Does anyone die in The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963?
Several young girls die in a church bombing near the end of The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963.
The novel is based on the historical tragedy of the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing, which occurred on September 15, 1963. Although the characters in this book are fictional, the bombing which almost kills Joey is historically true.
In the book, Joey is at the church moments before a bomb explodes. When chaos ensues, Kenny goes to the church to find her. When he does, she claims that she left before the bombs exploded because she saw him and followed him out; in actuality, Kenny was nowhere near the church at the time, but Joey's belief that she had followed her brother out of the church saves her life.
Outside the church, Kenny sees two of the girls who were not as fortunate. The details of this scene are covered tenderly, but...
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those two girls depict two of the actual victims of the bombing. In theepilogue, the author provides the names of the four girls who lost their lives that day: Addie Mae Collins, Denise McNair, Carole Robertson, and Cynthia Wesley.
This work of historical fiction depicts the true dangers that so many faced during this period of American history.
What quote from The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 best represents family relationships?
The theme of family relationships in The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 becomes especially significant after Joetta is spared from the church bombing and Byron later helps Kenny get over his guilt. A quotation could be taken from number of passages near the end of Chapter 15 about the “magic powers” displayed by family members’ behaviors.
For much of the novel, Byron tries to distance himself from the family as part of the adolescent rebellion he believes makes him seem cool. After the bombing, all the family members re-evaluate their relationships because they realize how close the little girl came to dying. Even before that, Kenny had learned how much Byron loves him by saving him from drowning.
When the family gets back to Flint, Kenny is unable to process the enormity of the experience. Rather than understanding that he actually saved Joey, he feels that he let her down by running from the church. Byron finally helps him understand what his role had been, and sits with him as he cries out the pent-up trauma. But Kenny does not agree that there is no such thing as “magic powers.” He reflects on all the different kinds of magic, genies, and angels that his relatives have shown him. Finally, he considers his grandmother’s love.
I’m sure there was an angel in Birmingham when Grandma Sands wrapped her little arms around all of the Weird Watsons and said, “My fambly, my beautiful, beautiful fambly.”
What's a notable quote from The Watsons Go to Birmingham?
After Kenny realizes that Joey has escaped death in the church bombing, he is deeply traumatized. He spends time hiding behind the family couch in a state of shock until his older brother Byron decides to give Kenny a brotherly kick back to reality. There are several quotes in chapter 15 that deserve personal reflection.
But Byron, it’s just not fair. What about those other kids, you know they had brothers and sisters and mommas and daddies who loved them just as much as we love Joey, how come no one came and got them out of that church? How’s it fair?
Kenny is, of course, thankful that Joey wasn't injured in the bombings, but he touches on a question that all humans grapple with at some point: Why do bad things happen to innocent people? This is a question which philosophers and religious experts have tried to answer for centuries. Kenny is trying to understand why innocent children had to die and there are no easy answers.
How’s it fair that two grown men could hate Negroes so much that they’d kill some kids just to stop them from going to school? How’s it fair that even though the cops down there might know who did it nothing will probably ever happen to those men? It ain’t. But you just gotta understand that that’s the way it is and keep on steppin’.
Byron's response touches on the social injustices of Southern culture in the 1960s. Byron has impossibly difficult questions of his own regarding the way people allow their own senseless hatred to create devastating consequences. Byron believes that Kenny can't live his life in a perpetual state of anger over societal conflicts and instead insists that Kenny needs to keep moving forward, seeking personal progress over things he can control.
He was also very wrong about there not being anything like magic powers or genies or angels. Maybe those weren’t the things that could make a run-over dog walk without wobbling but they were out there.
Maybe they were in the way your father smiled at you even after you’d messed something up real bad. Maybe they were in the way you understood that your mother wasn’t trying to make you the laughing “sock” of the whole school when she’d call you over in front of a bunch of your friends and use spit on her finger to wipe the sleep out of your eyes. Maybe it was magic powers that let you know she was just being Momma.
Kenny comes to believe that the real "magic" of life is lived in the everyday moments spent with people who understand and know you. He sees "magic" in his family's interactions with each other and in the way they intuitively understand exactly what each person in the family needs. The common and ordinary "magic" of Kenny's family is what brings him back to reality and helps him to believe that he is "going to be all right."