Rosa Parks
Rosa Parks
Rosa Louise McCauley Parkswas an African American civil rights activist, whom the United States Congress called "the first lady of civil rights" and "the mother of the freedom movement". Her birthday, February 4, and the day she was arrested, December 1, have both become Rosa Parks Day, commemorated in California and Missouri, and Ohio and Oregon...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionCivil Rights Leader
Date of Birth4 February 1913
CityTuskegee, AL
CountryUnited States of America
People have said over the years that the reason I did not give up my seat was because I was tired. I did not think of being physically tired. My feet were not hurting. I was tired in a different way. I was tired of seeing so many men treated as boys and not called by their proper names or titles. I was tired of seeing children and women mistreated and disrespected because of the color of their skin. I was tired of Jim Crow laws, of legally enforced racial segregation.
An opportunity was being given to me to do what I had asked of others.
My resisting being mistreated on the bus did not begin with that particular arrest…I did a lot of walking in Montgomery.
When one’s mind is made up... fear diminishes.
What really matters is not whether we have problems, but how we go through them. We must keep going on to make it through whatever we are facing.
There were times when it would have been easy to fall apart or to go in the opposite direction, but somehow I felt that if I took on more step, someone would come along to join me.
When people made up their minds that they wanted to be free and took action, then there was a change.
I did not get on the bus to get arrested I got on the bus to go home.
If I stayed angry at other people, I would miss finding friends among those I was angry with.
I had been pushed as far as I could stand
I do the very best I can to look upon life with optimism and hope and looking forward to a better day.
I had given up my seat before, but this day, I was especially tired. Tired from my work as a seamstress, and tired from the ache in my heart.
The only tired I was, was tired of giving in.
As long as there is unemployment, war, crime and all things that go to the infliction of man's inhumanity to man, regardless - there is much to be done, and people need to work together.