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50th anniversary of the Freedom Rides
Content related to the burning of the Freedom Riders bus in Anniston on May 14, 1961.
Conversations about the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Rides (Sunday morning update includes new news articles from appearance in Montgomery)
News stories and social media buzz surrounding the marking of this historic civil rights event.
May 15, 2011 |  0 comments | 23 23 recommendations | email to a friend
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Yvonne Thomas, left, (wife of Hank Thomas), Hank Thomas (original Freedom Rider on the Anniston bus that burned), William Harbour (original Freedom Rider) and Janie Forsyth McKinney (she helped the Freedom Riders as a young girl when the bus burned in Anniston) hold hands as a crowd sings ‘We shall Overcome’ Wednesday at the Public Library of Anniston-Calhoun County.
A prayer for reconciliation: Remembering the Freedom Riders
Rev. Alberta McCrory, the mayor of Hobson City, delivered this invocation Wednesday night at a reception honoring the Freedom Riders, a group of civil rights heroes who traveled to the South on buses to challenge Jim Crow segregation laws.
May 14, 2011 |  0 comments | 17 17 recommendations | email to a friend
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Spirit of Anniston Director Betsy Bean speaks to a crowd gathered for the bus painting on Gurnee Avenue Thursday morning. (Anniston Star photo by Stephen Gross)
Anniston bus murals unveiled
“We talk about Martin Luther King Day, we do service activities, but I’m not sure we have the full understanding of what happened here,” said Rachael DeMarce, a member of the Blackfeet tribe born and raised on the Blackfeet reservation in Montana. (Editor's note: This article is a somewhat longer version of the one that appears in the March 13 print edition of The Star.)
May 13, 2011 |  0 comments | 21 21 recommendations | email to a friend
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The group photo, taken at a downtown Anniston restaurant, shows students who are retracing the route of the original Freedom Riders. In the other photo, Hank Thomas, in white shirt, hugs Richard Couch on Wednesday at the Public Library of Anniston-Calhoun County. Thomas was an original Freedom Rider. Couch’s father was in the mob that burned the bus in 1961. (Anniston Star photos by Bill Wilson)
Reconciliation, understanding mark Freedom Riders' return to Anniston
The students who attended the ceremony at the library were chosen from hundreds of students who applied for the opportunity to retrace the steps of the 1961 Freedom Rides, and come face to face with history.
May 12, 2011 |  0 comments | 30 30 recommendations | email to a friend
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Portrait of Richard Couch, who is the son of Jerome Couch. Jerome Couch was one of the few people who were actually convicted of a crime in the Freedom Riders bus burning.
Bus burner's son takes a different path
Richard Couch is in the same line of work as Atticus Finch. It's a world away from the path chosen by his father, who did a year's probation for his role in the burning of the Freedom Riders bus.
May 11, 2011 |  1 comments | 60 60 recommendations | email to a friend
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Related Letters and Editorials
A sharper focus: The power of an iconic image to show what’s there — and what’s not
The still photo is the platform upon which an entire episode of human history can be transported. It must be taken in focus, with the scene properly composed, and at the precise moment that captures the enormity of the event.
May 15, 2011 |  4 comments | 16 16 recommendations | email to a friend
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Accepting responsibility in Anniston
Jewish people all over the world recently remembered the Exodus of our ancestors from slavery in Egypt. Central to this major Jewish Holy Season is a ceremony in the home in which the family elder narrates the story of the Exodus and enjoins each one present to remember it as if he or she were personally liberated.
May 13, 2011 |  3 comments | 13 13 recommendations | email to a friend
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A story and its audience: Honor city’s civil-rights history
Anniston is deserving of its spot on Alabama’s Civil Rights Trail, though its status may never equal that of Birmingham and Montgomery. The reasons are obvious — from Bull Connor to Rosa Parks, from Kelly Ingram Park to Martin Luther King Jr.
May 12, 2011 |  0 comments | 14 14 recommendations | email to a friend
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Freedom Rider Hank Thomas: Anniston’s place in my life
When I boarded the Greyhound bus in Washington, D.C., May 4, 1961, headed south, I was in search of my American dream — that elusive dream, the dream that the Declaration of Independence’s reference to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” included me, a coming-of-age black man.
May 12, 2011 |  0 comments | 25 25 recommendations | email to a friend
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H. Brandt Ayers: Redemption — How the shock of the bus burning became a spur to action
Yes, on Mothers Day 1961 a mob of white thugs burned a Freedom Riders bus and beat some of its occupants on the outskirts of Anniston, but that isn’t the whole story.
May 11, 2011 |  0 comments | 18 18 recommendations | email to a friend
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Related Documents


More than 1,000 pages from the FBI investigation into the attack on the Freedom Riders bus outside Anniston on May 14, 1961. The files were requested by the Anniston Star. Many names have been redacted by the FBI. Click the images to view a full size version of the documents.
The Ride: Special Section


Read the full special section commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Ride. Click the image to view a full version of the document.

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On May 14, 1961, Joe Postiglione took photos of the attack on the Freedom Riders bus for publication in The Anniston Star. Sixty-four photos were given to the FBI as evidence, along with descriptions provided by Postiglione. Photos 1-17 were taken at the Greyhound Bus Station between 8 a.m. and 1:10 p.m. Photos 18-64 were taken at Forsyth's Grocery, west of Anniston on State Highway 202, between 1:30 and 2:10 p.m. These images were provided by the Birmingham Civil Rights Institute. The final two photos were recently discovered in the Anniston Star photo archives.