09/15/2026
Carole Robertson was a member of Jack and Jill who was killed in the 16th Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham, AL, on September 15, 1963 along with three other young girls.
Carole was an active member of her community and school, participating in the Parker High School Marching Band, Science Club and was a member of Girl Scout Troop 264. She was also a straight ‘A’ student.
It was Youth Sunday at Sixteenth Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. The preacher had prepared a sermon especially for the children. The youth choir would lead the congregation in music, and children would serve as ushers.
For the youngsters, many of whom had marched proudly with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., it was another in a series of momentous events that year. That spring, their own church had been the center of a campaign against segregation. The long struggle was won mainly because children were brave enough to march into the overpowering water hoses and vicious dogs of Police Commissioner Bull Connor. After television news cameras revealed the brutal force unleashed on the children, city officials were forced to reform their harsh segregation laws.
In the basement ladies’ lounge of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church, four girls were chatting nervously and straightening their fancy white dresses. In a few minutes, the worship service would begin. Addie Mae Collins, 14, and Denise McNair, 11, were in the choir. Carole Robertson and Cynthia Wesley, both 14, had been chosen to serve as ushers.
Only a few feet away, beneath a stone staircase along the outside wall of the church, a dynamite bomb had been planted eight hours earlier. At 10:22, it exploded. The whole church shook. Plaster and debris fell around the people in Sunday School upstairs. The four girls in the ladies’ lounge were killed instantly. (Learningforjustice.org)
Windy City Chapter remembers Carole and all those whose lives were senselessly taken on this day in 1963. We shall, overcome!
