Photographs and stories that changed the world

A collaboration of and

Alabama

Centering People Power in the Selma to Montgomery March

Photos from the 1965 Selma to Montgomery March often downplay the transformative role of community-rooted power in securing voting rights for all Americans.

Desegregating the Schoolhouse Doors

Vivian Malone and James Hood calmly faced reporters as they prepared to integrate the University of Alabama in 1963, symbolizing the determination of Black youth in the face of those who were staunchly opposed to desegregation.

Florida-Prisoners in a chain gang building a road. Undated photograph.

Convict Leasing After Slavery

Slavery ended in 1865. But many Black Southerners remained unfree laborers under the convict leasing system.