The Jefferson County Memorial Project (JCMP) was created after the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI) opened the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, a groundbreaking memorial in Montgomery dedicated to African American victims of racial terror violence. The Memorial contains monuments corresponding to over 800 counties where EJI documented racial terror lynchings. EJI has invited these counties to participate in their Community Remembrance Project, retrieve their monument and take the lead in facilitating a local reckoning. 

Mission: 

The Jefferson County Memorial Project is a grassroots coalition that will memorialize victims of racial terror violence and expand our county’s understanding of past and present issues of racial injustice. 

To retrieve the Jefferson County Monument, EJI has asked counties to create coalitions that demonstrate broad support and intentional planning and use of the monument. The Jefferson County Coalition will: 

• Research and reach out to descendants of the victims of the 33 Jefferson County lynchings
• Educate the county on the history and purpose of the monument through museum exhibits, K-12 engagement, a city wide book discussion, and other programming.
• Place the monument and establish historical markers throughout the county
• Advocate for criminal justice reform for the city and county

Our Core Coalition

In June 2018, a group of Jefferson County residents created the JCMP Coalition to help guide our county in coming together to understand this history. Our current members include:

JCMP Staff

Timeline Highlights  

2018

• April: The National Memorial for Peace and Justice opened in Montgomery, Alabama 
• June: Residents create a core-coalition to build out the Jefferson County Memorial Project
• Summer: The coalition meets with community partners to gain support and feedback  
• September: Inaugural class of  JCMP Fellowship launches
• November: JCMP officially launches and accompanies Mayor Randall Woodfin and his staff to EJI’s Museum and Memorial in Montgomery. 

2019 

• February: JCMP hosts its first public event with the release of the 30 Residents Report, compiled by JCMP Fellows. 
• March – Ongoing: JCMP starts hosting trainings with community partners to discuss how to talk about this difficult topic with family and peers. So far we have held 20+ trainings to create over 175 JCMP Ambassadors.  
• May – November:  JCMP partners with UAB’s AEIVA for Mary Frances Whitfield’s exhibit, “WHY?” 
• June: Launch of the inaugural Summer County-Wide Book Discussion 
• August: Incarcerated Voices Blog, written by JCMP’s students at the Donaldson Correctional Facility launched on JCMP’s website 
• September: Historical marker dedication ceremony at Sloss Furnaces and launch of Birmingham High School Essay Contest 
• September: JCMP 2020 Fellowship cohort launches 
• December: Holiday Hygiene Drive for men incarcerated at the Donaldson Correctional Facility 

2020

• January: 600 BCS students see Just Mercy 
• January – March : JCMP partners with Bib and Tucker and UAB to exhibit LaShawnda Crowe Storm’s “Lynch Quilts Project”
• February: EJI and JCMP Host Ceremony for winners of high school essay contest 
• February: JCMP 2020 Fellows release their report, Jefferson County’s Broken Systems 
• May: Panel on Ahmuad Arbery and Nathaniel Woods 
• May: JCMP’s 2020 Fellows release final project, Segregated Sites Bike Tour 

2021

• February: Installation of Irondale historical marker
• February: JCMP’s 2021 Fellows release their report, Contested Terrain: A Historical Walk Through Birmingham’s Linn Park
• April: JCMP partners with the Greater Birmingham Arts Education Collaborative and Bush Hills STEAM Academy to present “The Green Book Project”
• April: JCMP partners with Space One Eleven for “Just Injustice” exhibit
• April: JCMP Fellows visit The National Memorial for Peace and Justice
• May: Red Mountain Theatre’s table read of Memorial
• May: Launch of  “ JCMP: My Story,” three part virtual speaker series
• June:  Launch of annual Summer County-Wide Book Discussion 
• September:  JCMP partners with UAB’s AEIVA for “Marking Time” exhibit
• Octobrr: JCMP Core members attend opening of the new Legacy Museum
• October: JCMP partners with Substrate Radio for “No Longer Silent: Within Our Gates” silent film event with DJ Suaze
• December: Holiday Hygiene Drive for men incarcerated at the Donaldson Correctional Facility 
• December: JCMP and Jefferson County District Attorney’s Office – Birmingham Division awarded $498,933  Emmett Till Cold Case Training Program Grant from the Bureau of Justice Assistance

2022

• January – Ongoing: JCMP Research Fellows begin pilot partnership completing case studies with Northeastern University’s Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project and  the Jefferson County District Attorney – Birmingham Division’s Office
• February – Ongoing: Community engagement for Linn Park memorial begins
• February: Red Mountain Theatre’s table read of Memorial at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church
• April: JCMP partners with The Black Cherry Tree Project for “33 Victims” inaugural exhibition at Gallery Vox
• May:   JCMP partners with the Greater Birmingham Arts Education Collaborative and Bush Hills STEAM Academy to present “The Green Book Project”
• May – Ongoing: JCMP begins participating in “Revision Linn Park” project
• July: JCMP presents “100 Years from Mississippi” Film Screening and discussion at Sidewalk Cinema
• July: JCMP partners with The Black Cherry Tree Project for  “Black Cherry Tree Corral” conversation series at Ground Floor Contemporary
• July – Ongoing: “Operation Legacy” Oral History Project begins w/2020 JCMP Fellow, Austin Lewter
• September:  Recruitment for 2023 JCMP Fellowship begins
• October:  JCMP to partner with Substrate Radio to host second silent film event “No Longer Silent: Scar of Shame” with DJ Supreme at UAB’s AEIVA
• November: – Holiday Hygiene Drive for men incarcerated at the Donaldson Correctional Facility 

2023 and Beyond

• JCMP progresses from design process to construction planning for Jefferson County Remembrance Plaza and Garden in Linn Park
• Brookside, Pratt City, Oak Hill, and Stockham Park move forward with placing historical markers
• JCMP Fellows continue research  and partnership with JCDA’s office and Civil Rights and Restorative Justice Project on the Emmett Till Cold Case Training Program
• JCMP partners with Bib and Tucker Sew-Op for community quilting sessions

Frequently Asked Questions

How can I learn about this history?

Our JCMP Fellows from the six Jefferson County colleges publish their research in an annual report that can be found on our website. Their reports include profiles of the thirty-three documented victims and ways to better understand how to learn about and interpret this history. Read the report here: https://jeffersoncountymemorial.com/fellowsresearch/ 

When will the monument come to Jefferson County? 

The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, opened in 2018, and the accompanying museum, are breaking new ground in how communities remember and respond to our collective history of racial terror violence. The Equal Justice Initiative is still developing the important protocol required for county retrieval. The JCMP team meets regularly with EJI staff for updates and guidance as we move ahead, and we look forward to being part of a collective national effort that is proceeding in the careful and deliberate manner that this painful subject matter requires. 

Where will the monument go? 

Because this will be a public monument in a public space, we wanted to ensure the community was involved in this process. Through our website and community engagement meetings, we heard from residents throughout the county that resoundingly supported JCMP’s recommendation that the monument be placed in Linn Park. We believe it should be placed there for three primary reasons: 

1. On November 24th, 1883, a white mob lynched Lewis Houston in Linn Park. This was the first of the thirty documented lynchings that occured in Jefferson County.
2. Linn Park was the route taken by those fighting against the poll tax, especially in the 1930’s. Voting rights was one of the core triggers that motivated the lynching of those who defending their rights.
3. Linn Park is the public space that connects the seat of city government, City Hall, with the seat of county government, the Jefferson County Courthouse. These public entities allowed these acts of racial terror to occur. By placing the monument in Linn Park, we will remind our local government and its citizens of this painful history , which is the first step necessary to ensure that such atrocities never happen again.

How do I get involved? 

Please see the “Join Us” section of our website to fill out the sign-up form or find an upcoming JCMP event to attend. You can also follow us on Instagram (@JeffCoMemorial) and Facebook (JCMP: Jefferson County Memorial Project). We are a grassroots coalition, and the majority of our work is done by committed volunteers. We would love for you to join us in this effort!

JCMP’s Work with the The Equal Justice Initiative’s Community Remembrance Project

The Community Remembrance Project is part of EJI’s effort to partner with communities to recognize the victims of racial terror lynching through education events, collecting soil from lynching sites, erecting historical markers in communities where racial terror lynchings occurred, and creating a memorial that acknowledges the horrors of racial injustice. 

EJI has documented more than 4400 racial terror lynchings throughout the country between 1877 and 1950. For a more comprehensive understanding of the historical and contemporary analysis and discussion that informs the scope and purposes of EJI’s community remembrance project, EJI encourages community members and potential partners to read EJI’s Lynching In America report and to engage with the interactive website. 

Many communities where lynchings took place have not created spaces to address the history of lynching and most victims have never been publicly acknowledged in these communties. To create greater awareness and understanding about racial terror lynching and the legacy of this violence, EJI works with communities to engage in truth-telling work through educational events and remembrance ceremonies. 

EJI’s Community Remembrance Project has several components that are all connected and intended to create opportunities for the community to deepen an understanding of the history of racial terror lynching and it’s continued legacies. EJI believes that truth and reconciliation are sequential. In order to get closer to healing and repair, we must address oppressive histories by honestly and soberly recognizing the pain of the past. In order to build towards those goals after an era of enslavement, an era of racial terror lynching and violence, an era of Jim Crow segregation, an era mass incarceration, we have to commit ourselves to building an era of truth and justice. We have to be intentional about creating space for honest engagement with the work of truth-telling. 

As communities consider working with EJI to respond to the call to action to claim the monument from the National Memorial for Peace and Justice, it’s critical that communities understand the monument as part of a larger effort/process of engaging in truth-telling work (under EJI’s community remembrance project umbrella). As of now, EJI has not yet released any of the memorial monuments to any of the communities that they represent. However, EJI encourages communities to consider partnering with EJI on other aspects of the community remembrance project to build towards community readiness for the memorial monument as well as building a local commitment to truth-telling work. Claiming the monument is not the end goal; the purpose is to help communities confront and recover from tragic histories of racial violence and terrorism and to create an environment where there can truly be equal justice for all. 

The process of community readiness includes public education, community engagement and raising consciousness about the local history of racial terrorism and it’s present-day legacy in that community. At this time, EJI continues to work with communities through the Soil Collection and Historical Marker Projects which allow for engagement with activities aimed at helping to create space for honest reflection and recognition of this history. Community partners who participate in these projects will also bring the experience of that work to an understanding of what it means and symbolizes to claim the memorial monument which will be helpful to do this work with great intentionality. 

EJI currently encourages and welcomes community partners to consider participating in our Community Remembrance Historical Marker Project as a meaningful step in the process towards engaging with effort to claim the memorial monument, which can be preceded or followed by a Soil Collection Project, as well. Community members and partners who choose to pursue a historical marker project in particular will have the opportunity to complete some of the preliminary steps necessary for participation in claiming the memorial monument. 

For more information, updates, or to pose any questions, please feel welcome to reach the team at EJI by emailing memorialmonument@eji.org.