Rosa Parks

Throughout the African American civil rights movement opportunities were sought to spark a chance at improving conditions in the south. Rosa Parks refusing to give up her seat on the Montgomery, Alabama bus was the fire to that spark. Rosa, standing up for herself something anyone person in today’s world would do, was arrested and put in jail. While Rosa was in jail she caught the eye of many people in the Civil Rights Movement, including the leaders. The Civil Rights leaders protested her arrest and hired lawyers to aid her in her trial. Although she was found guilty and was fined fourteen dollars for the cost of the court case, which lasted on thirty minutes, she wasn’t done yet. Rosa Parks has affected the society we live in today in many ways, she is the most influential person the black community has ever seen.

Rosa Parks, North American hero, or North American tragedy it depends on how you view her. Born in Tuskegee, Alabama on February 4, 1913, she was raised in an era during segregation which was normal and that black suppression was a normal way of life. Her mother worked as a school teacher at the school in Tuskegee. Rosa's father, James McCauley, worked as a carpenter. After her brother, Sylvester, was born, their dad had left them. He was cheated out on his land and couldn't support the family anymore. Her mom, brother and herself, then moved in with their grandparents. She finished High school in 1933, and continued her education at Alabama State College. She married in 1932 to a barber named Raymond Parks. She worked as an insurance salesperson, a clerk, and a tailor’s assistant in a department store. She also was employed as a seamstress by a white resident of Montgomery, who was a supporter of black Americans struggle for equal rights and freedom. She became active in Civil Rights work in the 1930’s.

The fight by African Americans for equal rights had been going on for years, one day Rosa Parks really got that battle going. Segregation was most visible on the buses in Montgomery. African Americans were told to ride in the back ten rows of the buses. The first ten rows were for white people and the center ten rows were whatever the bus driver wanted them to be. Many times the African Americans had to enter the front door to pay their toll, exit the front door and go in the back door of the bus. The bus drivers would often drive away while the African Americans were walking to the back door. Jim Crow laws prevented blacks from receiving the same rights as all other citizens.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama for not standing and letting a white bus rider take her seat. She was found guilty for disorderly conduct and fined fourteen dollars. The city law stated that all African Americans were to sit in separate rows on the buses. African Americans had to sit in the back rows of the bus because the front rows of the bus were reserved of the white passengers. Rosa was tired of all the horrible treatment her and her fellow African Americans were receiving everyday of their lives.

Rosa Parks was not the first African American arrested for this crime, in fact many others in the past were taken into custody, but she was the first well-known African American that would be arrested for this crime. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., a young African American pastor at the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, came to acknowledge Rosa and her trouble. Dr King felt that a protest of some sort was needed. Dr. King called a meeting to inform others about Rosa Park. The meeting was held at his church and an overwhelming number of people attended. He expressed the points of Interest and what needed to be done, but most important, "Only they could fight back". Dr. King set up a boycott on the bus company.

On December 5, 1955 the Montgomery Bus boycott began and it lasted for 381 days. The boycott brought attention to the young pastor, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. African Americans walked, rode bikes, or carpooled instead of taking the bus. As the boycott continued the white community became furious and started to fight back with harassment and terrorism. African Americans waiting on the street corners were arrested for loitering, carpools were arrested for picking up hitchhikers, and almost all the African American’s lost their jobs. Some African Americans help their fellow African Americans by giving them rides, but others attacked them. During the boycott, the bus company lost sixty-five percent of their earnings.

After twelve months of 50,000 African Americans boycotting, a federal court ordered the desegregation of the cities busses. On November 13, 1956 the supreme court ruled in favor of the African American boycotter. December 21, 1956, Dr. Martin Luther King and Rev. Glenn Smiley, a white man, shared the front seat of the bus In Montgomery, Alabama. Rosa said it was hard for her to return back to the buses even after the supreme court ruling, because she feared that even though there was suppose to be no segregation and harassment, that there would still be some among the city. After her arrest, Parks became an icon of the Civil Rights Movement but suffered hardships as a result. She lost her job at the department store, and her husband quit his job after his boss said no more talking about his wife or the legal case. Parks traveled and spoke extensively. In 1957, Raymond and Rosa Parks left Montgomery for Virginia, mostly because she was unable to find work, but also because of disagreements with Dr. King and other leaders of Montgomery's struggling Civil Rights Movement. In Hampton, she found a job as a hostess in an inn at black Hampton Institute. Later that year, after the urging of her younger brother Sylvester Parks, her husband Raymond, and her mother Leona McCauley, moved to Detroit.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/)

Rosa Parks didn’t stop at the Bus boycott. She became a leader and member in many groups. In 1965 Rosa and her family moved to Detroit she was hired by congressman John Conyers Jr. to manage his office, he was also a civil rights leader. Rosa has traveled around the world receiving numerous awards for her actions. She is honored by them but shows no emotion for what she has accomplished. She expresses that over the years she was not alone in the process, if it were just her, she would not have won that battle. Rosa’s courage gives her a place in World History, she is often referred to as the "mother of the modern day civil rights movement." Being called the "mother of the civil right movement.", was not an easy role for

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