| Show Rosa Parks' Parks bus ride jolted a nation r yam w. w t tk k- k m 0 Patricia Sullivan The Washington Post Rosa Parks the dignified African American seamstress whose refusal to surrender a bus seat to a white man launched Congressman Chaka Fattah awards awards' civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks a Congressional Proclamation at the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia the modern civil rights movement movement movement move move- ment and inspired generations of activists died Monday night at her home in Detroit the Wayne County medical examiners examiner's examiners examiner's examiners examiner's ers er's office said She was 92 No cause of death was reported report report- ed immediately She had dementia since 2002 Rosa was a true giant of the civil rights movement said US U.S. Rep John Conyers Jr D- D Mich in whose office Parks worked for more than 20 years There are very few people who can say their actions and conduct changed the face of the nation and Rosa Parks is one of those individuals Parks said that she didn't fully realize what she was starting when she decided not to move on that Dec 1 1955 evening in Montgomery Ala It was a sim- sim Rosa Parks Cont on Page 3 V Rosa Parks Cant Conf from front L- L fl t pie refusal l but her arrest and the subsequent protests protes began the complex complex complex com- com plex cultural struggle to legally guarantee equal rights to Americans of all races t r Within days her arrest sparked a day bus boycott which led to a US U.S. Supreme Court decision decision decision deci deci- sion that desegregated her city's public tion Her arrest also triggered triggered triggered trig trig- mass demonstrations demonstrations demonstrations made the Rev Martin Luther King Jr famous and transformed schools workplaces and ho housing sing Hers was an individual expression of of a timeless longing for human dignity and freedom King said in his book Stride Toward Freedo i t S1 r 1 She was plant planted there thereby thereby thereby by her personal sense of dignity and self She was anchored to that seat by the accumulated indignities of days gone and the boundless aspirations aspirations aspirations of generations yet unborn She was the perfect test- test case plaintiff a fact that activists realized only after she had been arrest arrest- ed Hardworking polite and morally upright Parks had long seethed over the everyday indignities of segregation from the menial rules of bus seating and store entrances to the mortal societal endorsement endorsement endorsement endorse endorse- ment of lynching and imprisonment |
