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Brown vs 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. -
Voting Rights Act (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. -
Murder Of Emmit Till
He was shopping at a store owned by Roy and Carolyn Bryant—and someone said he possibly whistled at Mrs. Bryant, a white woman. At some point around August 28, he was kidnapped, beaten, shot in the head, had a large metal fan tied to his neck with barbed wire, and was thrown into the Tallahatchie River. -
Rosa Parks and the Bus Boycutt
Sparked by the arrest of Rosa Parks on 1 December 1955, 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. -
Southern Christian Leadership Conference
The Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) is a civil rights organization founded in 1957, as an offshoot of the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), which successfully staged a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery Alabama's segregated bus system. -
Little Rock 9
In 1957, nine ordinary teenagers walked out of their homes and stepped up to the front lines in the battle for civil rights for all Americans. The media coined the name “Little Rock Nine" to identify the first African American students to desegregate Little Rock Central High School -
Greensboro Sit ins
Greensboro sit-in, act of nonviolent protest against a segregated lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, that began on February 1, 1960. Its success led to a wider sit-in movement, organized primarily by the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), that spread throughout the South. -
Ruby Ridges
She was the first African American child to desegregate William Frantz Elementary School. At six years old, Ruby's bravery helped pave the way for Civil Rights action in the American South. Ruby was born on September 8, 1954 to Abon and Lucille Bridges in Tylertown, Mississippi. -
Freedom Riders
Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who rode interstate buses into the segregated Southern United States in 1961 and subsequent years to challenge the non-enforcement of the United States Supreme Court decisions Morgan v. Virginia (1946) and Boynton v. -
March On Washington
March on Washington, political demonstration held in Washington, D.C., on August 28, 1963, that was attended by an estimated 250,000 people to protest racial discrimination and to show support for major civil rights legislation that was pending in Congress. -
Civil Rights Act
This act, signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson on July 2, 1964, prohibited discrimination in public places, provided for the integration of schools and other public facilities, and made employment discrimination illegal. It was the most sweeping civil rights legislation since Reconstruction. -
Assassination of Malcom X
Malcolm X, an African American Muslim minister and human rights activist who was a popular figure during the civil rights movement, was shot multiple times and died from his wounds in Manhattan, New York City, on February 21, 1965, at the age of 39 while preparing to address the Organization of Afro-American Unity -
Selma to Montgomery Marches (Bloody Sunday)
The first march took place on March 7, 1965, led by figures including Bevel and Amelia Boynton, but was ended by state troopers and county possemen, who charged on about 600 unarmed protesters with batons and tear gas after they crossed the Edmund Pettus Bridge in the direction of Montgomery. -
Assassination of Martin Luther King
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.