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African-American History
The Narrative of Rosa Parks
On Thursday December 1, 1955 at 5:30 p.m., I, Mrs. Rosa Lee McCauley
Parks, 42, left my job as a tailor's assistant at the Montgomery Fair Department
Store and walked to the Court Square bus stop. I boarded the bus and sat
in the "colored" section behind the seats reserved for whites.
I sat on the aisle next to a black man. Two black women sat in the seat
across the aisle. The bus filled up quickly at the next two stops. By the
third stop, the white section was filled, and a white man remained standing
at the front. This meant that all four of the passengers in my row would
have to move in order for this white man to sit down. According to custom,
a black person could not sit in the same row as a white person. The driver,
James F. Blake, said that he expected passengers to comply with company
policy. He called out, 'All right, you folks, I want those two seats!'
No one moved. "Y'all better make it light on yourselves and let me
have those seats!" he said.
The two women across the aisle from me got up and moved. The man next
to me got up too. I shifted to let him out, then moved to the window seat.
I didn't say anything to Blake. But he said, "Look woman, I told you
I wanted that seat. Are you going to stand up"? 'No.' I said. "I'm
tired of being treated like a second class citizen." "If you
don't stand up, I'm going to have you arrested," Blake warned me.
"You can do that," I told him. Blake then parked the bus in front
of the Empire Theater and telephoned his supervisor. "Did you warn
her, Jim?" his boss asked. "I warned her," Blake said. "Well
then, Jim, you do it; you got to exercise your powers and put her off,
yuh hear?" Blake called the police, who arrived in a few minutes.
Officers Day and Nixon boarded the bus and Blake pointed to me, telling
the officers, "I needed that seat. The other ones stood up."
The officers approached me and asked if the driver had asked me to stand.
'Yes,' I said. "Why didn't you stand up?" they asked. I said,
"I didn't think I should have to. I paid my fare like everybody else."
"Well," said one of the officers, "the law is the law, and
you are under arrest." I stood up and the officers took me to the
patrol car. They went back to talk to the driver who wanted to press charges
against me under Montgomery's bus segregation ordinance. The officers drove
me to police headquarters, then to the city jail. I asked to drink from
a water fountain but was told that it was for whites only. So I called
my husband after the officers completed the paper-work for my arrest. My
bond was $100.00. Dr. E.D. Nixon and Clifford and Virginia Durr signed
my bond and took me home. On December 5th, the day the boycott started,
the court found me guilty and fined me $10.00 plus $4.00 in court costs.
The Movement begins!
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