Rosa Parks Autograph

Rosa Parks is an iconic figure of the civil rights movement in the United States. She is best known for her refusal to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama bus to a white passenger on December 1, 1955. This courageous act of civil disobedience sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott, which lasted for more than a year, and eventually resulted in the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that segregated public transportation was unconstitutional.

Rosa Louise McCauley was born on February 4, 1913 in Tuskegee, Alabama to James and Leona McCauley. Her mother was a schoolteacher and her father was a carpenter. Rosa attended the Montgomery Industrial School for Girls and then went on to Alabama State College, where she received a degree in business education.

In 1932, Rosa married Raymond Parks, an active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). For the next decade, Rosa and Raymond worked diligently to end segregation and racial injustice. Rosa volunteered with the NAACP as a youth leader and acted as the secretary for the Montgomery branch, while Raymond was the branch’s president.

In 1955, while riding the bus home from work, Rosa refused to give up her seat to a white man as per the customary segregation of the time. She was arrested and fined for violating the city’s segregation laws. The NAACP, led by E.D. Nixon, saw this as an opportunity to challenge the segregation laws, and the Montgomery Bus Boycott began. The 381 day boycott, organized largely by women in the black community, was successful in ending the segregation of public bus transportation.

After the boycott, Rosa moved to Detroit, Michigan, where she worked for Congressman John Conyers for more than 20 years. She was also a part of many other civil rights initiatives and organizations, such as the Black Power Movement, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee.

Rosa Parks died on October 24, 2005 at the age of 92. She was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and was the first woman ever to have her body lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda. Rosa Parks was a brave and determined woman, whose courageous act of civil disobedience sparked a movement that forever changed America.