Anniston Hardware, in Anniston, Alabama

Anniston, Alabama

Anniston is a city in Calhoun County in the state of Alabama, United States.As of the 2000 census, the population of the city is 24,276. According to the 2005 U.S. Census estimates, the city had a population of 23,741...

 was bombed by the KKK

Ku Klux Klan

Ku Klux Klan, often abbreviated KKK and informally known as the Klan, is the name of three distinct past and present far-right organizations in the United States, which have advocated extremist reactionary currents such as white supremacy, white nationalism, and anti-immigration, historically...

 in 1964 during the Civil Rights Movement

Civil rights movement

The civil rights movement was a worldwide political movement for equality before the law occurring between approximately 1950 and 1980. In many situations it took the form of campaigns of civil resistance aimed at achieving change by nonviolent forms of resistance. In some situations it was...

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The company had been incorporated in 1887 when Anniston was opened to the public. James Creswell Sproull was the founder, and in 1905, he was mayor of Anniston.
J.C. Sproull's grandson, H. Miller Sproull, was a City Commissioner in 1963, and was a leader in appointing a bi-racial Anniston "Human Relations Council" which assisted in desegregation. After a previous desegregation attempt was met with mob violence, on Monday September 16, 1963 Miller Sproull participated in escorting black ministers into the public library to integrate that facility. The bombing of the store took place in February, 1964, along with several other facilities associated with white community leaders involved in desegregation.