It’s my second time visiting the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis, Tennessee, and I’m again brought to tears viewing exhibits telling the gut-wrenching story of black Americans’ struggle for equality.
The museum is located at the former Lorraine Motel where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated April 4, 1968. The site serves as a beacon for change with a museum, established in 1991, providing a comprehensive overview of the American Civil Rights Movement. It was especially thought-provoking during my early November visit to the United States, when I toured the museum two days prior to the presidential election.
My self-guided tour begins in a circular gallery showing the chronology of the trafficking of millions of human beings by slave traders, between 1619 and 1861, followed by an exhibit on the rise of Jim Crow laws, that enforced racial segregation, from the 1880s into the 1960s.
The next exhibit, entitled The Year They Walked, depicting the 1955-1956 Montgomery Alabama bus boycott, is equally moving. I walk onto a full-scale, dimly lit bus from that era and a recording is triggered. Near the front of the bus is a bronze sculpture of a defiant-looking Rosa Parks, who became a civil rights activist in the United States. As I walk through the bus, I listen to the looped recording of the bus drivers’ voice sternly warning Parks she couldn’t sit in a preferred seat now that a white person wanted it.
“I need that seat now. Please move back….”
“If you don’t move out of that seat I’ll have you arrested. Get up from there.”
Although Parks was arrested and found guilty of disorderly conduct, segregation on public buses was declared unconstitutional in 1956.
Unfortunately, the next exhibit The Freedom Ride of 1961 shows a different result. The burned and mangled, full-size bus is a stark reminder of when brave, young civil rights activists on The Freedom Ride were attacked in Anniston, Alabama, by a mob of angry whites and Klu Klux Klan members, who firebombed the bus, killing three of the peaceful protestors.
Around the corner is another poignant exhibit — the lunch counter where racists heckled and physically assaulted young black activists in Greensboro, North Carolina. A film plays in the background of the cafe showing the brutal attacks on the nonviolent activists. The civil rights struggle is palpable as I watch the violence unfold on the screen, reminding me of a time when U.S. division was at its worst.
The museum tours ends in room 306, behind a pane glass window, which is the actual motel room where Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. stayed before his assassination on the balcony, which is also viewed from the motel’s hallway. The room, left untouched from that day in April, 1968, serves as a sombre reminder of the civil rights struggle in America.
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was in Memphis, where he gave his last speech on April 3, in support of striking Memphis sanitation workers. The strike began after two black workers were killed as a result of unfair working conditions. White workers would still receive pay if it rained and they didn’t have to work but black workers would not be paid unless they worked.
After two black workers, seeking shelter from the rain, were crushed by a malfunctioning truck hundreds of workers and their supporters marched to city hall daily, carrying signs reading “I AM A MAN.” This slogan became a rallying cry in the civil rights movement.
Headquarters for the striking sanitation workers was Clayborn Temple, which was the latest monument to be added to The U.S. Civil Rights Trail, which features over 100 locations across 15 states.
Memphis has eight sites to visit on that trail, which includes the National Civil Rights Museum and, several blocks away, the I AM A MAN Plaza, adjacent to Clayborn Temple.
“This was the first strike that King followed instead of led. At the time, he was looking to address classism and the multicultural movement,” says Brooke Warden, managing director of Historic Clayborn Temple, a cultural and arts organization dedicated to restoring the church.
The former Presbyterian church was founded in 1892 by a white congregation, which sold it to an African-American congregation in 1949 after refusing to accept integration. After sitting abandoned for 20 years and falling into disrepair, the church was sold in 2019 and is now undergoing a $33 million renovation by the Historic Clayborn Temple, with the plan to reopen as a centre for community gatherings.
“The intent is to really bring back those values of the sanitation workers’ strike and make this a place for community, [and] a beautiful performance place, where artists can come. We’re also looking at opening as a resilience hub…When there’s a weather crisis, or something like that, and if it rains and half the city is out of power we would have the ability to take people in and give shelter so that Clayborn really belongs to the community and is not just a historic space,” says Warden.
The first stage of the church revitalization project involved stabilizing the building and renovating its exterior, including installing beautiful glass windows honouring community activists, and the 1968 sanitation workers’ strike.
The next stage, expected to take two years, will be renovating the interior, at an estimated cost of $25 million.
Revitalization of spaces was a noticeable theme during my visit to Memphis, well-known as the birthplace of rock ’n’roll and the blues, and is closely associated with legends like Elvis Presley and B.B. King.
While Presley’s Graceland remains unchanged from when he lived there, for 20 years until his death in 1977, I couldn’t help noticing the famous mansion was the exception. Most of the older buildings I visited during my time in Memphis have been updated but still maintain a connection to their past, beginning with the hotel where I stayed.
Central Station Hotel, in Memphis’ South Main district is located in a 110-year-old building that was once an active train station and known as the Grand Central Station when it opened in 1914. The hotel still serves as a smaller transportation hub, with Amtrak making twice daily stops there with visitors either going or coming from New Orleans and Chicago.
The modern hotel maintains a retro vibe in its public spaces, and has a DJ spinning vinyl records most nights from a booth that was once a church organ. Guests can also enjoy music in their rooms, with a daily curated playlist piping out music from custom-designed speakers or they can take a walk to nearby Beale Street, to hear live blues music.
Crosstown Concourse, originally a Sears, Roebuck and Company distribution centre and retail store, which opened in 1927, went into a state of decline after Sears left in the early 1990s. But in 2017, this 65,000-square-foot space was reopened providing housing, art-making facilities, gallery spaces, theatres, restaurants and shops, becoming a destination place for tourists visiting Memphis.
If you visit the Concourse, I’d recommend checking out the Art Bar, where you can enjoy a classic cocktail, wine or beer in an eclectic lounge decorated with vintage finds. My favourite spot was sitting on a 1960s-era couch under a wall of paint-by-number dog artworks with spaghetti poodles and other interesting ceramics on side tables.
Adding to Memphis’ long list of funky old spaces that have a modern twist is Amelia Gene’s, a new restaurant located in what was once the William C. Ellis and Sons Ironworks and Machine Shop, constructed in 1879. This fine dining experience located in Memphis’ South Main Arts District has a cosy atmosphere and delicious foods that can be ordered, from the small bites to main entrees. My favourites were the Gulf of Mexico prawns as a starter and black sea bass with caramelized onions and white onion puree as a main.
And for a more casual dining experience, in a revitalized space, check out The Beauty Shop in mid-town Memphis, that was formerly where Priscilla Presley went to have her hair done.
Some of the unique seating spots include hooded Belvedere hair dryer chairs that were once used in this former 1940s beauty shop. Diners can order chicken and waffles, shrimp tacos and beignets, to name just a few of the classic menu choices.
Kim Pemberton was hosted by Memphis Tourism, which did not review or approve this article. Follow her on instagram at kimstravelogue.
