On May 8, 1963, Sheriff Bull Conner had no sympathy for protestors and on this day ordered the fire department to use water cannons and hoses to break up the protests that had been going on for nearly a month.
In the picture is Mamie King-Chalmers, no relation to Dr. Martin Luther King, who had been protesting peacefully at a nearby park when the hoses were used. The photo is by Life Magazine Charles Moore.
"It trapped me in the doorway," King-Chalmers said during a Detroit school visit in 2013, referring to the firehose. "The hose was so strong it damaged my hearing."
This was part of a terrible summer of violence in Birmingham
Mamie King-Chalmers died in Dec. of 2022 at the age of 81
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