RECOGNIZING THE 50th ANNIVERSARY OF THE BIRMINGHAM BOMBING
WHEREAS, September 15, 2013 commemorates the 50th anniversary of a Sunday morning in 1963 when Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins, Cynthia Wesley, and Denise McNair were murdered by a bomb that was set off at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama while they were inside; and
WHEREAS, This heinous and cowardly act of terrorism galvanized the nation and steeled the resolve of both the United States President and Congress to adopt the 1964 Civil Rights Act just a year later; and
WHEREAS, The Carole Robertson Center for Learning, named in memory of those four young girls who lost their lives, was founded in 1976 by parents and other community residents and first located on this city's Near West Side. Every five years since its inception, the Center memorializes this solemn occasion with a rededication ceremony to commemorate the anniversary of the bombing; and
WHEREAS, On this 50th anniversary, the Carole Robertson Center will hold a special Rededication Ceremony on the evening of Thursday, September 19, 2013 at Saint Ignatius College Prep on West Roosevelt Road. Surviving members of Carole Robertson's family, elected officials, and other special guests will be in attendance to commemorate the positive impact the Center's work has had on so many and the magnitude of work still to be done in memory of these four girls; and
WHEREAS, The Carole Robertson Center for Learning has since grown ten-fold and has evolved into a comprehensive family development agency with additional locations. The Carole Robertson Center opened in Little Village during 1989. In 2000, a two-story addition was added at this location to service the largest Mexican-American community in the Midwest. In 2001, the Carole Robertson Center opened a third site in North Lawndale, a community that has suffered years of decline after the mass exodus to Chicago's suburbs in the 1950's and the civil unrest of 1968 but has recently...
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