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African-Americans boycott bus service in Montgomery, Alabama.
the Montgomery bus boycott was a 13-month mass protest that ended with the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that segregation on public buses is unconstitutional. -
Brown vs. Board of Education declared segregation illegal.
When school was made they separated blacks and whites. Whites had their own school and same went for the blacks. A lot of (black) parents protested about why their children was separated from the rest of them (whites). -
Southern Christian Leadership Conference for nonviolent integration.
With the goal of redeeming ''the soul of America'' through nonviolent resistance, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference was established in 1957, to coordinate the action of local protest groups throughout the South. -
Nine African-American students are denied access to the school by an angry mob.
Army’s 101st Airborne Division, nine black students enter all-white Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas. Three weeks earlier, Arkansas Governor Orval Faustus had surrounded the school with National Guard troops to prevent its federal court-ordered racial integration. After a tense standoff, President Dwight D. Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent 1,000 army paratroopers to Little Rock to enforce the court order. -
The year of sit-ins
four black students from North Carolina A&T College sat down at a Woolworth lunch counter in downtown Greensboro, North Carolina. The students purchased several items in the store before sitting at the counter reserved for white customers. When a waitress asked them to leave, they politely refused; to their surprise, they were not arrested. The four students remained seated for almost an hour until the store closed. -
Student activism grows on college campuses; sit-ins erupt.
Just as has been happening in communities at large, campus protests against racism and have become commonplace. -
Television as a catalyst for change
Ninety percent of American homes had television. Television became a catalyst for change on a massive scale. People in the northern states could see what was happening in Selma, Birmingham, and Memphis and vice versa. In addition, television helped Southern blacks unify, for while local Southern media rarely covered news involving racial issues, they now had access to national newscasts that were witnessing and documenting this revolution. -
Despite sentencing and violence, volunteers continue the rides
The valor came from everyday Americans – civilians concerned about the state of their country. Eventually, there would be hundreds of them, acting over a five month period. They came from all over the U.S. They were black and white; liberal and conservative; Catholic, Protestant, and Jew. -
A comprehensive Civil Rights Act is signed into law.
Southern members of Congress and was then signed into law by Kennedy's successor, Lyndon B. Johnson. In subsequent years, Congress expanded the act and passed additional civil rights legislation such as the Voting Rights Act. -
Race Riots in Harlem
The first in New York City in the 20th Century, was the consequence of a lingering unemployment crisis and police brutality. At 2:30 p.m. on March 19, 1935, a 16-year-old black Puerto African boy named Lino Rivera stole a 10 cent penknife from the Kress Five and Ten store on 125th Street. -
The Watts section of Los Angeles breaks out in riots
The riot spurred from an incident when Marquette Frye, a young African American motorist, was pulled over and arrested by Lee W. Minikus, a white California Highway Patrolman, for suspicion of driving while intoxicated. -
Lowndes County Freedom Organisation formed as a political party
Lowndes County in Alabama was 80% black but not a single black citizen was registered to vote. Carmichael arrived in the county to organize a voter registration project and from this came the LCFO. Party members adopted the black panther as their symbol for their independent political organization. -
Civil Rights Act - Fair Housing Act
the bill was the subject of a contentious debate in the Senate, but was passed quickly by the House of Representatives in the days after the assassination of civil rights. The Fair Housing Act stands as the final great legislative achievement of the civil rights.