Selma at 60: Bloody Sunday’s Lasting Fire

Mar 9

Selma marks 60 years since Bloody Sunday, where marchers faced brutality for voting rights. Their faith-driven fire still burns bright.

Written By Jurnee Davis // EEW Magazine Online

Sixty years ago, March 7, 1965, wasn’t quiet in Selma. Hundreds marched across the Edmund Pettus Bridge for voting rights, only to meet Alabama troopers swinging billy clubs and firing tear gas.

JoAnne Bland, just 11, still sees it: “They beat us down—old, young, didn’t matter,” she told Associated Press. That day, dubbed Bloody Sunday, lit a fuse. The nation watched, stunned, and months later, the Voting Rights Act of 1965 cracked open ballot boxes for Black folks across the South.

Fast forward to March 9, 2025—Selma buzzed again. The Bridge Crossing Jubilee pulled in thousands: survivors like Bland and Charles Mauldin, then 17, plus families and preachers packing Tabernacle Baptist Church with song and prayer.

Mauldin hasn’t forgotten: “One minute in, they hit us—clubs, gas, horses running us off.” Now, he’s back, crossing that bridge with kids who weren’t born then, stopping mid-span to bow his head. Bland, who runs Freedom Park tours, keeps it real: “This is about those who took the hits so we could stand here.”

The march wasn’t a history lesson—it crackled with life. Martin Luther King III traced his dad’s steps, while U.S. Rep. Terri Sewell lit up the crowd: “Selma’s where guts met grit.”

At Brown Chapel AME, where the ‘65 march kicked off, voices lifted hymns, feet hit pavement, and the air hummed with something bigger. For EEW Magazine readers, it’s a faith flex—marching with God’s love, trusting it outlasts hate.

Bloody Sunday’s fire still burns, and Selma’s not letting it fade.