A quiet hero.

Get Talking

Ask students: Who is Rosa Parks Noun 1. Rosa Parks - United States civil rights leader who refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man in Montgomery (Alabama) and so triggered the national Civil Rights movement (born in 1913)
Parks ? Why is she considered a champion of freedom? What does the term civil rights mean?

Notes Behind the News

* Rosa Parks was born Feb. 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Ala. She is often referred to as the "mother of civil rights." Her actions led to greater legal equality for African Americans African American Multiculture A person having origins in any of the black racial groups of Africa. See Race. . She died on Oct. 24, 2005.

* In the early 1950s, Parks was an active member of the civil rights movement. She worked as a secretary for the Montgomery NAACP NAACP
in full National Association for the Advancement of Colored People

Oldest and largest U.S. civil rights organization. It was founded in 1909 to secure political, educational, social, and economic equality for African Americans; W.E.B. Du Bois and Ida B. and attended the Highlander Folk School Highlander Folk School, New Market, Tenn.; founded in 1932 by Myles Horton in Monteagle, Tenn., now known as the Highlander Research and Education Center. At first the school focused on training union organizers, but in the 1950s Highlander became a center of the , an education center for racial equality, in the summer of 1955.

* James Blake

For other people named James Blake, see James Blake (disambiguation).

James Riley Blake^[1] (born December 28, 1979 in Yonkers, New York, United States) is an American professional tennis player and is currently the 8th ranked player in , the bus driver who had Rosa Parks arrested on Dec. 1, 1955, had argued with Parks before. Twelve years earlier, Blake had kicked Parks off a bus because she had boarded using the front door instead of the back, and she refused to get off and reboard using the back door. Around the time of Parks's arrest, approximately 50,000 African Americans lived in Montgomery. The estimated 30,000 African Americans who used public transportation accounted for more than 66 percent of the city's bus riders. During the bus boycott, private cars and station wagons transported African Americans to and from work every day. The cars drove from 5:30 a.m. to 12:30 a.m. People also walked or rode bicycles to work. Some people even got around on mules or using horse-drawn buggies.

* In February 1956, police arrested Parks, Martin Luther King Jr., and about 20 other local leaders for taking part in the boycott. King was the only one to face trial; he was found guilty but successfully appealed the conviction.

* In 1999, at age 86, Parks received the Congressional Gold Medal

Congressional Gold Medals should not be confused with the Medal of Honor (commonly called the "Congressional Medal of Honor"), which is the highest military decoration of the United States.

. It is one of the highest honors a U.S. civilian can receive.

* People can step aboard the bus that made Rosa Parks famous. It is on display at the Henry Ford Museum in Michigan. The bus has been restored to look as it did in 1955.

Doing More

Ask students: What would you have done if you were in Rosa Parks's shoes the day she was arrested for not giving up her bus seat? Would you have defied Defied is an active punk rock band from Long Beach/Wilmington, California. They were formed in December 2001 by guitarist, George Romano; bassist, Melvin Trinidad; and drummer, Manuel Mora. Defied soon inducted Brian Zuniga as lead vocalist in February 2002. the bus driver? Why or why not?

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Title Annotation:	Special Report; civil rights activist Rosa Parks
Publication:	Current Events, a Weekly Reader publication
Article Type:	Biography
Geographic Code:	1USA
Date:	Dec 2, 2005
Words:	378
Previous Article:	Looking ahead.(Main News)(Amazon rain forest)
Next Article:	"There comes a time".(speech given by civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., Montgomery, Alabama)
Topics:	Civil rights movements History Racial integration History Women civil rights activists Appreciation Biography Women civil rights workers Appreciation Biography

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