1. The Civil Rights Movement

2. Rosa Parks
( )
An African American who worked at a department store as a seamstress.
On the bus on her way home from work, she refused to give up her seat to white people boarding the bus.
As a result of her defiance, she was arrested and fined for her crime.

3. Rosa Parks
Parks is often portrayed as an ordinary woman with no background in activism, but in reality she was an active member of the NAACP.
Rosa Parks’ arrest quickly gained attention, as black leaders saw her as an ideal and sympathetic plaintiff to challenge segregation.

4. Protests Arise
The Women’s Political Council, or WPC, began handing out flyers to protest bus services in Montgomery following Parks’ arrest.
Four days after the event, on December 5th, 1955, African American leaders throughout Alabama met up to protest and lend support.
Around 40,000 African American bus riders boycotted the bus system, the vast majority of the city’s bus riders.

5. The Montgomery Bus Boycott
Black leaders met on December 5th to form the Montgomery Improvement Association, or MIA.
Martin Luther King Jr., a 26 year old pastor, was elected to become its president, and led the bus boycott in Alabama.
Demands initially included hiring black drivers, and a first-seated policy, but no mention of desegregating buses.

8. Boycott Continued
The boycott ended on June 5th, 1956, the Montgomery federal court ruled that segregated bus seating violated the constitution, ending the strike.
This decision resulted in violent reactions from white Americans:
Snipers began firing into buses
Four black churches, and the homes of black leaders were bombed by the KKK.

9. Greensboro Sit In Strikes
Black college students in North Carolina sat at the segregated Woolworth’s lunch counter.
Inspired by Gandhi and his emphasis on Civil Disobedience.
This action gained a lot of popularity from young men and women in towns throughout the region, who chose to protest despite the risk of arrest and protest.

11. Results
By February 5th of that year, over 300 students had actively protested the lunch counter, as well as other local businesses.
This movement, being highly televised, caused a variety of other protests throughout the country, at beaches, hotels, libraries, restaurants, and other establishments.

12. Freedom Rides
Set up by CORE, or the Congress of Racial Equality, this movement involved 13 African American and white activists taking bus trips into the deep south.
They would protest segregation along the way by using whites-only facilities.
Violence was a common reaction, but the event quickly got media attention, and segregation in bus and train stations was soon banned nationwide.