Rosa Parks Story, Bus Boycott, Children, Facts & Quotes

Rosa Parks was an African-American human rights activist. She is an important figure in the civil rights movement in the United States. Rose is best known for her crucial role in the Montgomery bus boycott.

On December 1, 1955, Parks rejected to give up her seat on the bus to a white passenger at the order of the driver James F. Blake in Montgomery, Alabama. The police arrested her immediately and were fined $15.

This episode triggered the movement that was called the Montgomery Bus Boycott. On November 13, 1956, The Supreme Court of the United States strikes down bus segregation laws and said it is unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Rosa Parks Facts

Rosa Parks Biography

Rosa Parks was born on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama, The United Starts, as Rosa Louise McCauley. She was born into a poor Christian family. Rosa Park’s father’s name is James McCauley, who was a carpenter.

Rosa Park’s mother’s name is Leona McCauley, who was a teacher in high school. In addition, Rosa Parks Ethnicity was of Scots-Irish-African ancestry. When her parents separated, she moved with her mother to Pine Level, where she attended a rural school.

Rosa Parks had only one brother, whose name was Sylvester McCauley. Rosa Parks complete her early education at Montgomery Industrial School for Girls. Then, she attended Alabama State Teachers College for Negroes for secondary education.

With her grandmother’s illness and then her mother’s illness, Rosa was forced to drop out of school. She went on to work as a tailor to help with household expenses.

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Personal Life

Rosa Parks husband? On December 18, 1932, at the age of 19, Parks married Raymond Parkes, who was a barber by profession and a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). Rosa Parks has never had children with her husband Raymond Parkes.

In 1933, on the advice of her husband, Parks graduated from the university. At that time, only 7% of blacks had a college education. She changed several jobs, including being a housekeeper and a nurse. During the year of the protests, she worked as a tailor. She was a faithful Christian and loved to read the Psalter.

Rosa Parks Nickname is “The Mother of the Civil Rights Movement” and “The First Lady of Civil Rights”, which is given by The United States Congress.

For her African-American human rights activism, she was honored with the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and a posthumous statue in the United States Capitol’s National Statuary Hall.

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Bus Segregation Law

In Montgomery, capital of the state of Alabama, in the South of the United States, where the biggest racial conflicts in the country took place, since 1900, by law, the first seats on buses were reserved for white passengers.

On December 1, 1955, when Rosa was returning from work, she took one of these buses and sat in one of the seats located in the middle of the collective. When some whites got on the bus and stood up, the driver demanded that Rosa and three other blacks get up to make way for the whites.

While the other three stood up, Rosa refused to comply with the order and remained seated. The police were called and Rosa Parks was arrested and taken to jail for violating the Montgomery City Code segregation law despite not being seated in the front seats.

The next day, Rosa was released after she was bailed out by Edgar Nixon, president of The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), and his friend Clifford Durr.

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The Montgomery Bus Boycott

Rosa’s arrest sparked a large protest that resulted in a boycott of city buses, when black workers and supporters of the cause began to walk kilometers towards work, causing great damage to the company.

The protests received support from several personalities who engaged in the movement, including Martin Luther King, who was a pastor in the city of Montgomery, and gospel singer Mahalia Jackson, who performed a series of concerts to help activists who were imprisoned.

The movement against segregation lasted 382 days and only ended on November 13, 1956, after the Supreme Court declared the segregation laws unconstitutional. It was the first movement against segregation to emerge victorious on American soil.

On December 21, 1956, Martin Luther King and Glen Smiley, a white priest, got on a bus together and took the top spots. Rosa Parks has been nationally recognized as the “mother of the modern civil rights movement”.

The difficulties did not stop, Rosa suffered death threats and found it difficult to get a job. In 1957, she moved to Detroit, Michigan. In 1964, she became a deaconess of the African Methodist Episcopal Church (AME).

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Last Years and Death

In 1992, Rosa published her autobiography, “Rosa Parks: My Story”. In 2002, widowed and struggling financially, Rosa received an eviction notice from her $1,800 per month (equivalent to $2,600 in 2020) apartment for non-payment of rent.

With great national commotion, Rosa received help from the Hartford Memorial Baptist Church and debt relief from the bank. On October 24, 2005, Rosa Parks died in Detroit, Michigan, the United States, at the age of 92, due to some natural causes.

Her coffin was flown to Montgomery with honors by the Michigan State National Guard and taken in a horse-drawn hearse to the St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church. Finally, she was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery, Detroit, Michigan, United States.

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Rosa Parks Quotes

• Only one person is enough to change the world.
• I’m feeling tired of being treated like a second-class citizen in this Country.
• Every human being must live their life as a model for others.
• The bus was among the first ways I realized that there is a two-world one black and another one white.
• Racism is still with us. But it is up to us to prepare our children for what they have to meet, and hopefully, we shall overcome.
• There is no future without proper education.

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