Rosa parks biography essay

On December 1,1955, Rosa Parks boarded a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Instead of going to the back of the bus, which was designated for African Americans, she sat in the front. When the bus started to fill up with white passengers, the bus driver asked Parks to move. She refused. Her resistance set in motion one of the largest social movements in history, the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

Rosa Louise McCauley was born on February 4th, 1913 in Tuskegee, Alabama. As a child, she went to an industrial school for girls and later enrolled at Alabama State Teachers College for Negroes (present-day Alabama State University). Unfortunately, Parks was forced to withdraw after her grandmother became ill. Growing up in the segregated South, Parks was frequently confronted with racial discrimination and violence. She became active in the Civil Rights Movement at a young age.

Parks married a local barber by the name of Raymond Parks when she was 19. He was actively fighting to end racial injustice. Together the couple worked with many social justice organizations. Eventually, Rosa was elected secretary of the Montgomery chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). 

By the time Parks boarded the bus in 1955, she was an established organizer and leader in the Civil Rights Movement in Alabama. Parks not only showed active resistance by refusing to move she also helped organize and plan the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Many have tried to diminish Parks’ role in the boycott by depicting her as a seamstress who simply did not want to move because she was tired. Parks denied the claim and years later revealed her true motivation:

“People always say that I didn’t give up my seat because I was tired, but that isn’t true. I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people have an image of me as being old then. I was forty-two. No, the only tired I was, was tired of giving in.”

Introduction

Born in February 4, 1913, Rosa Parks was and still is a human rights activist icon of all the time. Parks’ memories highlight an end to a black chapter in American history, which was littered with bestiality and utter violation of basic human rights. During Parks time, black Americans were only but ‘the other people’; to be seen and not to be heard, a set of people who could not enjoy the rights their white counterparts were enjoying in the United States of America in the twentieth century.

Black Americans faced segregation in hotels, public accommodations and public transport to name but a few; moreover, abuse and mistreatment accompanied this denial of human rights. Nevertheless, Parks’ heroic act in the evening of December 1, 1955 in a bus in Montgomery Alabama brought a revolution that led to the famous Montgomery bus boycott and the subsequent birth of numerous human right activists’ movements, which led to review of laws that hitherto permitted segregation in public transport.

Rosa Parks Story and Its Influences

Park’s story influenced the world greatly. In the evening of December 1, 1955, Parks refused to offer her seat in a bus to a white man, something that led to her arrest. When the bus driver, James F. Blake threatened to call the police, Parks simply said, “You may do that” (Parks, 1992, p. 1). Sure, to his threats, Blake called the police and that is how Parks found herself in police custody for the rest of the evening.

The humiliation of being whisked from a public bus into police custody notwithstanding, this event brought revolution, which led to numerous human rights movements across America and it became the mother of human rights activists across nations. As aforementioned, Parks’ act of defiance led to the famous 381-days Montgomery bus boycott spearhead by Martin Luther King. This boy

1. Early Life and Education

Rosa Louise McCauley, known as Rosa Parks, was born on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama. Her father, James McCauley, was a carpenter, and her mother, Leona McCauley, was a teacher. Rosa was the first child in their family, and she had a younger brother named Sylvester. She described their family as "a happy family living in a small community." When she was growing up, Alabama was strictly segregated. Because of this segregation, and in order to receive an education that would match her intelligence, Rosa's mother had to homeschool her until she was twelve years old, at which time she could go to the private, tiny industrial school for girls that her mother had gone to. As Rosa Parks once said, "My mother was a teacher and she had gone to school in her little town, and she had been given an excellent education." Also, because her mother was so well educated, she became a member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), which was a group that helped black people gain their civil rights. When Rosa finally did go to school, despite the inequalities of segregated education, she did well and particularly enjoyed the subjects of industrial arts and sewing. Rosa finished her education, despite being forced to leave high school at the age of sixteen. She was needed to help her family, and because she had sprained her hand and could not perform the work duties in the shirt factory that she was attending at the time, she had to leave. However, this was where she met and married her first and only husband, Raymond Parks, who was a strong and conscientious member of the NAACP, and helped change Rosa's life. He also had admiration for her inner strength, one reason for the bright, loving relationship they had for the twenty years that they were married.

1.1. Childhood in Alabama

She was born Rosa Louise McCauley on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama

1913-2005

Who Was Rosa Parks?

Born in February 1913, Rosa Parks was a civil rights activist whose refusal to give up her seat to a white passenger on a segregated bus in 1955 led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Her bravery led to nationwide efforts to end racial segregation on public transportation and elsewhere. Parks was awarded the Martin Luther King Jr. Award by the NAACP, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, and the Congressional Gold Medal. She has been described as the “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.” She died in October 2005 at age 92.

Quick Facts

FULL NAME: Rosa Louise McCauley Parks
BORN: February 4, 1913
DIED: October 24, 2005
BIRTHPLACE: Tuskegee, Alabama
SPOUSE: Raymond Parks (1932-1977)
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Aquarius

Childhood, Family, and Education

Rosa Parks was born Rosa Louise McCauley on February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama. Her parents, James and Leona McCauley, separated when Parks was 2. Parks’ mother moved the family to Pine Level, Alabama, to live with her parents, Rose and Sylvester Edwards. Both of Rosa’s grandparents were formerly enslaved people and strong advocates for racial equality.

The family lived on the Edwards’ farm, and this is where Rosa spent her youth. She experienced chronic tonsillitis as a child that often left her bedridden. After undergoing a tonsillectomy in the fifth grade, she experienced temporary blindness, but her health improved soon afterward, according to Rosa Parks: A Life in American History by Darryl Mace.

Early in life, Rosa experienced racial discrimination and activism for racial equality. Once, her grandfather Sylvester stood in front of their house with a shotgun while Ku Klux Klan members marched down the street.

Young Rosa often fought back physically against bullying from white children, noting: “As far back as I remember, I could never think in terms of accepting physical abuse without some form of retaliation if possible,” according to The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Ros