Plan would make march campsite a historic place, tourist draw

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Posted 8:03AM on Tuesday, September 24, 2002

MONTGOMERY, ALABAMA - Fresh out of high school in 1965, John Knight camped out on the athletic fields behind St. Jude with the marchers who had walked from Selma to Montgomery to demand the right to vote. The next day, the marchers would complete the last few miles of the trek to the Capitol steps, but that night they were entertained by singers Harry Belafonte and Mahalia Jackson and Joan Baez. The march is credited with sparking national support for full voting rights for black citizens. ``I was at the camp ground. I was young and I didn't realize that the event was as historic as it was,'' Knight remembered Friday. Now he realizes. A state representative, Knight was among officials who earmarked $800,000 in state bond funds last week to fund an Alabama Historical Commission project to commemorate the St. Jude complex and civil rights history. The director of the Alabama Historical Commission said the funds should kick-start plans to anchor the eastern end of the Selma-to-Montgomery civil rights trail with an interpretive center on Interstate 65 in west Montgomery that could attract 800,000 visitors annually. Commission director Lee Warner has outlined a plan for state and federal transportation agencies to buy and preserve the 10.6 acres of the St. Jude property where civil rights marchers camped. The plan, projected to cost about $1 million, also calls for the Historical Commission to buy 9.8 acres at the northwest corner of I-65 and West Fairview Avenue -- currently the site of a shopping center. That property has been appraised at about $1.9 million, he said. Once purchased, both parcels would be given to the National Park Service, which would build the visitor center on the shopping center site. The visitor center would serve as a magnet for the civil rights trail, directing visitors to tourism sites as close as downtown Montgomery, as far west as Selma, and as far east as Tuskegee, Warner said. ``This is a really big deal for us. Rarely do we as public servants get an opportunity to make something like this happen. We are enablers in helping something to get done that is terribly important,'' Warner said. ``The Alabama Department of Transportation is now engaged in negotiations for the purchase of the property on the campus itself, the green space. The $800,000 is part of the purchase price for the shopping center,'' Warner said. Owner of both the St. Jude and shopping center properties is the Catholic Diocese of Mobile. ``We are in negotiations with a willing seller,'' Warner said. The Catholic mission complex on West Fairview Avenue was founded during the Depression by the Rev. Harold Purcell to address the needs of poor and black residents in segregated central Alabama. Its school, social service center, church and hospital offered services unavailable to blacks elsewhere in Jim Crow Alabama. ``What we have tried to do here is buy the land before the price went up so we could reserve this land for something to come in the future,'' Warner said. Paul Winegar, spokesman for the National Parks Service Southeast Office in Atlanta, said a master plan for Park Service development of civil rights trail facilities probably will not be completed until 2004. ``The legislation for the trail envisioned three centers, one in Selma, one midway, and one in Montgomery. Historically, St. Jude is an ideal location. Logistically, it is a good place with tremendous ties to the march. But there are some details to work out,'' said Winegar. He said if the center attracts 800,000 visitors annually, it would rank with the Martin Luther King National Historic Site in Atlanta, one of the most popular Park Service destinations in the South. Warner said a permanent visitor center is at least five to 10 years away and subject to congressional funding. In the interim, he expects the vacant Ellis Seafood restaurant at the shopping center will become a temporary visitor center in 12 to 24 months. Winegar said although the Parks Service has sent a historical architect to Montgomery to look at the Ellis Seafood building, ``we are not designing anything. We don't have the money to design a temporary center, let alone open it. But we are not closing the door. It depends on the kind of cooperation we get, the funding and the enthusiasm,'' he said. One enthusiastic backer of the project is Gwen Patton of Montgomery. As a Tuskegee University student, she marched and camped out at St. Jude in 1965. As a march organizer, she was working rather than participating in the festivities. Any permanent visitor center must face Oak Street and the campground. She also wants a monument at the St. Jude site as a tribute to those who lived in the Washington Park neighborhood north of the site. They opened their homes to the racially integrated marchers at a time when blacks who welcomed whites into their homes could face legal trouble. ``This is about black and white people working together. Young people need to know about that and they need to know what was done for democracy,'' Patton said. A legislative advocate who has pushed for the project with Knight is Rep. Thad McClammy, D-Montgomery. As chairman of the state's Joint Parks Committee, he hopes this week to secure at least $1 million for the project. Father Mathew Sindik, director of the City of St. Jude, said no one has made St. Jude an offer. Sindik said the part of the St. Jude property under consideration for purchase includes an administrative building. ``If they want it, they would have to purchase it, too. We are open to that, but we have had no proposal. No one in an official capacity has approached us,'' he said.