-
Brown v. Board of Education
Brown v. Board of Education was a 1954 Supreme Court case that declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional. It challenged the "separate but equal" doctrine from the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson decision. The Court ruled that segregated schools created a sense of inferiority among African American children, making them inherently unequal. This landmark decision helped to pave the way for the Civil Rights Movement and the desegregation of public institutions in the U.S. -
Rosa Parks and the Bus Boycott
In 1955, Rosa Parks, a Black woman, was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Her act of defiance sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott, a year-long protest led by Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders. The boycott successfully challenged segregation on public buses, leading to a Supreme Court ruling that declared bus segregation unconstitutional. Parks’ courageous act became a key moment in the Civil Rights Movement. -
Murder of Emmett Till
Emmett Till was a 14-year-old Black boy who was lynched in Mississippi in 1955 after being accused of flirting with a white woman, Carolyn Bryant. He was brutally beaten, murdered, and thrown into a river. His mother held an open-casket funeral to show the world the horrors of racism. Despite clear evidence, an all-white jury acquitted the two white men responsible for his death. Till's murder and the trial sparked outrage and helped ignite the Civil Rights Movement.