Rosa Parks



Rosa Louise McCauley was born in Tuskegee, Alabama, in 1913. She was raised on her grandparent's farm at Pine Level, a small community outside of Montgomery, by her mother, Leona Edward McCauley. She attended a segregated rural school until 1924. In that year, she enrolled at the private Montgomery Industrial School for Girls, known as "Miss White's school". It was called that after its principal and cofounder, Alice L. White.

As a teenager she attended Booker T. Washington Junior High School in Montgomery, and participated in a program at what is now Alabama State University. She dropped out at the age of 16 to care for her grandmother, who died soon after she dropped out, and then she cared for her ailing mother. In December 1932 she married Raymond Parks, a 29-year-old barber. Rosa Parks received her high school diploma the following year and helped support the family by sewing and doing other jobs.

Raymond Parks had been active in the NAACP, or the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, which is an organization founded to improve the conditions for blacks in the United States. Rosa Parks became not only involved with, but committed to racial justice when her husband and her joined the campaign to save the "Scottsboro boys"
nine young black men who were accused of raping two white teenagers near Scottsboro, Alabama in 1931. The boys were convicted and eight were sentenced to death, despite strong evidence of their innocence. All of them eventually gained their freedom, but the process took almost 20 years.

Rosa Parks became secretary of the Montgomery branch of the NAACP in 1943. That was the first year she tried to register to vote, but she didn't succeed until her third try in 1945.

On December 1, 1955 was the turning point of her life and in history when she was riding home from work on a Cleveland Avenue bus. She refused to give up her seat in the front row of the colored section to a white man who couldn't find a seat in the section of the bus reserved for whites. Her refusal got her arrested and jailed, fined $10 plus $4 in court costs.

The black community was outraged by the case and organized a bus boycott, which began as a one-day demonstration and ended up going on for more than a year. Protesters formed an organization under the leadership of Martin Luther King, Jr. called the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA). This organization urged people not to ride on Montgomery's segregated buses and helped them find other means of transportation. In November 1956 a federal court ordered the Montgomery buses desegregated.

The boycott was a success and brought Martin Luther King to national attention. However, both Rosa and Raymond Parks lost their jobs and suffered repeatedly from harassment and threats. In August 1957, the two of them moved to Detroit, Michigan. At first, it was difficult for them to find work, but Rosa took in sewing and worked as a fund-raiser for the NAACP. In 1965 Democratic Congressman, John Conyers, Jr., hired her to work in his Detroit office. She worked there until her retirement in 1988.

Rosa Parks remained active in the NAACP, and in other civil rights organizations, such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), until her age started to slow her down. She received numerous awards and tributes, including the NAACP's highest honor, the Spingarn medal, in 1970 and the prestigious Martin Luther King, Jr. award in 1980. Cleveland Avenue, which was where everything began for her, was renamed Rosa Parks Boulevard in 1965. In 1987, she founded the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development, which provides scholarships and guidance for young blacks. In 1996, President Bill Clinton awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom, which is the highest honor the U.S. government can give to a civilian. Along with those, she received the Congressional Gold Medal from the U.S Congress. In January 1999 President Clinton invited Parks to sit with Hillary Rodham Clinton during the annual State of the Union address. During the speech President Clinton recognized the contributions of Parks, who received a standing ovation from the audience.





*~Amanda~*