[55], Parks participated in activism nationally during the mid-1960s, traveling to support the Selma-to-Montgomery Marches, the Freedom Now Party,[14] and the Lowndes County Freedom Organization. [55] When Conyers was elected, he hired her as a secretary and receptionist for his congressional office in Detroit. In a 1992 interview with National Public Radio's Lynn Neary, Parks recalled: I did not want to be mistreated, I did not want to be deprived of a seat that I had paid for. ", he replied: "I need a secretary and you are a good one. [21] On November 27, 1955, four days before she would make her stand on the bus, Rosa Parks attended a mass meeting at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery that addressed this case, as well as the recent murders of the activists George W. Lee and Lamar Smith. Use the HTML below. When she died at age 92 on October 24, 2005, she became the first woman in the nation’s history to lie in state at the U.S. Capitol. October is packed with great movies and several new and returning TV series. "[39] She later said, "I only knew that, as I was being arrested, that it was the very last time that I would ever ride in humiliation of this kind. Nonetheless, at one point on the route, a white man had no seat because all the seats in the designated “white” section were taken. Rosa Parks and her niece, Urana McCauley, had come for the event following the death of McCauley’s grandmother. He requested a reward and when Parks paid him, he demanded more. The assailant, Joseph Skipper, broke down the door but claimed he had chased away an intruder. She was also active in the Black Power movement and the support of political prisoners in the US. There Parks was mentored by the veteran organizer Septima Clark. It rained that day, but the black community persevered in their boycott. [41] Edgar Nixon, president of the Montgomery chapter of the NAACP and leader of the Pullman Porters Union, and her friend Clifford Durr bailed Parks out of jail that evening.[42][43]. It served as a museum honoring Rosa Parks. Shortly after the boycott, she moved to Detroit, where she briefly found similar work. Parks was not included as a plaintiff in the Browder decision because the attorney Fred Gray concluded the courts would perceive they were attempting to circumvent her prosecution on her charges working their way through the Alabama state court system. "[49], The group agreed that a new organization was needed to lead the boycott effort if it were to continue. "[32] Three of them complied. She organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including Edgar Nixon, president of the local chapter of the NAACP; and Martin Luther King Jr., a new minister in Montgomery who gained national prominence in the civil rights movement and went on to win a Nobel Peace Prize. She was the first woman and the second black person to lie in honor in the Capitol. One of the speakers, United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, said that if it had not been for Parks, she would probably have never become the Secretary of State. As appeals and related lawsuits wended their way through the courts, all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Montgomery Bus Boycott engendered anger in much of Montgomery’s white population as well as some violence, and Nixon’s and Dr. King’s homes were bombed. Raymond and Rosa, who worked as a seamstress, became respected members of Montgomery’s large African American community. Black people could not sit across the aisle in the same row as white people. Parks said, "The driver wanted us to stand up, the four of us. [54], Parks played an important part in raising international awareness of the plight of African Americans and the civil rights struggle. Parks was interred between her husband and mother at Detroit's Woodlawn Cemetery in the chapel's mausoleum. [34] Parks later said about being asked to move to the rear of the bus, "I thought of Emmett Till – a 14-year-old African American who was lynched in Mississippi in 1955, after being accused of offending a white woman in her family's grocery store, whose killers were tried and acquitted – and I just couldn't go back. Parks was invited to be part of the group welcoming. It received awards from the NAACP and the Black Reel Awards. As a student at the Industrial School for Girls in Montgomery, she took academic and vocational courses. Nixon conferred with Jo Ann Robinson, an Alabama State College professor and member of the Women's Political Council (WPC), about the Parks case. Parks also served on the Board of Advocates of Planned Parenthood. 2857 bus on which Parks was riding before her arrest (a GM "old-look" transit bus, serial number 1132), is now a museum exhibit at the Henry Ford Museum. City officials in Montgomery and Detroit announced on October 27, 2005, that the front seats of their city buses would be reserved with black ribbons in honor of Parks until her funeral. [24], The first four rows of seats on each Montgomery bus were reserved for whites. She grew up on a farm with her maternal grandparents, mother, and younger brother Sylvester. There, her clan is introduced to the crass, fun-loving Brown family. But to me, that was a way of life; we had no choice but to accept what was the custom. On the day of Parks' trial—December 5, 1955—the WPC distributed the 35,000 leaflets. On that anniversary, President George W. Bush signed. A statue of Rosa Parks was unveiled in Montgomery, Alabama. '"[36], During a 1956 radio interview with Sydney Rogers in West Oakland several months after her arrest, Parks said she had decided, "I would have to know for once and for all what rights I had as a human being and a citizen."[37]. And the other three people moved, but I didn't. The performance of Angela Bassett and the other actors in the movie was great. As the officer took her away, she recalled that she asked, "Why do you push us around?" Since the state could not refuse the KKK's sponsorship, the Missouri legislature voted to name the highway section the "Rosa Parks Highway". After retirement, Parks wrote her autobiography and continued to insist that the struggle for justice was not over and there was more work to be done. Parks died of natural causes on October 24, 2005, at the age of 92, in her apartment on the east side of Detroit. [55] Parks took part in the black power movement, attending the Philadelphia Black Power conference, and the Black Political Convention in Gary, Indiana. As the bus traveled along its regular route, all of the white-only seats in the bus filled up. On December 5, Parks was found guilty of violating segregation laws, given a suspended sentence and fined $10 plus $4 in court costs. [20], In the 1940s, Parks and her husband were members of the League of Women Voters. On Sunday, December 4, 1955, plans for the Montgomery bus boycott were announced at black churches in the area, and a front-page article in the Montgomery Advertiser helped spread the word. Bus and train companies enforced seating policies with separate sections for blacks and whites. But as you can see, at this time we still have a long way to go." The house lived in by Rosa Parks's brother, Sylvester McCauley, his wife Daisy, and their 13 children, and where Rosa Parks often visited and stayed after leaving Montgomery, was bought by her niece Rhea McCauley for $500 and donated to the artist. As the hearse passed the thousands of people who were viewing the procession, many clapped, cheered loudly and released white balloons. When Rosa Parks refused to give up her bus seat in 1955, it wasn’t the first time she’d clashed with driver James Blake. In 1900, Montgomery had passed a city ordinance to segregate bus passengers by race. She herself lived in a neighborhood, Virginia Park, which had been compromised by highway construction and urban renewal. The 1970s were a decade of loss for Parks in her personal life. There was only one Rosa Parks. Please stay off the buses Monday.[48]. [5] In her final years, she suffered from dementia. 1980: She received the Martin Luther King Jr. Award. This set the stage for her to become the 1st woman to lie in honor, in the Capitol Rotunda. Parks was arrested sitting in the same row Obama is in, but on the opposite side. In spite of her fame and constant speaking engagements, Parks was not a wealthy woman. 1982: California State University, Fresno, awarded Parks the African-American Achievement Award. The Jacksons are your average working-class family in Gary, Indiana; but when their father discovers the kids have an extraordinary musical talent they form a band. Led by a young Rev. Parks received national recognition, including the NAACP's 1979 Spingarn Medal, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and a posthumous statue in the United States Capitol's National Statuary Hall.