Linn Park is a urban park in the centre of

Birmingham, Alabama Birmingham ( ) is a city in the north central region of the U.S. state of Alabama. Birmingham is the seat of Jefferson County, Alabama's most populous county. As of the 2021 census estimates, Birmingham had a population of 197,575, down 1% fr ...

. It is overlooked by

Birmingham City Hall Birmingham ( ) is a City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands (county), West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1. ...

. Formerly known as Capitol Park, Woodrow Wilson Park, and Central Park, the park was renamed after Confederate naval officer and businessman

Charles Linn Charles Linn born Carl Erik Engelbert Sjödahl (June 13, 1814 – August 7, 1882) was a sailor, wholesaler, banker, and industrialist. He was a captain in the Confederate Navy and an important figure in Alabama's early economy. Early life Carl ...

in the 1980s.

Confederate monuments

From 1905 until 2020, the park was home to the Confederate Soldiers and Sailors Monument, a -high obelisk erected by the Daughters of the Confederacy, even though the city itself did not exist until after the Civil War. Following protests in 2020 after the

murder of George Floyd On , George Floyd, a 46-year-old black man, was murdered in the U.S. city of Minneapolis by Derek Chauvin, a 44-year-old white police officer. Floyd had been arrested on suspicion of using a counterfeit $20 bill. Chauvin knelt on Floyd's ...

, during which protestors damaged and tried to remove the monument, the mayor removed the obelisk, leaving only the

plinth A pedestal (from French ''piédestal'', Italian ''piedistallo'' 'foot of a stall') or plinth is a support at the bottom of a statue, vase, column, or certain altars. Smaller pedestals, especially if round in shape, may be called socles. In ...

. A

statue of Charles Linn A statue of Charles Linn was previously installed in Birmingham, Alabama's Linn Park, Birmingham, Alabama, Linn Park, in the United States. The statue was erected in 2012 and toppled in 2020. Description The bronze sculpture depicts Charles Linn ...

was installed in 2013 and toppled on May 31, 2020, during the

George Floyd protests The George Floyd protests were a series of protests and civil unrest against police brutality and racism that began in Minneapolis on May 26, 2020, and largely took place during 2020. The civil unrest and protests began as part of internat ...

. The state Attorney General responded by filing a new lawsuit against the city.

References

External links

* parks in Birmingham, Alabama {{Alabama-stub