Cry, My Beloved Country

  • Race Laws started

    apartheid laws are made, racial discrimination is institutionalized
  • Publication of Cry, My Beloved Country

    Cry, My Beloved Country is published
  • New Laws affect alll races

    In 1950, the Population Registration Act required that all South Africans be racially classified into one of three categories: white, black (African), or colored (of mixed decent).
  • Bantus Authority act

    In 1951, the Bantu Authorities Act established a basis for ethnic government in African reserves, known as ``homelands.'
  • Public Safety Act and Public Safety Act

    In 1953, the Public Safety Act and the Criminal Law Amendment Act were passed, which empowered the government to declare stringent states of emergency and increased penalties for protesting against or supporting the repeal of a law.
  • Brown vs. Board of Education

    The Supreme Court rules on the landmark case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kans., unanimously agreeing that segregation in public schools is unconstitutional.
  • Jim Crow Laws affect African Americans

    African Americans grow very tired of the Jim Crow laws
  • Rosa Parks

    NAACP member Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat at the front of the "colored section" of a bus to a white passenger, defying a southern custom of the time.
  • MLK starts his movement

    Martin Luther King, Charles K. Steele, and Fred L. Shuttlesworth establish the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, of which King is made the first president.
  • Laws cause lots of pain and suffering

    1960, a large group of blacks in Sharpeville refused to carry their passes; the government declared a state of emergency. The emergency lasted for 156 days, leaving 69 people dead and 187 people wounded. Wielding the Public Safety Act and the Criminal Law Amendment Act, the white regime had no intention of changing the unjust laws of apartheid.
  • Ole Miss Scandal

    James Meredith becomes the first black student to enroll at the University of Mississippi. Violence and riots surrounding the incident cause President Kennedy to send 5,000 federal troops.
  • MLK arrested

    Martin Luther King is arrested and jailed during anti-segregation protests in Birmingham, Ala.
  • I Have a Dream

    About 200,000 people join the March on Washington. Congregating at the Lincoln Memorial, participants listen as Martin Luther King delivers his famous "I Have a Dream" speech.
  • MLK SHOT

    Martin Luther King, at age 39, is shot as he stands on the balcony outside his hotel room.
  • LBJ signs civil rights act

    President Johnson signs the Civil Rights Act of 1968, prohibiting discrimination in the sale, rental, and financing of housing.