Rosa Parks was in jail for roughly a day. The president of the NAACP Edgar Nixon bailed Rosa Parks out of jail one day after her arrest for refusing to give up her seat to a white man on Dec. 1, 1955. The courts convicted her of disorderly conduct four days after her arrest. After being arrested again, Parks lost her job and moved to Detroit, where she was an essential member of the Black Power movement. She was 95 years old when she died in 2005, and she was the first African-American woman to lie in state in the Capitol rotunda (via Find a Grave). Parks was arrested two times during her life. On December 1, 1955, during a typical evening rush hour in Montgomery, Alabama, a 42-year-old woman took a seat on the bus on her way home from the Montgomery Fair department store where she worked as a seamstress. Before she reached her destination, she quietly set off a social revolution when the bus driver instructed her to move back, and she refused. Rosa Parks, an African American, was December 1, 1955: Rosa Parks Is Arrested On Thursday, December 1, 1955, the 42-year-old Rosa Parks was commuting home from a long day of work at the Montgomery Fair department store by bus. Rosa Parks Arrested. On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, for disorderly conduct for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man. Civil Rights leader E. D. Nixon bailed her out of jail, joined by white friends Clifford Durr, an attorney, and his wife, Virginia. “The first thing I did the morning after I went to jail was to call the number the woman in the cell with me had written down on that crumpled piece of paper.” Parks reached the woman’s brother. A number of days later, she saw the woman on the street looking much better. About 9:30 p.m, Rosa Parks was bailed out by E.D. Nixon and the Durrs. Nine months before Rosa Parks' arrest for refusing to give up her bus seat, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin was arrested in Montgomery for the same act. The city's Black leaders prepared to protest When Rosa Parks was arrested on December 1, 1955, for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man, she was mentally prepared for the moment. Earlier that summer, she attended a workshop on implementing integration at the Highlander Folk School in Monteagle, Tennessee. On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a city bus in Montgomery, Alabama. This single act of nonviolent resistance sparked the Montgomery bus boycott, an eleven-month struggle to desegregate the city’s buses. Rosa Parks arrested in Alabama, Dec. 1, 1955 Rosa Parks arrives at circuit court Feb. 24, 1956 in Montgomery, Ala. | AP Photo “I did not get on the bus to get arrested,” she later said Rosa Parks (born February 4, 1913, Tuskegee, Alabama, U.S.—died October 24, 2005, Detroit, Michigan) was an American civil rights activist whose refusal to relinquish her seat on a public bus precipitated the 1955–56 Montgomery bus boycott in Alabama, which became the spark that ignited the civil rights movement in the United States. April 14, 2005: Parks and the hip-hop group Outkast reach an out-of-court settlement regarding their 1998 song "Rosa Parks." October 24, 2005: Parks dies at the age of 92 Today marks the anniversary of Rosa Parks’ decision to sit down for her rights on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus, putting the effort to end segregation on a fast track. Parks was arrested on December 1, 1955, after she refused to give up her seat on a crowded bus to a white passenger. In 1932 she married Raymond Parks, a barber and member of the NAACP. At that time, Raymond Parks was active in the Scottsboro case. In 1943 Rosa Parks joined the local chapter of the NAACP and was elected secretary. Two years later, she registered to vote, after twice being denied. By 1949 Parks was advisor to the local NAACP Youth Council. Rosa Parks refuses to vacate her seat and move to the rear of a Montgomery city bus to make way for a white passenger. The driver notifies the police, who arrest Parks for violating city and state ordinances. Parks is released on $100 bond. Rosa Parks spent only a couple of hours in jail. On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested for violating a Montgomery segregation code when she Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American activist in the civil rights movement, best known for her pivotal role in the Montgomery bus boycott. On 1 December 1955, Rosa Parks was arrested in Alabama for refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man. Discover how her act of defiance sparked the US civil rights movement. Rosa Parks (center, in dark coat and hat) rides a bus at the end of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, Montgomery, Alabama, Dec. 26, 1956. Don Cravens/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images/Getty Images. Most of us know Rosa Parks as the African American woman who quietly, but firmly, refused to give up her bus seat to a white person Dec. 1, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama. That small act of Four days before the incident, Parks attended a meeting where she learned of the acquittal of Till's murderers. In her autobiography, Rosa Parks: My Story (1992), Parks declares her defiance was an intentional act: "I was not tired physically, or no more tired than I usually was at the end of a working day. I was not old, although some people
Articles and news, personal stories, interviews with experts.
Photos from events, contest for the best costume, videos from master classes.
![]() | ![]() |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() | ![]() |
![]() | ![]() |