By Erica Thomas, managing editor
BIRMINGHAM On July 6, 2021, the sound of a cracking foundation rang out in east Birmingham. The demolition of Banks High School/Middle School was the end of an era for many, as it served as the place they developed their personal foundation.
For years, the old building stood vacant and now the city of Birmingham is working on a $400,000 project to clear the land and begin new development of the area.
“Banks has served this community well, and now it’s time we serve Roebuck Springs and South East Lake just as well by providing new opportunity for its residents,” Mayor Randall Woodfin said.
For John Archibald, it began with silence. What he describes as “white silence.”
The Pulitzer Prize–winning columnist for Alabama Media Group writes of the deafening silence from the pulpits of white churches in his 320-page biographical memoir, “Shaking the Gates of Hell: A Search for Family and Truth in the Wake of the Civil Rights Revolution.”
Available on March 9, Archibald’s book tells of “an all-American white boy, son of a long line of Methodist preachers, in the midst of the Civil Rights revolution and discovering the culpability of silence within the church,” according to promotional material.
During a recent interview from Cambridge, Massachusetts, where the author is studying under a Nieman Fellowship at Harvard University for the 2020–2021 academic year, Archibald said, “The story of me starts with white silence, which is why this book just