Rosa Parks - Civil Rights Activist

Full name: Rosa Louise McCauley Parks
Born: 4 February 1913
Hometown: Tuskegee, Alabama, USA
Occupation: Civil rights activist
Died: 24 October 2005
Best known for: The Montgomery Bus Boycott



Rosa was born in the town of Tuskegee in Alabama, a state in southern USA. Her mother was a teacher and her father a carpenter, and she had a little brother called Sylvester. After her parents separated when she was just a little girl, Rosa and Sylvester moved with their mother to Alabama’s capital city, Montgomery.

Rosa Parks is best known for The Montgomery Bus Boycott, and the work she did as a Civil Rights Activitist. As a person of colour Rosa had to deal with a lot of racism every single day. Where she lived in the southern states of America there was a thing called the Jim Crow laws. Each state had slightly different ways of using these laws but they had one common goal - to make sure black citizens and white citizens led very separate lives.

Understandably Rosa, her husband and lots of their friends who were also people of colour thought this was bullshit, and they joined the National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People (NAACP). This was a group that was working towards putting an end to discrimination and segregation.

It was on the 1st December 1955 that Rosa really sparked changed. In Montgomery, Alabama there was a law that stated the city buses had to be segregated. White passengers could sit at the front but black passengers had to sit at the back.On this day Rosa got on the bus after work, as the bus continued its journey it quickly filled with passengers. When a white man boarded, the driver told the African American passengers to give up their seats for him. Whilst the other black passengers obeyed, Rosa did not. Rosa was shouted at by the bus driver and she still refused to give up her seat, so the driver got off the bus and fetched a police man to arrest her.

She was arrested by the police and fined for breaking segregation laws, but Rosa (super kick-ass woman!) refused to pay, and argues that it was the law that was wrong, not her behaviour. On news of Rosa’s arrest, the black citizens of Montgomery came together and agreed to boycott the city’s buses in protest. This meant that from 5 December 1955 (the date of Rosa’s trial), African Americans refused to travel on buses. The boycott was managed by an organisation called the Montgomery Improvement Association, for which Dr Martin Luther King Jr was elected as leader.

It was really hard for the people who chose to take part in the boycott as many of them didn't drive or have cars, so getting around was really difficult. But they stuck at it and on 13 November 1956 their efforts were finally rewarded. After 381 days of boycotting the buses, the Supreme Court ruled that Alabama’s racial segregation laws were ‘unconstitutional’ – meaning they weren’t valid and should not be recognised. In light of such a wonderful victory, Rosa became known as “the mother of the civil rights movement”.

Throughout her life Rosa Parks continued to campaign for civil rights and received numerous awards for her strength, courage and her incredible work – including the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1996 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.

I think she was so brave to refuse to give up her seat, I am not sure that I would have had the strength to be as brave. I have really enjoyed learning about this inspirational lady and hope you have liked reading about what I found out. 

~ Ella x



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