Back to the Garden

  Intro: A Song for Change In 1963, tensions were high. Police turned fire hoses and dogs loose on Black youth protesting for civil rights. In Birmingham, the Klan bombed  a Sunday school killing four young girls. In Jackson, Mississippi, civil rights leader Medgar Evers was assassinated in his home. Between these punctuating acts of terror, the structural violence of Jim Crow ground on adding indignity after indignity to Black life in America. In October of that year, the celebrated R&B singer, Sam Cooke, found himself on tour in Shreveport, Louisiana. On October 8 th , Cooke called ahead to a Holiday Inn to make reservations for himself and his wife. However, upon arrival later that evening, the desk clerk looked nervously at Cooke and his group and declared that there were, in fact, no vacancies that evening. Cooke was righteously furious and started yelling at the clerk, demanding to see a manager. His brother Charles pleaded with him to just let it go and leave. H...