In rural Alabama, a mass shooting America ignored

A ray of orange light shoots through a hail-size hole in the stained-glass window of what was once a church. On this evening, some of the lightbulbs are broken, and a folding table covered with a white sheet passes as a dais.

This is the new Town Hall complex of Camp Hill, Alabama, and Mayor Messiah Williams-Cole would like to make sure it stands for something. But for a predominantly Black town of 1,000 people struggling through grief, that has proven more difficult than he expected. 

Four miles away on April 15, many Camp Hill kids were at a Sweet 16 party when six teens from another town swept in and started firing. More than two dozen teenagers were injured, including two of Mr. Williams-Cole’s cousins. Four died, and several others were paralyzed. Five defendants – all between the ages of 16 and 20 – were indicted May 22 by a grand jury on charges of reckless murder and assault. The case of a sixth defendant, age 15, is being handled by juvenile courts.  

Seeking some small measure of healing, Mr. Williams-Cole had an idea: to rename the new