the 40 newly-enhanced photographs from that day now on display at the African American Research Library and Cultural Center in Fort Lauderdale.

“ Her face is beginning to swell because she's been beaten and standing over her is an Alabama State Trooper who just—  I just really am struck by the look of satisfaction that that Alabama State Trooper has on his face,” said Dr. Tameka Hobbs, regional manager at the center.

The Spider Martin Collection

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Courtesy: Doug McCraw

The exhibition "Selma is Now" includes photographs, taken by Spider Martin, of famous figures like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., John Lewis, and Hosea Williams.

Hobbs says that while there is video of the events of “Bloody Sunday,” the photographs allow visitors to linger on the details of the historic march. Its also caused people to draw comparisons between the police response in Selma and the ongoing protests against ICE presence in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

“There's a shot of a line of Alabama State Troopers standing at the ready and people instantly make a comparison to ICE agents,” she said.

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Doug McCraw, who owns the photographs on display said those parallels were unintentional when he was curating the collection last year, but now they are unavoidable.

“ It is more timely right now than I ever could have possibly imagined when the exhibition was being put together. I say that in regret and disappointment, but it's the truth that we're experiencing right now,” he said.

Hobbs says she hopes the exhibit can teach the lessons of the past to ensure a better future.

“[The state troopers'] faces are forever frozen on the wrong side of history, doing things that we now can appreciate as being undemocratic, as being racist.” she said, “What will people be saying about us 60 or 61 years from this moment?”

The Spider Martin Collection

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Courtesy: Doug McCraw

IF YOU GO
What: “Selma is Now” exhibit
When: Until June 27th
Where: The African American American Research Library and Cultural Center in Fort Lauderdale