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Brown v. Board of Education
On May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional. -
Rosa Parks
On December 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Parks refused to obey bus driver James F. Blake's order to give up her seat in the colored section to a white passenger, after the white section was filled. Parks was not the first person to resist bus segregation. -
The Little Rock Nine
The Little Rock Nine was a group of nine African American students enrolled in Little Rock Central High School in 1957. Their enrollment was followed by the Little Rock Crisis, in which the students were initially prevented from entering the racially segregated school by Orval Faubus, the Governor of Arkansas. -
Freedom Rider
Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated southern United States in 1961 and following years to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court -
James Merdith
The Ole Miss riot of 1962 was fought between Southern segregationist civilians and federal and state forces beginning the night of September 29, 1962; segregationists were protesting the enrollment of James Meredith, a black US military veteran, at the University of Mississippi -
The March on Washington
On August 28, 1963, more than 200,000 Americans gathered in Washington, D.C., for a political rally known as the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. Organized by a number of civil rights and religious groups, the event was designed to shed light on the political and social challenges African Americans continued to face across the country. The march, which became a key moment in the growing struggle for civil rights in the United States, culminated in Martin Luther King “I Have a Dream" -
Civial Rights Act
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is a landmark piece of civil rights legislation in the United States that outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. -
MLK Wins Nobel Prize
The Nobel Peace prize for 1964 was awarded to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. The 35-year-old civil rights leader is the youngest winner of the prize that Dr. Alfred Nobel instituted since the first was awarded in 1901. -
Voting Rights Act of 1965
This act was signed into law on August 6, 1965, by President Lyndon Johnson. It outlawed the discriminatory voting practices adopted in many southern states after the Civil War, including literacy tests as a prerequisite to voting. -
MLK Assassinated
Shortly after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and mortally wounded as he stood on the second-floor balcony outside his room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn. He was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. at St. Joseph Hospital. -
Civial Rights Act of 1968
The Civil Rights Act signed into law in April 1968–popularly known as the Fair Housing Act–prohibited discrimination concerning the sale, rental and financing of housing based on race, religion, national origin and sex.
