Black History Fact of the Week: Claudette Colvin
Activist
Before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat and move to the back of the bus in Montgomery, Ala., 15-year-old Claudette Colvin had refused to yield her seat to a White passenger on March 2, 1955, and was arrested.
Parks’ similar act followed on December 1 of the same year.
Born Sept. 5, 1939, Colvin understood early what injustice was.
According to one report, she had been inspired by her ancestors who endured and fought the institution of slavery.
“I’d moved for White people before,” Colvin said. But this time, she was thinking of the slavery fighters she had read about recently during Negro History Week, which was always celebrated in February. “The spirit of Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth was in me. I didn’t get up.”
Colvin was a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s youth council.
Despite her individual protest to one of the South’s Jim Crow laws, her actions did not spark the bus boycott, but she did testify at a court hearing in the Browder v. Gayle case that led to the end of segregated buses in Montgomery.
Some reports alleged that she was too young and too dark-skinned to be an effective symbol of justice. Therefore, she was not used as the face of the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Further, there was a question as to whether or not her case was even worthy to pursue in court. What fueled the controversial debate about whether she was the right symbol was the fact that a year after her arrest she became pregnant by a married man. So that effectively eliminated any question as to whether she was the one civil rights leaders would rally around. Parks and other leaders raised money for her defense.
After testifying and giving birth to her son, Raymond, in 1958 she moved to New York due to the ridicule she received about her son who was very light-skinned.
For 30 years, she worked in a Catholic nursing home. Her son unfortunately died of a heart attack, possibly caused by his addiction to drugs and alcohol. He was 37.
It was not a very happy ending to Colvin’s tale of life and activism, but her impact was significant.
“I’m not disappointed,” Colvin said. “Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. But also let them know that the attorneys took four other women to the Supreme Court to challenge the law that led to the end of segregation.”
For more Black history facts, visit www.Black365.us.
With a sloped back, cracked hands, and veined and muscled arms, Destin Samford, a sharecropper now generations away from Minkah, his African ancestor, cultivates a field in Alabama. In August, he turns away from the white-orange sun fading against a wine-colored sky to scan the earth speckled with cotton bolls framed by green leaves. He bends, back curved and crooked in places, to pull a boll of cotton from the tough spiny casing, marking the beginning of the harvest.
- Diane Glave
History Of Black Farmers And Their Loss
Mothers are the most-honored family members around the world for their selflessness and the love they give to their children. That’s why this year, NewsOne will provide a number of daily posts about mothers until Mother’s Day. Enjoy!
States around the nation, in an effort to address what they allege are two issues of major concern—the flow of undocumented immigrants into their environs and the level of illegal voting—have passed a number of controversial laws that are galvanizing opponents.
In Alabama, the state Legislature is currently revisiting its anti-illegal immigration law House Bill 56 and has presented a list of revisions it plans to use to tweak the legislation passed in 2011.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—Funeral services will be held Saturday for Geraldine Washington, a prominent Los Angeles civil rights leader whose death was confirmed today by the local arm of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People.
Washington died last Thursday of natural causes at the age of 81, NAACP spokeswoman Joy Atkinson said. She had been ill for several years and suffered from a form of dementia, the spokewoman said.
LOS ANGELES, Calif.—The Tavis Smiley Foundation announced today it will host a series of parent education seminars nationwide to give parents tools and information on how they can ensure their child’s success in learning.
The Too Important to Fail Parent Education Summits will kick off in Los Angeles on Saturday, Oct. 29 with six other cities scheduled throughout spring 2012. These include: Philadelphia, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Atlanta, Houston, and Montgomery, Alabama.
