The Intricacies of Narratives

2025 Spring Series Episode 1: How Lies Become Truth

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Summary

This engaging webinar, hosted by the Living Legacy Project, dives into the complexities of how narratives around historical events take shape and influence perception. The episode, titled "How Lies Become Truth," focuses on the 1965 murder of Reverend James Reeb in Selma, Alabama. Reggie Harris opens the session with soulful music from the civil rights movement, setting a tone of reflection and activism. The core discussion involves Chip Brantley and Andrew Beck Grace, creators of the NPR podcast "White Lies," who spent several years investigating the counternarrative that arose in white Selma about Reeb's death. Their conversation with Gordon Gibson reveals how these false narratives perpetuate and the challenges of uncovering the truth in deeply divided communities. The webinar concluded with a call to action to continue preserving honest histories and engaging with the living legacy of social justice.

Highlights

Reggie Harris captivates the audience with powerful songs from the civil rights movement 🎤.
Chip Brantley and Andrew Beck Grace unravel the complexities behind the narrative of Reverend James Reeb’s death 🕵️‍♂️.
Explores how entrenched local myths can overshadow documented truths and how they are perpetuated 📚.
Audience gains insight into the intensive process and ethical considerations of true-crime and historical journalism 📻.
Encouragement to engage in meaningful historical tours and webinars with the Living Legacy Project 🚍.

Key Takeaways

Reggie Harris sets an inspiring tone with civil rights songs that foster community and resilience 🎶.
The NPR podcast "White Lies" delves into the counternarratives around Reverend James Reeb's death, exploring the battle between truth and myth in civil rights history 📜.
Despite common obstacles, Chip Brantley and Andrew Beck Grace's investigation highlights the power of perseverance in uncovering facts against entrenched local myths 💪.
The conversation underscores the difficulty but necessity of engaging across divides to construct honest historical narratives in contemporary society 🏛️.
Webinar attendees are reminded of the importance of supporting ongoing projects like the Living Legacy Project to maintain and expand the fight for social justice ✊.

Overview

The kickoff of the 2025 Spring Series by the Living Legacy Project was nothing short of captivating, with Reggie Harris setting a somber yet invigorating stage with his music rooted in the civil rights movement. His songs, famous in historical marches and protests, echoed resilience and unity, reminding us of the potent role music played then—and continues to play—in social justice movements.

At the heart of this session were Chip Brantley and Andrew Beck Grace, two determined journalists from the NPR podcast "White Lies," who embarked on a compelling journey to elucidate the truth behind Reverend James Reeb's death. Delving into their investigative processes, they shed light on how counternarratives serve to muddy historical waters, often propagated by deeply ingrained community beliefs rather than facts.

In an engaging discussion moderated by the Reverend Dr. Gordon Gibson, viewers were drawn into the painstaking efforts used to unravel old lies and the broader implications of these narratives on today's efforts for racial equality. Participants were encouraged to support ongoing educational efforts through the Living Legacy Project to ensure that history is not just preserved but honestly told.

Chapters

00:00 - 05:30: Introduction and Music Performance The chapter begins with a music performance, setting the stage for an engaging introduction. It captures the ambiance of a live event with music playing and a welcoming evening greeting.
05:30 - 15:00: Discussion on Civil Rights Movement Songs The first edition of the spring education series of the Living Legacy Project begins with a warm welcome from Reggie Harris, the musical education director. He expresses excitement about the evening and hints at providing some music before delving into a night filled with education and inspiration, specifically focusing on the discussion of songs from the Civil Rights Movement.
15:00 - 17:00: Introduction to the Webinar Series The chapter introduces the webinar series focused on civil rights movement through music. The speaker plans to sing several songs that played a crucial role in maintaining unity and energy within the movement. The emphasis is on the influence these songs had on mobilizing people and their ongoing relevance. Participants are encouraged to sing along, highlighting the community spirit these songs invoke.
17:00 - 31:00: Guest Introduction and NPR Podcast "White Lies" The chapter is titled 'Guest Introduction and NPR Podcast "White Lies"'. It begins with a discussion about the goals of a movement. As part of setting the mood for an inspirational evening, there's an encouragement to sing a song together, specifically 'Wade in the Water'. The provided transcript includes a call-and-response style interaction, urging the audience or participants to engage with the song and reflect on the collective journey and goals. There's also an ambiance of music that plays an integral role, enhancing the communal sense of purpose and motivation.
31:00 - 46:00: Investigation into Jim Reeb's Story This chapter explores Jim Reeb's story, immersing the reader in themes of faith and perseverance as exemplified by the imagery of 'wading in the water,' a metaphor for navigating challenges and uncertainties. The recurring motif of 'God's going to trouble the water' suggests divine intervention, testing, or change. The reference to children 'dressed in red' may symbolize martyrdom, sacrifice, or a state of readiness to face trials, aligning with Jim Reeb's legacy of activism and courage.
46:00 - 55:00: Challenges in Investigative Journalism The chapter title is 'Challenges in Investigative Journalism', but the provided transcript seems unrelated to journalism or investigation, involving instead a spiritual or reflective context mentioning biblical references and a setting involving comfort and contemplation. It might be metaphorically related to the themes of change and readiness for action. Without more context or connection to journalism, the chapter's connection to the title is unclear.
55:00 - 68:00: Efforts to Uncover the Truth The chapter titled 'Efforts to Uncover the Truth' appears to be centered around themes of connection and revelation during challenging times. The narrative seems to encourage viewers or participants to share moments with loved ones, suggesting an atmosphere charged with emotional or significant 'vibes' that are conveyed through a screen, indicating perhaps a digital or broadcasted medium. Further, the text hints at a spiritual or divine intervention, referencing a transformation or juxtaposition with the phrase 'God's going to trouble the water,' alongside an imagery of children 'dressed in blue,' suggesting innocence, potential, or a significant future role.
68:00 - 74:00: Importance of Accurate Historical Narratives This chapter delves into the significance of maintaining accurate historical records and narratives, emphasizing the impact these have on shaping collective memory and cultural identity.
74:00 - 87:00: Current Challenges in Historical Documentation The chapter discusses the existing challenges in documenting history accurately and comprehensively. It highlights how traditional methods might not adequately capture the nuances and complexities of historical events, thus complicating the process of historical analysis and understanding.
87:00 - 90:00: Audience Engagement and Future Pilgrimages The chapter delves into the theme of audience engagement through the use of historical songs that have been instrumental in movements for justice and freedom. Particularly, it mentions a song associated with the Underground Railroad, illustrating how art and music have influenced societal change. It also suggests the continuation of this journey toward freedom and justice in future endeavors. This engagement aims to build on the legacy of past movements and propel them into future pilgrimages towards greater equity.

2025 Spring Series Episode 1: How Lies Become Truth Transcription

00:00 - 00:30 [Music] Good evening. and
00:30 - 01:00 welcome to this the first edition of this spring education series of the living legacy project. You are in the right place. And if you're not in the right place, well, why don't you stay anyway? I'm Reggie Harris. I'm the musical education director for the Living Legacy Project. So thrilled to have you with us tonight. I'm going to provide some music before we begin this very exciting evening of education, inspiration,
01:00 - 01:30 and I'll be singing a few songs related to the civil rights movement. And you can feel free to sing along because these are all songs that were sung in community, continue to be sung to this day. But we know that the songs were the glue that kept those in the movement energized and feeling like they could have an impact on a nation that very
01:30 - 02:00 much needed what the movement was trying to achieve. So, we're all still waiting in the water. So, sing that with me as we get ourselves ready for an evening of inspiration. [Music] M hey chorus goes say wait in the water wait in the water children wait in
02:00 - 02:30 the water. God's going to trouble the water. Say wait in the water. Wait in the water, children. Wait in the water. God's going to trouble the water. Say who with those children all the dressed in red. God's going to trouble
02:30 - 03:00 the water. They must be the ones that Moses led. God's going to trouble the waters. And who with God's children all are dressed in white? God's going to trouble the water. Must be the ones getting ready to fly. Say, "God's going to trouble the water." I hope you are sitting there maybe with a tasty beverage in front of you or you're sitting there
03:00 - 03:30 with someone that you love or at least like tonight. You're going to be feeling the vibes of the movement coming right through this screen. And also this is going to be a program that is very timely as we face a very challenging time. Who with those children are the dressed in blue. God's going to trouble the water. They must be the ones made it
03:30 - 04:00 through. Say going to trouble the water. Well, who with those children all dressed in white? God's going to trouble the water. Must be the ones that are ready to fly. God's going to trouble them. Sing it with me. Say, "Wait in the water." Wait in the water, children. Way in the
04:00 - 04:30 water. God's going to trouble the water. Way in the water. Wait in the water, children. Wait in the water. God's going to trouble the water. God's going to trouble the Sing that over. Sing. God's going to trouble the water. Well, God's going to trouble the water. Say, God's going to trouble the
04:30 - 05:00 water. Hey, God's going to trouble the world. Well, welcome, welcome, welcome. We know that that particular song is a song that has been part of the movement toward justice and freedom since really the Underground Railroad and since the uh
05:00 - 05:30 1700s, people singing into the desire to find freedom and justice. And welcome tonight as we continue to um celebrate the fact, yes, celebrate the fact that for all of that time, brave and courageous people of different races and colors and creeds and backgrounds have been seeking to make a difference. And tonight, we're going to be having an amazing amazing discussion uh uh some
05:30 - 06:00 information on how we can deal with this very challenging time in which we find ourselves. I'm really excited because this very week uh at the end of the week, I'll be flying uh down to Savannah, Georgia for our very first pilgrimage in the Low Country in South Carolina and uh in uh uh Georgia. And um and we'll be singing some of those songs as well. songs that were birthed in that place in America where rice was being
06:00 - 06:30 grown and where slavery had a very firm foothold in the 1600s. Uh folks keeping their history alive on John's Island and in Charleston, South Carolina. Uh song sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my lord, I know the road. The songs galvanized communities as they sang and they reminded themselves that even those who were in slavery could have power if they stayed in community.
06:30 - 07:00 Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my Lord, I know the road. Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord, I know the road. I say, sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, of my Lord, I know the road. Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord, I know the road. They sang to remind themselves to
07:00 - 07:30 stay aware of opportunities to escape. And if they themselves could not escape, stay aware of opportunities where they could help somebody else. We're talking community here. Well, don't you know the road by the singing of the song? Yes, my Lord, I know the road. Don't you know the road by the singing of the song? Yes, Lord, I know the road. Well, don't you know the road by the praying of the prayer? Yes, my Lord,
07:30 - 08:00 I know the road. Don't you know the road by the praying of the prayer? Yes, Lord, I know the road. I see sheep. Sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my Lord, I know the road. Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord. Yes, my Lord. I say, sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my Lord, I know the road. Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord, I
08:00 - 08:30 know the road. Well, oh sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my Lord, I know that road. Oh, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord, I know the road. Well, I say, sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, my Lord, I know the road. Sheep, sheep, don't you know the road? Yes, Lord, I know the
08:30 - 09:00 road. Well, welcome again. I'm Reggie Harris, musical education director for the Living Legacy Project, and we have got an amazing, amazing webinar for you tonight. So, I want to say thank you so much for joining us. Thank you so much for singing. And I'm going to turn this back over to our director of operations, Annette Marquee, and she's going to introduce you into this
09:00 - 09:30 marvelous night of inspiration and information. So get comfortable and be ready to be inspired. Annette, it's all yours. Thank you, Reggie. And um it is great to have you all here tonight. It's it's such an honor to start this webinar series and we're very excited about it. And I'm going to pass it directly to our
09:30 - 10:00 illustrious um the Reverend Dr. Gordon Gibson who will take things from there. Well, thank you in that. Uh this this is going to be an interesting evening. We have two excellent guests and uh I think I think we'll find that um some stimulating discussion of how a flatout lie can really take hold in a
10:00 - 10:30 community and have a lasting effect. So we have two guests with us tonight. Uh Chip Brantley is a co-host of the NPR podcast White Lies, which was a finalist for the 2020 Puliter Prize in audio Reporting and recipient of the Edward R. Muro Award for best podcasts given in
10:30 - 11:00 2024. This is quality work that was done. He's the author of the book The Perfect Fruit. Uh Chip's work has appeared in Slate, Gourmet. I think he likes food. Uh the Oxford American, New York Times, and the Washington Post among other places. Uh an instructor in journalism at the University of Alabama. Chip uh helps with the Desert Island Supply Company, a nonprofit creative writing
11:00 - 11:30 program for students in Birmingham, Alabama. So, welcome, Chip. Good to have you here. And thank you, Gordon. His sidekick, his partner in this uh sidekick's right, Gordon. in the White Lies podcast uh was Andrew Beck Grace
11:30 - 12:00 uh co-host and producer of the uh NPR podcast White Lies. Uh his work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Usual Suspects, PBS, uh Independent Lens. uh his film Eating Alabama premiered at SXSW, which I think South by Southwest uh aired nationally on PBS and was awarded best documentary by the James
12:00 - 12:30 Beard Foundation. His interactive documentary, After the Storm, was a co-production of PBS's uh Independent Lens in the Washington Post. It's been exhibited internationally and was nominated for an Emmy in new approaches to documentary. Uh Andrew teaches non-fiction film making making and journalism at the University of Richmond. So welcome to both of you.
12:30 - 13:00 Thank you for having us. I am the much younger uh partner of Chip there. That's the the sidekick. The age jokes have to start at some point. He has like on me and it's all early. Yeah, it was early. We're the same generation. We're essentially the same age. We'll move on. Well, I I hope tonight doesn't age you greatly. Uh, the White Lives podcast, which as I
13:00 - 13:30 recall was broadcast or what everyone does with the podcast 2019, uh, looked at the murder of my colleague uh, James Reeb in Selma in 1965 and looked at a weird thing that happened to his
13:30 - 14:00 demise. It changed for White Silma. Uh factually what happened was that Jim and two others uh Clark Olsen and Olaf Miller had had their dinner in a small black restaurant on Washington Street in Selma and were leaving there to walk back to Brown Chapel AMA church for a mass meeting that evening and four white men came across the
14:00 - 14:30 street and attacked them. Uh Jim Reeb was hit in the side of the head with a club of some kind. Others were punched and kicked. Uh and Jim was the worst hurt of the three. they supported him and walked around the the corner to uh the insurance agency which had been
14:30 - 15:00 sort of the headquarters for Dr. King and he was taken from there to uh a hospital for black selma and he said you know we he needs more than we can do here. he needs to see a neurosurgeon in bra in Birmingham and so was put in a well realistically it was a hearse the you know black Alabama doesn't have
15:00 - 15:30 excellent ambulances hers have to double and was taken to Birmingham and Chip and Andy heard the story from Clark Olsen I've heard the story from spark of holding Jim's hand as they rode up the up the back roads to Birmingham and feeling the moment when
15:30 - 16:00 Jim's hand went limp. That's what really happened. But in white Selma, a whole different story took root that basically the civil rights movement needed a martyr, maybe ideally a a white martyr, you know, better punchier
16:00 - 16:30 PR. And Jim wasn't that hurt when he was put in the ambulance, but was nearly dead when he got to Birmingham. That's the white lie. And Andy and Chip, fill me in. The podcast ran several hours. Obviously, I have super simplified. Uh, but uh what what
16:30 - 17:00 important pieces didn't fit there in my super simple summary? Well, I think that's that's just getting at sort of our the genesis of our interest in the story. I mean, and Chip and I just had a brief call this afternoon about trying to we made a second season since this show this show this story was in my in my mind a story like no other. I mean, I don't think that I don't think it's often that a journalist comes across a story as um
17:00 - 17:30 fruitful as this one was for us. And so we have worked on other stories, but we've we just can't stop thinking about the kind of serendipity of of reporting this story. Um, and just the meaningful nature of the connections we had with certain people as we reported it. Um, but to go back to the very beginning, uh, the way that it all got started, which kind of answers your question about sort of what is the what is it about and how did we come on to this thing that we ended up calling the counternarrative, is that, um, a reporter friend of ours, Jerry Mitchell, who's a very famous um, Mississippi
17:30 - 18:00 based journalist who was instrumental in lots of civil rights era cold cases, he actually Clark had been uh, with Jerry and had given him at some point this FBI file and Jerry was uh, never able to really work on it. So I called Jerry saying like, "Hey, what what's you know, we were just catching up and he said, "Oh, well, if you're working on Selma, you should maybe look into this case." Um, so that's kind of how and when we first looked at it, as journalists do when you analyze a story, if you're
18:00 - 18:30 going to tell a story, we started thinking about where where might it go and what might it look like? And the story of Reeb was, at least in my I thought I'd understood the civil rights uh movement pretty well. Well, I mean, I'd studied history and I'd studied a lot of southern history and contemporary southern history and Jim Reeb is not really a he's a kind of a footnote. I mean, you understand the story of Jim Lee Jackson and Viol Leo partly because of the clan and of course Jim Lee Jackson because he's this black man who's killed that that begins the march in the first place. But Reeb is is
18:30 - 19:00 complicated and and maybe and maybe there's not even really maybe maybe that's just a complex story and we didn't and and and complexity sometimes isn't great for storytelling if the complexity uh is is easily understood as just the factor of several things being a scance all at the same time. But this became pretty clear pretty quickly after going to Selma. We realized that the complexity here was because White Selma had told a certain story about what happened to Reed. And it wasn't a story
19:00 - 19:30 that was borne out by the facts. Even just the layman's understanding of what had happened that the eyewitness testimony of people on the street, not even if you even if you didn't have the FBI file. If you'd watched on the Prize, for instance, you would know that there was verifiable information out there that this was not what had happened to Reed, that he had been attacked on the street, that they done everything they could to get him to Birmingham, that he had this really grievous injury. Um, and so we started wondering why as white Alamians, were we not told this story? And was it because so many people
19:30 - 20:00 believed this counterfactual, this counternarrative? Um, and I think that's really when we knew that there was a story to tell here. That was before we had discovered the fourth attacker. That was before we had really spent years of our lives, literally years of our lives in Selma. But just that idea that maybe something was hidden from us because of a lie became kind of the the metaphor, the sort of guiding metaphor for um for our our investigation, I guess. Chip, that's my my version. What's your ver whenever we talk about this, we always have to make sure. Yeah. Yeah. No, I
20:00 - 20:30 think I I think um I mean two things kind of related to that. The origin, we got this FBI file which was really just an incredible road map. Um uh because the FBI in 1965 of course was as you know was everywhere um around the south especially in Selma where um uh the voting rights campaign had been going on for what you know a little over two months at this point and um so there were lots of agents on the ground here
20:30 - 21:00 and so after this attack even though uh you know if you know the story and listen to the show there's nothing was no one was ever held accountable They did a pretty the FBI did a pretty robust um investigation. Um knocked on a lot of doors, talked to a lot of people and um if you request that FBI file as we did after we received the unredacted file, you get a redacted file that's not even the complete redacted file. Um so so
21:00 - 21:30 having that was a was just an incredible incredible road map. And then, you know, as Andy said, we we encountered this and Gordon, as you alluded to, we encountered this counter narrative really early. You know, you'd ask you'd tell people uh, you know, people ask why you're in town, what are you working on, what are you doing here? And you'd tell them and they'd say, "Oh, is that the guy that you know that's the guy that they killed on the way to Birmingham or that's the guy that they left out on the way to Birmingham?" Didn't it take him I mean this is the the the son of the
21:30 - 22:00 defense attorney from 1965 said didn't it take him like 12 hours to get him to Birmingham. So I mean it was this you realize you're on the other end of this decadesl long game of telephone you know um and it's partly telephone was partly benign. I think some people just don't bother to learn the story but of course it's also um there's a there's a not benign uh part of it. There's a malignant part of that of that story. Um and that's what we became really interested in. Um, and then we had this moment which I thought about last week
22:00 - 22:30 when um, it was the 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday and the March. Well, not quite to the March, but 60th anniversary of Bloody Sunday and the Jubilee was going on. remembered that it was 10 years ago uh when Obama, President Obama spoke at the 50th anniversary and we were down there and we decided we were early and we were looking for a parking spot and we went to the um the um Confederate Circle in the Old Leok Cemetery just to kind of
22:30 - 23:00 poke around and park near there and walk to town and they had it sort of surrounded and fenced off and were essentially guarding it. the sons of the the daughters of Confederacy and the friends of Forest because they were afraid someone was going to steal the new bust of Nathan Bedford Forest which had happened before um and were basically I mean they weren't armed visibly maybe maybe uh maybe maybe they were armed somewhere gun somewhere but they were they were basically guarding the place and we started talking to a
23:00 - 23:30 woman named Pat Godwin who who um whose voice you don't hear in the show but who's invoked in the show who's referenced in the show because She um is the president of the Daughters of the Confederacy chapter there and a and a sort of founding member of Friends of Forest, the the organization that is sort of essentially the caretaker of the old Confederacy circle in the cemetery. And she gave us among other pamphlets, she had a bunch of them in the backseat of her car just sort of ready to distribute to anyone who would take
23:30 - 24:00 them. One of the pamphlets was the truth about Jim Reeve. And it was this uh you know faximile of a letter that had been written in 1965 by a a noted white supremacist in town, the sort of de facto secretary to the sheriff Jim Clark. Um and some other information, some other pamphlets like I Andy, I wish I could find them. we could share them. But like the true the true facts about, you know, 10 facts you need to know about Selma that was all just like
24:00 - 24:30 pictures of black people and white young black people and young white people together just in the street. But the innuendo is that this was a big orgy basically. Yeah. And so she gave us this letter which in our mind when we read it was like oh my god this is the this is the origin of this lie. this is the origin of this counternarrative that that Jim Reed was either uh you know killed by by his friends and his compatriots or that they as you said Gordon you know let him die because he needed this white martyr to sort of
24:30 - 25:00 further the cause and so finding that letter really was like oh my god it is still it's still in the water you know this has been passed along for 50 years and people are still people are still drinking it you know you know how many years did you spend and talking to people. You know, you you expended immense energy knocking on doors repeatedly. And when we started, I had incredible hair.
25:00 - 25:30 You did. Um was amazing. Yeah. Better than Andy's. That's right. When did we start? 2014. We started. It's funny because you sometimes are shy to tell the true origin stories of a of a particular project. Uh and in this case I am kind of shy because it sounds um it sounds a little uh I don't know we I think what it the reason why we started it is because the 50th anniversary of the marches in 1963 had
25:30 - 26:00 happened in a couple years before this is 2013 2014 so that the tail end of those memorializations of the 63 children's march had happened and I think we were we were teaching actually we were teaching a class together at the University of Alabama and we were looking for a story um connected to the Voting Rights Act. And I didn't know much about Selma. I had a close friend who was a civil rights um foot soldier, Theresa Burroughs, who lived in Greensboro in Hail County. And my wife and I used to take her to the Jubilee uh in the early 2000s and like she she
26:00 - 26:30 passed away in probably 2017 or 2018. But um back in 2005, 2006, 2007, we would go, but that was my only encounter with Selma. It was through helping Miss Burroughs go to go to this um you know memorialization, go to the prayer breakfast and then I don't even think we walked the bridge necessarily, but we were just sort of there to help her get there, you know. Um but I had no as an Alabama I grew up in North Alabama. I had been living in Tuscaloosa. SA's just not a place that most Alamians go. Um, and so the bridge, the the sort of
26:30 - 27:00 Bloody Sunday and the march was something that obviously are huge huge moments in civil rights history, but I didn't know much about them. So we thought, well, the 50th anniversary of this big event and the signing of the Voting Rights Act is coming up, so maybe we'll find a story in some. That was honestly like as as generic as it sort of was. That's when Jerry gave us that file and we met Clark Olsen and we spent time with Clark in Asheville. Yeah. and Clark's memory of it and Clark's reckoning with it. We made a small piece for the New York Times um that play that
27:00 - 27:30 aired on the 50th anniversary of the march that was just about Clark and his own memory. Didn't have anything to do with who actually committed the crimes. But in that process during that time of going down to Selma and talking to people, we had discovered that there was still some there was still some knowledge there that hadn't really been shaken loose that no one had really asked the right questions. And I always defer to uh my my big buddy Chip. Chip's got a couple years on me and maybe eight inches on me. He's a lot taller than I
27:30 - 28:00 am. Um and I thought we were done with the ace. Well, I had to I'm going to tell them how much taller you are than me than I am. Remind them that you're older than uh the we his tenacity with just finding a name and saying, "Let's knock on their door." Uh, and that began honestly one of the first times we went to Selma, which is we went right to where Reeb's marker is where he had been attacked. And sitting right there is an empty lot. And then right next to the empty lot is this squat little brick building that was probably built in the
28:00 - 28:30 80s or the '90s. And it says Selma Bail Bonds on the front of it. And because it was right there, Chip said, "Let's just go in." So we went in and we there's an older lady sitting there. Um, and I I one of us said to her like, "We're just here, you know, interested in the Reed Memorial. Interested what you know about the story. We're from Tuscaloosa, you know, we're just from up the road. We're just kind of wondering about the Reeve story." And she said, "Well, not only do I know what happened, but I was there on the street that night and I saw
28:30 - 29:00 everything." And that's the that's the sort of thing that just doesn't happen to reporters. Um, and so I think at that point we just knew, well, there's there's a source to cultivate. Um, there's a story that she wants to tell, but doesn't know how to g we haven't gained her trust. We don't know her yet. Uh, so that was 2014 and we worked on the story on and off. Um, for those of you who haven't listened to the podcast that goes into discovering this fourth attacker, um, Bill Portwood, I hate to
29:00 - 29:30 spoil it for you, but uh, and Portwood was um, he was older at the time that we first met him. He was aphasic and he had had several strokes. And there was a big and still is some and I think we address it on the show some ethical considerations about how how we interviewed him and how we talked to him about this thing that he admitted being a part of but also at other times claimed to not have any memory of. Um, and honestly that stuff was so legally fraught from our perspective as journalists that I think we we kind of
29:30 - 30:00 sheld the story for a little while because it felt like without a distributor, without without the support of a place like NPR, it would be really hard to figure out how to legally approach those kind of tricky ethical issues. Um, so we set it down, worked on something else for a year or two, but we would always keep going back. In fact, I think it was Chip by himself one time driving through South Alabama and or that part of the state rather uh who happened in to to go visit Portwood and recorded him on the record talking about
30:00 - 30:30 attacking Reed. That was I wasn't there for that. That was that was all chip. Um but we were talking on the phone the whole time. He said, "I think I'm going to swing by Selma." And I was like, "Let me know how it goes, you know." Um so we weren't even really But once we had that tape, we knew we had something. And that's then we took it to NPR and they basically vetted the story and heard all this this stuff that we had and they said of that bail bonds woman her name was Francis Bowden that if Francis would go on the record and tell us what she knew then they would come on board to to help us do that and then that was another six or eight months. Honestly, we had we had cultivated Francis for
30:30 - 31:00 years. We every time we were down there we would visit her. Um we would spend time with her. We heard all kinds of stories about her medical problems and her daughter's medical problems and and really in many ways came to care about her even though she was a very problematic person to deal with. um you know she had had a she had lived a really rough a rough really rough life and had had a lot of really rough men in her life and I feel like there was a we we generated a lot of empathy for her I think in that process and eventually after you know denying our requests over
31:00 - 31:30 and over and over again or saying she would be there and not showing up and etc. We just showed up in summer one day. I had my recorder and I said, "Can we sit down? Is now a good time and she told us everything she know." And the bulk of what the bulk of what of her tape from that from that um show is from that one day that we sat down with her. We we interviewed her several times, but that that day that she finally said, "I'll tell you now." on the record um was was pretty huge for us. Yeah. So five
31:30 - 32:00 years, that's a that's a long time. And mo most journalists need to turn something in hours, days, maybe if they're lucky, weeks. Yeah. Yeah. We're we're fortunate in that we have academic jobs for now may not be academic jobs soon but uh
32:00 - 32:30 we have them now and you know it really it it does give you um the the luxury of some things which is time you know I mean important thing for a story like this as Andy just outlined is time and um you know to be able to drive down on a Wednesday and not have any obligations to turn a story around or you know um recall your editor or do any of that stuff that you do at a at a you know daily newspaper or or those don't exist
32:30 - 33:00 anymore either at a at a um at a at a publication. Um so uh we were really fortunate that way and in fact this is a story that a lot I mean one of the one of the forms of resistance that we we ran into in Selma was just fatigue you know mostly among white people but not entirely that oh another you know person who doesn't live in Selma is coming down here to tell the same damn story over and over again. It's the only story people have told for 50 years. There's
33:00 - 33:30 nothing new. you know, you're going to dig up the same stuff. I mean, a woman who was a I would say a strong ally in Selma, who I think loved the show, who would never talk to us on the record and was sort of initially at least resistant to what we're doing because she said, you know, you're going to you're just going to come, you know, dig this thing up again and and nothing is going to come of it. It's not going to do anything for Selma. And that's that's another thing we constantly heard, you know, that um as
33:30 - 34:00 someone memorably put it, Selma did so much more for the civil rights movement than the civil rights movement ever did for Selma. And in some ways that's undeniable. And it's hard to argue with people when they say, "Gh, you're back to do the same thing." And so, um, yeah, so we were but we were fortunate that we that we could that we were close, A, and B, that we had the time to just come and do what essentially an old school beat reporter does, which is just sort of hang out, talk to people and get to know the lay of the land. And at one point,
34:00 - 34:30 we had a we had a long list of I mean, I think we made a list of everybody who's even referenced in the FBI file, many of whom were barbers for some reason. Not many, but like there were more barbers represented as an occupation than anybody else. Um, I guess because barbers here a lot, you know, like bartenders. I don't know. But we tried to find a lot of barbers and couldn't find any of them. But we tried all of them, I think. Joan's brother, doesn't he cut hair? He's not really Yeah. Okay. This, you know, it I'm sure it it helped
34:30 - 35:00 a lot that you had Alabama addresses. You had Alabama identity. Uh somebody with a nasal accent and New York address. No. Uh door gets slammed if it ever gets opened. But you were swimming upstream. you were
35:00 - 35:30 talking to people who clearly saw these guys are sort of on the other side from me. How how do you actually this is an important question in these days? How do you get into productive conversation with someone who is coming from a different viewpoint than you are? I'll just say two things and then
35:30 - 36:00 um Andy's been reading the news a lot more than I have lately, so he's he maybe I'll tee him up. But uh um it's funny you say that about about being from Alabama and having Alabama dresses, both of which were true. Well, both from Alabama. We were both living here at the time. And um and uh story I love to tell is that we would kind of do this like look, you know, we I grew up in Birmingham uh and you know, do the whole like I get it. You know, you're you're
36:00 - 36:30 tired of the story. Birmingham's been through the same thing. Birmingham has sort of, you know, known as I remember meeting a German couple in my 20s and they were like, "Oh, Birmingham, the the the the dogs and the bomb, you know, and you're like, well, yeah, but you know, um, and so I would try that tactic and try tried it a lot." Um, and somebody finally said to me, somebody who was sympathetic, I think, to what we're doing, but just said, "Just stop. Don't say that anymore. You're better off saying you're from Chicago than saying you're from Birmingham." Um, which I
36:30 - 37:00 think is true in a lot of ways because Selma, as how Reigns memorably said to us, Selma, what did what was it exactly? He said, oh God, Selma is its own sort of own sort of weird or something like, you know, just there's such a there is such a pride among old Selma. Um, they have a phrase, you my people dug the river. So, um, if you, you know, of a certain lineage who's been there a long time, your people dug the river. Um, and so there's a real pride there. Um, and
37:00 - 37:30 so Birmingham, you know, is a post post civil war city. It's a, you know, uh, didn't even exist. It was a, it was a secluded valley, you know, in 1872 when people and settlers, uh, discovered that there were steel making ingredients here. Um, so, so yeah, so I think that helped and didn't help in a lot of ways. It certainly helped, I think, that we're white. Um, I think that helped a lot. Um, and you know, I think in terms of doing the work then for this story, and
37:30 - 38:00 I think this is maybe instructive, we're working on a different story now that is similar in some ways. We we had this mantra or we had this this phrase that that had the convenient value of being true, but was also a really um effective thing to say to people uh when trying to talk to them, which is we're just trying to get to the truth about what happened to Jim Reed. That's it. certainly agenda. We're not here to do anything except get to the truth about what happened to Jim Reed. And if you're Pat
38:00 - 38:30 Godwin, uh president of the Daughters of the Confederacy in Selma, uh and your part of her frustration is that the world has come to believe this absurd story, uh that Jim Reeb, you know, died uh from the attack on Washington Street in Selma. and she thinks that's absurd and thinks the whole world needs to know that the civil rights movement was responsible for killing Jim Reed. That's the truth the world needs to get to. But you can both agree that a a really
38:30 - 39:00 valuable goal is to get to the truth about what happened. And so that got us in some doors and I think it honestly allowed us to have conversations with people on not neutral ground because you know if you're looking back into the story for as Pat Godin said the world's largest communist organization National Public Radio um that's what she called it if you haven't listen to the show very funny but um but if you're working on the story for NPR in 2015 you obviously have a certain orientation to the story that you know anybody can sort
39:00 - 39:30 of pick up on. Um, but it was but it was a a helpful thing to be able to say that you're just trying to get to the truth because even people who um are misinformed u by that counternarrative um or by something their parents told them or um they're still think that they're getting to the truth of it. Yeah, I would just say um it is it's being white, it's being from Alabama. It's also weirdly being able to talk not
39:30 - 40:00 just about Alabama football, but like the running back class of Auburn as well. I mean, just the idea of being able to have a kind of vernacular conversation about the best barbecue in town and everything. I mean, there's the the cultural trappings of being a white southerner can really help you in those spaces. Uh, and yes, there was distrust for sure. Um, but I will say, you know, we're I think we're all as a country right now really struggling with how do we talk across a divide. And I think
40:00 - 40:30 there's something actually maybe unhelpful about our approach, which is we really we wanted to extract information. It was less about empathy and more and and trying to get people to change their mind. Um, from a reporter standpoint, you know, that we needed to we needed to get that information. Uh, and I, you know, I I'm often I'm actually I'm teaching a check off story tomorrow. So, I was been thinking about check off today. And, uh, there's this great line that it's not the task of the writer is not to solve the problem, but
40:30 - 41:00 to state the problem correctly. And I feel like we wanted to not solve the problem for the people of Selma. They they weren't our audience in many ways, but we needed to extract what had happened there, what they understood about it, so that we could state the problem correctly. so that we could say to the world basically here's here's how this story unfolded for people in Selma here's how whiteness treats this kind of cognitive dissonance here's what white supremacy does to people's minds um and that so in a way you know there's a
41:00 - 41:30 betrayal in in many ways at the heart of the journalistic practice that we are we are asking people to give us their secrets only to take them and do what we will with them and you have to be rooted in this ethical practice that you believe that there's a there's a virtue to the story that you're telling But it's sometimes it's you you can't see that in the middle of it. You have to just believe in yourself and also of course treat people with dignity and have respect for them. Um but it's a little different and I feel like I'm not actually good at trying to explain to people how to talk across political divides. And one just one brief example
41:30 - 42:00 of that. Um there was a woman who came to work on our show just briefly in PR I think was thinking about we had never you know Chip is a bookw writer was a non-fiction filmmaker. We had worked almost exclusively in in long form stuff and had really thought that way. But NPR didn't know us, you know. I mean, they they liked us, but we were it was early in our careers and we didn't we didn't have the chops. And so they thought, well, maybe we'll bring someone in to listen to some of this tape and and sort of help these guys if they need help.
42:00 - 42:30 Um, and thankfully we didn't need help, but this person was still very helpful in many ways. But what she did was she lay she listened to some of the tape that we had with Francis who had been there on that street that night and listened and watched what had happened. Then she lied at trial. She lied to the FBI and now she's telling us this whole story. And this person who listened who's a really well-established radio producer and really well respected in the field and I have a ton of respect for her as well. Um she had a real problem with the tape with the raw tape itself because she didn't hear us
42:30 - 43:00 pushing back on Francis at all. when Francis would say something racist, she didn't hear us say, "Well, I can't believe you would say that." Blah, blah, blah. And she would things that you would naturally want to say if you were in that conversation, but there's a great deal of restraint in the journalistic practice, too, where I need you to keep telling me these things. My job is to get the story of what happened so that I can then, you know, I I do believe we're both sort of we're really we love history. We think a lot about history. I was kind of trained as a historian. I think of that idea of the journalist as the first draft of
43:00 - 43:30 history. You know, our job is to figure out the truth of what happened. It's not about making friends. It's not about correcting somebody's morality. It's not about changing the way they vote. Our our job is to try to figure out what exactly happened. What tools can I use? Talking about the Auburn running backs, uh talking about barbecue, being white, um being from the South, those are tools that I use to do that, you know. Um, but as it relates to this current moment that we're in as a culture and as a politics, I it it is hard for me to understand how to take those talents and
43:30 - 44:00 turn them into convincing people they should see the world differently. I I guess sorry to finish that. I would say our hope has always been and the stories we've chosen and the kinds of things we've been interested in pursuing together has always been to tell stories that that have the opportunity to reach out to someone who might be a little skeptical, someone who might not have ever really thought about the world in the way that we're bringing it to them and offer that kind of kindness to the listener to bring them in. We're not we're not presupposing that you're going to feel exactly what we feel, but we're
44:00 - 44:30 trying to tell a story that that helps you get to the place where we got in the reporting of the story. So maybe in some way there's some empathy there that's extended to the listener. I Yeah. Yeah. Just real quick, Gordon, it just occurs to me that, you know, we interviewed um um Bill Baxley uh and Doug Jones. Bill Baxley when we interviewed him, sorry, Bill Baxley used to be the attorney general of the state of Alabama in the 19 he was elected in 1970, I think.
44:30 - 45:00 Yeah. Was the youngest attorney general in the country, I think. Um, and was was intent from from the moment he he came into office on pro on on prosecuting some of these civil rights era um crimes. And uh you know he's he he talked about that uh the fact that when he requested the Birmingham Police Department files um for the church bombing 1962 church bombing in Birmingham that they were almost unusable because they had focused the
45:00 - 45:30 Birmingham Police Department had focused almost exclusively on investigating the black community in Birmingham and the sort of civil rights um uh committee civil rights um uh uh protesters in Birmingham. um again as a way to generate sympathy for the cause that there the Birmingham Police Department investigated the the uh the black community and the and the civil rights protesters. Um and so there was just nothing really usable in those files. Doug Jones later came in um uh as
45:30 - 46:00 US attorney in in Alabama and and sort of followed up picked up some of what Maxley had done in the in the 70s and um and Doug said to us, you know, it's you can you can still tell a story, a false story about what happened in 1963 um or or any any event for that matter. But you know now the history books say that this happened because we know this happened and those trials helped
46:00 - 46:30 establish that history. Those those trials put forward a version of that history that complemented the the rigorous journalism and historic historical work that have been done about those events. So you can say what you want about them, but if you if you say something that's contrary to that history, you just look like a fool. If you say something that's contrary to that history, you're wrong. you know, there's no counternarrative anymore about those. And so that work of getting down what happened, I think, is in a in
46:30 - 47:00 a way it's it's a political act, I think, in a way because it is getting down in a way that is um again, you can argue with it all you want, but it's been proven out. It's been fact checked. It's been held up to light. And there's something powerful to that when you're when you're not able to do something else. have been uh well we won't get into actual politics but there are people who are documenting day by day what's happening right now there's an incredible podcast if people haven't listened to it called Slowburn the first season of which looks at sort of
47:00 - 47:30 dayby-day micro history of Watergate which is something we all think you know think we know about um but it really looks at the the um the kind of dayto-day turns and twists that that story took back uh when it happened um and I think there's full power to them. Okay. But we are in a moment where some of those stories are being blanked out. Uh we were just hearing that um
47:30 - 48:00 information about military veteran Medgar Evers has been removed at Arlington. And um the um predominantly Japanese fighting unit that did amazing things in Italy in World War II not there on the Pentagon uh website
48:00 - 48:30 anymore. What What do we need to do to keep that history sufficiently alive that it's accessible? I mean, I don't know. I I I read all these things too and they're greatly troubling to me. But then I but then I start thinking that this is all of these moves are just a true sign of weakness of of real terror that the world has changed and left certain ways
48:30 - 49:00 of thinking about the world behind and that you can eradicate somehow the evidence of the the country doing the right thing. the evidence of the country wrestling with its racial history. The evidence of the country uh you know coming to its senses to acknowledge the multi-racial pluralistic society we live in. You can you can erase those websites but that is a fundamental part of the American story at this point in our
49:00 - 49:30 history and you can't change that. So, I mean, not to get too partisanly political about it, but the Democrats may be real flat-footed right now, and they are as an opposition party to this autocratic movement, but they won't be forever. And I'm not talking about the political party. I'm talking about the people of this country who understand the value of this pluralistic society, who understand the sort of the marvel of the founding documents as as much in need of revision as many of them need,
49:30 - 50:00 the promise that those documents provided to have a civil war that could then somehow result in reunion. And it just there's there's there's ways in which this the history of this country is immutable and it's something to be incredibly proud of as much as we acknowledge all the terrible parts of of our past as well. And the acknowledgement of those of those terrible parts makes us stronger in many ways. And I think that's that's the thing that folks are so terrified by right now. And so the attempt to erase
50:00 - 50:30 all of this I just don't think is going to happen. I I know that it's happening on the internet. I know that it's happening. uh you challenge universities. Um but think of the number of people across the political spectrum whose lives were so greatly enriched by education uh whose whose diseases have been cured by science whose understanding of the biological world has been so greatly influenced by the research that we do in this country. Um you this is a this is a horrible tough
50:30 - 51:00 difficult time for sure. Uh but I take heart that there is there are a people here. They just need to be directed. They need to be motivated. They need to be mobilized. They need to have a leader or several leaders who come out and say, "Here's what we're doing and here's why we're making the argument about the future of the country." Um and I I I don't know. I don't look around and see lots of people rejoicing in the street about the not not being burdened by the his the story of Jackie Robinson
51:00 - 51:30 anymore, for instance. Um, I see instead a group of people caught completely blindsided by the rapid pace of change and getting ready to fight like hell. That's what I see personally. Um, but I'm trying also to stick with that belief and be optimistic. It's not I've never seen you optimistic. This is this is amazing. Optimistic Andy. I know. This is real weird. I don't know. It is weird. Um, well, I think you're right. And I think
51:30 - 52:00 that there are I mean if you want to see you know uh another people who felt dispossessed were the white community against Selma and as much as they try to you know eradicate that history or make that history go away it doesn't it doesn't go away. It won't go away. You can try to make it go away but it's not going to go away. Um and you know I think the truth will out always. And I think um I think that uh I think the key right now is like where do you how do you focus your your work and your
52:00 - 52:30 attention and and how do you um give that attention the time and the the energy that it needs to sort of keep yourself sane and and and functional and happy but also like to do something concrete and um that's a different answer for all of us. Yeah. Well, and sometimes it's important to take a longer view. It took you years to work this story. Uh it will not
52:30 - 53:00 be the work of a few days or a week to respond to current uh craziness in the nation. So yeah. Yeah. Well, not to toot your horn too much, Gordon, but when you think about the work that you all did and you look at the impact of that, not just in the
53:00 - 53:30 culture, but like I mean, as a as a very minor example of its impact, um I passed through Montgomery. I've been passing through back and forth from Birmingham to South Alabama a lot lately. And I've been going through Montgomery and I've stopped at the EGI's um memorial several times and it's always full. And that place should not exist. If in a logical world, don't don't get me wrong, it should exist. I'm glad it exists, but the politics of the state and the way that most things get done in the state,
53:30 - 54:00 that place that it exists is a miracle. U and that has a lot to do with the way that that Brian Stevenson and EJI went about securing the land and and getting the funding for the memorial. And it was it was um it was shrewd and and and it enabled this thing that it enabled the vision that had to happen for it to happen, but it's happened. Um and I think that that that history is not going anywhere. That monument's not going anywhere. in one of the most conservative places in the country. Um, you know, a place where all these
54:00 - 54:30 stories took place, there is this monument that has upended tourism in the state um for for the better. Um, and and brought a history made a history alive that it wasn't. And so I think there are um there are you know we uh for all the all the horrors going on um there's this persistent lasting hope that I think um that that can all drive us as well.
54:30 - 55:00 And that's I think that's particularly true of what has been created in Montgomery. just superb interpretive uh work is being done there. But the state of Mississippi, Mississippi for crying out loud, built a wonderful civil rights museum that tells the story
55:00 - 55:30 uh of what what it took in Mississippi. Um, not a pretty story. Uh, but state state dollars used for that. Friend of mine was worried that, you know, it's a two Mississippi museum. One just, you know, general state history and one civil rights. He said, "Well, you you know, the the white
55:30 - 56:00 schools are all going to go to the general history and the predominantly black schools will go to the silver." And that may be true, but the general history side also tells the story very honestly. And it's it's encouraging for those of us who've been at it for a while to to see, you know,
56:00 - 56:30 in these two improbable states a little bit of honesty. Uh how refreshing a little bit. Yes. Not everywhere. We we shouldn't over go over with it, but uh uh obviously there, you know, there's a white angle and and there's a black angle on what happened in Selma.
56:30 - 57:00 How how aware was Black Selma of the the craziness go the the uh fictionalizing that was going on in the white neighborhoods? It's a good question. I mean, I think um I I'm trying to um I'm trying to
57:00 - 57:30 remember. I mean, I think there are people that we interviewed for the story, black people and some for the story who were uh you know, not at all surprised by um that narrative and by anything that happened frankly um regarding the story. And then there were people who just didn't want to talk to us understandably because I mean as one man said to us who we had we we were trying to in our search for these tapes we well and we were trying to to trying
57:30 - 58:00 to chase down the origin of this counternarrative. We had heard that there were tapes um made of the trial where this where this counternarrative was was basically espoused by the by the defense attorney. And um so we've been on spent many many many many days and hours and weeks looking for these tapes or any relic of these tapes or anyone who went to the trial. And Clark, of course, had gone to the trial because he was called to testify, but he was only there for uh, you know,
58:00 - 58:30 his his testimony and then he wasn't he didn't he wasn't there for the rest of it. And so, we were looking for anyone who attended the trial. We heard the names of some black folks who were grown up in some, some younger folks who who um had gone to the trial and went to try to talk to this one guy who's who still lived in Summer who' left and come back to S at some point. And he said, 'Wh would I want to talk to you about this white guy, Jim Reeb, when you could, you know, there are any number of black people who were lynched and killed in
58:30 - 59:00 this um in this town in my lifetime. Why not tell their story? And that's a there's no good. There's no answer for that. Um and so, you know, I think that there were people who who um had a good reason to not want to talk to us. Um, but then I also think that there were people who felt that um that it wasn't a risk, but there was also some there was a little bit of a risk to to to to putting your neck out to tell your side of the story. Um, even
59:00 - 59:30 all these years later. Uh and so I think that they were aware to your question. And I think that many many if not all of them are aware of the story but also that story like so like it it's not just the rest of the country and civil rights history where that story has been forgotten but because of where the ree attack and and murder happened in the arc of the even the voting rights campaign those few months of the voting rights campaign but also this sort of broader civil rights movement um it's
59:30 - 60:00 largely forgotten even in Selma I mean it's not what people talk about in Selma in part because Jim is not from there. Um, you know, Jimmy Lee Jackson not from Soma, but he's from the area. Uh, and so I think when people think about even those intense few months of the Veteran Rights Campaign in Dallas County, uh, you know, it's a it's it's it's, uh, down the list of notable events for many people who live there. Yeah. Well,
60:00 - 60:30 people, hundreds of people were putting themselves on the line. You know, if if you went to the courthouse, you could lose your job, you could lose your house, your family could suffer all sorts of consequences. Who's going to say that that you're a hero, right? Yeah. At one point while we're looking for records, we came
60:30 - 61:00 across, I don't know, dozens of shoe boxes of mug shots from, you know, a very brief period and I would say 63 to 65, 66. Um, it's remarkable how many people were um, you know, detain. I mean, they had camp Selma, they had like a detention center basically, you know. Um, no. Um, so yeah, it was uh it was not easy for anyone. Um, but especially if you're black. Yeah.
61:00 - 61:30 Yeah. Yeah. Do you think it it really cemented the lie that it was adopted by the defense in the trial? I think it was really born there. Honestly, I think it was it was really uh it was it you know the way that we often thought about it. I think we we talked about it on the show this way.
61:30 - 62:00 But the the theory was that the civil so the the the Reeb attack happens in early March of 63. I mean 65 and then the trial happened in December of that year. Is that right? I think so. Uh and so the the voting rights act was passed and he makes this he makes the speech uh shortly thereafter after and then it's passed in September I believe. Yeah. August September. August September. Late summer. So by the time you know Reev is attacked uh the Voting Rights Act is
62:00 - 62:30 passed and the trial happens. So by the time the trial comes to fruition, the defense essentially says they needed a white martyr to pass the Civil Rights Act and they got a white martyr. It felt like a foregone conclusion to the jurors at that point in time. Um Selma had been a target for the civil rights movement because of the hotheaded uh sheriff Jim Clark because uh you know there's there's a number of reasons why um the overreaction that led to Jimmy Lee
62:30 - 63:00 Jackson's death had been the catalyst for the march. The the cameras had been there on Bloody Sunday to telegraph that story across the world and that's what had brought Ree there. everything sort of lined up in the defense's argument. So, they had almost everything they needed to pass the Voting Rights Act, but they really needed something even more visceral than that. They needed the death of this white man, you know. Um I mean, LBJ even says the death of this this good man, you know. Um and he mentions him in the speech, right? So I
63:00 - 63:30 think that for the for the defense attorney and for for the formulation of the narrative for White Selma, uh the the the sequence of events was almost confirmation of their of their theory in a way. Um and it is also just factually true. I'm sorry I'm the son of an attorney, I guess, but but it is factually true that he's attacked on the street and he dies not in Selma, but in Birmingham several hours later. Um there that's that sort of this is often how conspiracy theories work. There is
63:30 - 64:00 something that is true that's verifiable. There's a way to interpret that truth um and and understand it in a complex way, but there's another way to use that those truths selectively and and come to a totally different conclusion. That's how almost all conspiracy theories work. And so in a way that's what happened here. Um he got beat here. They roughed him up a little. Nobody inspect. There was a black doctor who looked at him here, but that black doctor was not credible to white selma. They didn't do much to really, you know,
64:00 - 64:30 they didn't document what sort of medical procedure had happened there. So, at trial, there's no real concrete evidence that, not to mention the fact that my personal uh grind against uh who does not get does he does not get what he deserves in our show, but that's all right. It's a long process telling a big complex story like this, but Blanchard Mloud, the the county solicitor who was the the prosecutor of the trial, did everything he could to
64:30 - 65:00 throw the trial. He he mounted almost no defense. Um, and actually we we interviewed very close to the end of his life, a New York Times reporter who had been in Selma at the time, and he uh he was living outside DC when we interviewed him in 2018. Um, and he he was he himself was a little aphasic and didn't remember he remember very clearly his conversations with Blanchard Mloud. And he had said to him, you know, Blanchard said, "There's no way I can win this case." And uh and he said, "Well, why why are you even prosecuting?" He said, "Because you
65:00 - 65:30 bastards keep coming down here and digging this up." Basically, the press is looking at us. I've got to take it to trial, but we're not going to win it. And he was determined not to win it. There was no there was no real attempt at all to win that case. Um, so not only did the counternarrative function and and operate compellingly for that audience who was captive to that story, but the the defense did almost nothing to try and and change the minds of of the jury. I mean, again, it goes without saying it's an all-white jury of Selma
65:30 - 66:00 Selma natives mostly. Yeah. It's it's really quite quite an amazing story and I'm so glad that you you two put in the years to unear it and get those get those voices. I can't imagine how many glasses of iced tea you must have gone through in these visits
66:00 - 66:30 to people who initially Yeah. didn't want to talk to you fellas. Uh but maybe the third or fourth or fifth time. Okay. You know, I I you know, I think I remember a little bit. You you really did something for for our our understanding of what happened there in Selma. We are getting to the time when we
66:30 - 67:00 should wrap up and uh we will move on from here to uh conversation. If you've tuned in to to the webinar, keep track of the uh other link that's been posted in the chat and shift over to that because uh Chip and Andy and I will be there and we'll deal with your questions. We may
67:00 - 67:30 go off on some tangents that we didn't get to in in this hour together. Um but um it should be a very interesting conversation. Uh please do consider contributing to the work of the living legacy project. We are trying to not just continue but to
67:30 - 68:00 grow and to do even more. Uh as was mentioned at the outset, next week we start a new to us uh itinerary for a pilgrimage in the low country of Georgia and South Carolina. And we have other webinars coming up. We will shortly be hiring a new executive director and we need to
68:00 - 68:30 give that person a good running start. And if if a pilgrimage sounds intriguing to you, we have scheduled next uh September and October pilgrimages, one to Alabama, including Selma, and one to Mississippi. We'll be visiting Mississippi Civil Rights
68:30 - 69:00 Museum. will be visiting the EJI museums in Montgomery. Uh check our website. Registration for those pilgrimages should open next week. So if you want to be on the bus, here's your chance. and Chip and Andy, it has been delightful reconnecting with you. Viewing audience. These two guys
69:00 - 69:30 wasted a couple of hours talking to me. That's true. We still talk about your We still talk about your apartment. How wonderful it is. They got absolutely nothing that they could use in the podcast. not great stories. That's all really honestly memories and stories and experiences with other people. That's what it's about. I really appreciate what they've done and look forward to spending time with them in the next
69:30 - 70:00 segment. So, thank you so much, Gordon. Thank you all very much. It's been great. Thanks everybody for coming. Okay, we'll see you in the other chat then. Yeah.