James F. Blake, the bus driver who asked Rosa Parks to move to the back of the bus talks about that historic day. James Frederick Blake (April 14, 1912 – March 21, 2002) was an American bus driver in Montgomery, Alabama, whom Rosa Parks defied in 1955, prompting the Montgomery bus boycott. James F. Blake, the Montgomery, Ala., bus driver who had Rosa Parks arrested in 1955 when she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger, has died. He was 89. Blake died of a heart In 1955, Rosa Parks ignited a civil rights revolution by refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Had she noticed that James Blake was behind the wheel, she might never James Fred Blake (April 14, 1912 – March 21, 2002) was an American bus driver in Montgomery, Alabama, whom Rosa Parks defied in 1955, prompting the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Born on April 14, 1912, Blake was drafted into the Army on December 23, 1943, at Fort McClellan in Anniston, Alabama. In an interview on February 5, 1956, Parks put the agency on Blake, rather than the officers, who were willing to just put her off the bus. That decision, according to E.D. Nixon, “was the worst James Blake, who Parks encountered on a bus 12 years earlier, threatened to have Parks arrested if she didn’t move. She didn’t, so he did. In an interview with Scholastic, Parks recounted what ensued. The police boarded the bus within minutes asking why she didn’t stand up. Rosa Parks writes “I had been pushed around all my life and felt at this moment that I couldn’t take it any more.” On the evening of Dec. 1, 1955, when bus driver James Blake ordered her to give up her seat to a white passenger and she refused. 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. PARKS: I think the American Dream should be to have a good life, and to live well, and to be a good citizen. I think that should apply to all of us. That it is the land of the free and the home of the brave, and I believe it should be just that for all people. "James Blake, 89; Driver Had Rosa Parks Arrested". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved February 5, 2023. The obituary also noted that Parks had offered her condolences to the Blake family through the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development in Detroit. "[I'm] sure his family will miss him," Parks was reported to have said in the message. Then a 28-year-old patrol officer with Montgomery Police Department, he was the first officer to arrive on scene when bus driver James Blake called police on a black woman who refused to change TIL about James F. Blake, the bus driver that tried to make Rosa Parks move out of her seat. en.wikipedia.org Open. Archived post. New comments cannot be posted and Biography: Rosa Parks's deliberate decision to test the practice of Jim Crow was the catalyst that triggered the 1955 bus boycott in Montgomery, Ala. The daughter of James and Leona Edwards McCauley, she grew up in Pine Level, Ala., and was sent away to a private girls' school in Montgomery at the age of 11. Rosa Parks is fingerprinted by police Lt. D.H. Lackey in Montgomery, Ala., Feb. 22, 1956, two months after refusing to give up her seat on a bus for a white passenger on Dec. 1, 1955. Associated They would just beat you like you was a dog or a cat,” Smith told the Daily News in her most extensive interview to date. SEGREGATION ON BUSES RULED UNCONSTITUTIONAL IN 1956. Debbie Egan-Chin/New York Daily News. Mineola Dozier Smith, 94, was on the bus the day Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat for a white man. “I was a little bit afraid. The bus driver, James Blake, noticed and asked Parks and other black passengers in the middle section to move. By the terms of Alabama segregation, all four Black people in the row Parks was seated in would have to get up so one man could sit down. Montgomery bus drivers carried guns. No one moved. Folk Figure. A native of Montgomery, Alabama, he served in the United States Army during World War II. He was the bus driver who on December 1, 1955, insisted that a African American woman named Rosa Parks give up her seat in the front of the bus to a white man, and move to the back of the bus. For this Rosa Parks James F. Blake, the Montgomery, Ala., bus driver who arrested Rosa Parks in 1955 when she refused to give up her seat to a white passenger, has died. He was 89. James Frederick Blake (April 14, 1912 – March 21, 2002) was an American bus driver in Montgomery, Alabama, whom Rosa Parks defied in 1955, prompting the Montgomery bus boycott. Early life Born on April 14, 1912, Blake was drafted into the Army on December 23, 1943, at Fort McClellan in Anniston, Alabama .
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