Tag Archive for: church bombing

A Name and a Promise —T.K. Thorne

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Rob Langford is probably not a name you are familiar with. He was a quiet, thoughtful man who wanted to make things better. When the FBI chose him to serve as Special Agent in Charge of the Birmingham, Alabama office, he came with an open mind.

And that changed everything.

Langford realized there was edgy and sometimes dangerous tension between the African American community and law enforcement. Rather than just accepting this as status quo, he wanted to open communications between them and invited several leaders from the Black community to come “talk.”

It wasn’t easy to garner enough trust for anyone even to show up at the FBI office. Finally, he found a man who acted as a mediator and made it happen. Still, it didn’t go well. One Black minister blurted out, “Why didn’t the FBI investigate the bombing of the church? The FBI never did do anything.”

The minister was referring to the 1963 bombing of a Black church in Birmingham, where four young girls were killed. It had been thirty years since the tragedy, but the scars were far from healed. As a newcomer to the city, Langford did not know how to answer the question, but he made a promise.

“I will look into it.”

He could have chosen to say, “That’s been thirty years ago; we aren’t going back there.” But he didn’t.

Reopening the case was a far harder task than bringing distrusting people in to talk. Investigators spent 18 months just going through the old files. Suspects and witnesses were aging and some had already died. None wanted to talk.

But they pressed on. Because of Rob Langford, that cold case was reopened. Because of him and the team of investigators and prosecutors who worked on the case, the remaining two Ku Klux Klansmen —who had planted that bomb on a Sunday morning while young girls got ready for services—were indicted and tried, found guilty, and spent the rest of their lives in prison.

It didn’t bring those girls back, but it gave closure to their families and to the community and to the world.

The deaths of Annie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, Carole Robertson, and Carol Denise McNair, along with the severe injuries of Sarah Collins and the bravery of the children who marched for their freedom and rights in Birmingham that same year, pushed Congress into passing the 1964 Civil Rights Act that made segregation in public places illegal in America.

Thank you, Rob Langford, for what you did. It was a moment when you could have turned aside, but you didn’t.

Rest in Peace, my friend.

George ‘Rob’ Robert Langford
May 7, 1939 – February 21, 2024

 Personal Note:

I was privileged to call Rob a friend and to write about his story and the story of the team that investigated and prosecuted this infamous case over a period of almost forty years in my book, Last Chance for Justice.

T.K. Thorne writes about what moves her, following a flight path of curiosity, reflection, and imagination. Check out her (fiction and nonfiction) books at TKThorne.com

Behind the Magic Curtain – by T. K. Thorne

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Writer, humanist,
          dog-mom, horse servant and cat-slave,
       Lover of solitude
          and the company of good friends,
        New places, new ideas
           and old wisdom.

 

 

Four men who loved the city of Birmingham, Alabama asked me to write a
book. I look back on that day when I met them in the high-rise office
of a prominent attorney. They were all strangers, decades older. They
had lived through “pivotal nation-changing days.”
Three of them had been in the thick of happenings.  

As I sat at the polished hardwood table, I thought possibly they assumed
I was a scholar of civil rights because I had recently written a book
about the investigation of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing that
killed four young black girls in Birmingham in 1963 (Last Chance for Justice),
but to my surprise, the gentleman who invited me to that meeting said
he had done so because of a totally different book, a historical novel
set thousands of years in the past in ancient Turkey (Noah’s Wife).
I had to ask him why he thought that qualified me. He said, “If you
could write a book about Noah’s wife and make me believe that was what
really happened, then you can tell the true stories of what happened
here.” 

To say I was reticent was an understatement. What they were asking me to
do seemed a huge commitment, and so much had been documented about the
era, what could I possibly add? Then one of the men sent me his notes
about a day in 1962 when he pushed through the double glass doors of The Birmingham News, weary from an all-night stakeout with police, and
his eccentric, powerful boss shouted for him to join him for breakfast.
What was said at that breakfast changed a young reporter’s life and
affected the tangled web of history.  

I was hooked.

After the better part of a decade, it is done. Regretfully, three of the fine gentlemen who trusted me to write this did not live to see it. I only hope I have been true to their vision.

 

 

What folks are saying:

Behind the Magic Curtain: Secrets, Spies, and Unsung White Allies of Birmingham’s Civil Rights Days is a remarkable look at a historic city enmeshed in racial tensions, revealing untold or forgotten stories of secret deals, law enforcement intrigue, and courage alongside pivotal events that would sweep change across the nation.

T. K. Thorne has hit another home run with Behind the Magic Curtain. For five and a half decades we have read accounts of the civil rights era in Birmingham and Selma written by those with a particular ax to grind. Thorne is an excellent reporter, recognizing the nuances that “outsiders” or opinionated writers could not see or chose to overlook. Her reading and especially her interviews over the past several years have been remarkable, allowing her to give far more accurate details than we have seen before. For those who want to know the secrets of what really went on behind the “magic curtain” in those pivotal nation-changing days, days that brought the Civil Rights Bill in 1964 and the Voting Rights Bill in 1965, this is an important book to read.
—Douglas M. Carpenter, Retired Episcopal minister and son of Alabama’s Episcopal Bishop, C. C. J. Carpenter.

In Behind the Magic Curtain, T. K. Thorne introduces us to
those who operated behind the scenes in the civil rights movement in
Alabama, shedding light on the individual moral complexities of these
participants—some firebrands, some reluctant players, and some predators
who worked for their own gain. This journalistic exploration of a
complicated time in Alabama’s social history will sit comfortably on the
shelf next to histories by Dianne McWhorter, Glenn Eskew, and Taylor
Branch. — Anthony Grooms, author of Bombingham and The Vain Conversation

Deeply engaging, Behind the Magic Curtain tells a forgotten part of the Birmingham story, prompting many “real time memories” for me. The lively and descriptive writing brought the characters and settings to life, while diving into the white community’s role in all its complexities. This is a treasure trove of stories about activities and perspectives not well known to the general public. In particular, journalist Tom Lankford’s sleuthing and the machinations of the Birmingham Police Department, along with the risk-averse role of the local newspapers, and a full blown portrait of the inscrutable Birmingham News VIP, Vincent Townsend, make for a fascinating read.
—Odessa Woolfolk, educator, community activist, and founding president of the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute

“T.K. writes like a seasoned news editor, meticulously hunting down facts and laying out the context in a colorful, intriguing way. Behind the Magic Curtain documents many untold stories and faithfully relates my own personal, unforgettable memories of a time of racial transition in Birmingham.”
—Tom Lankford, journalist for The Birmingham News

 “Novelist and former Birmingham Police Captain T.K. Thorne demonstrates
there was more to Birmingham of the Civil Rights Era than Bull Connor,
Klansmen, and African-American protestors.  Behind that “Magic Curtain,”
an ethnically diverse group from downtown to the surrounding bedroom
communities of ministers, priests, rabbis, newspaper reporters, and
housewives comprised a community belying monikers like ‘Bomingham’ and
‘Murder Capital of America,’ and fighting for justice in the Magic
City.”
—Earl Tilford, author of Turning the Tide: The University of Alabama in the 1960s

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T.K. is a retired police captain who writes books, which, like this blog, go wherever her interest and imagination take her.  More at TKThorne.com