After her minister paid her bail, she went home where she and her family stayed up all night out of concern for possible retaliation. [32], In 2005, Colvin told the Montgomery Advertiser that she would not have changed her decision to remain seated on the bus: "I feel very, very proud of what I did," she said. "He said he wanted the people to know about the 15-year-old, because really, if I had not made the first cry for freedom, there wouldn't have been a Rosa Parks, and after Rosa Parks, there wouldn't have been a Dr King. She refused, saying, "It's my constitutional right to sit here as much as that lady. ", To complicate matters, a pregnant black woman, Mrs Hamilton, got on and sat next to Colvin. Video1894 shipwreck confirms tale of treacherous lifeboat, How 10% of Nigerian registered voters delivered victory, Sake brewers toast big rise in global sales, The Indian-American CEO who wants to be US president, Blackpink lead top stars back on the road in Asia, Exploring the rigging claims in Nigeria's elections, 'Wales is in England' gaffe sparks TikToker's trip. "I didn't know if they were crazy, if they were going to take me to a Klan meeting. "I waited for about three hours until my mother arrived with my pastor to bail me out. Read about our approach to external linking. Funeral Services will be held Saturday, April 20, 2013 at 11:00 a.m. at the Ft. Deposit Municipal Complex with Pastor. Like Parks, she, too, pleaded not guilty to. Colvin was a kid. It was going to be a long night on Dixie Drive. Just as her case was beginning to catch the nation's imagination, she became pregnant. "I was really afraid, because you just didn't know what white people might do at that time," Colvin later said. So he said, 'If you are not going to get up, I will get a policeman.'" Her pastor was called and came to pick her up. But, as she recalls her teenage years after the arrest and the pregnancy, she hovers between resentment, sadness and bewilderment at the way she was treated. Claudette Colvin, 1953 Claudette Austin was born in Birmingham, Jefferson County, to Mary Jane Gadson and C. P. Austin on September 5, 1939.Her father abandoned the family, which included a sister, when she was a small child, and the two girls went to live in Pine Level, Montgomery County, with an aunt and uncle, Mary Anne and Q. P. Colvin.Both children took the Colvin name as their last name . Two more kicks soon followed. Sapphire was once thought to guard against evil and poisoning. "They did think I was nutty and crazy.". "It would have been different if I hadn't been pregnant, but if I had lived in a different place or been light-skinned, it would have made a difference, too. Claudette Colvin was an African American civil rights activist who pioneered the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s. If she had not done what she did, I am not sure that we would have been able to mount the support for Mrs. I was glad that an adult had finally stood up to the system, but I felt left out.. I was glued to my seat. Rembert said, "I know people have heard her name before, but I just thought we should have a day to celebrate her." In March 1955, nine months before Rosa Parks defied segregation laws by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, 15-year-old Claudette Colvin did exactly the same thing. She herself didn't talk about it much, but she spoke recently to the BBC. [9] When they took Claudette in, the Colvins lived in Pine Level, a small country town in Montgomery County, the same town where Rosa Parks grew up. "I respect my elders, but I don't respect what they did to Colvin," she says. [16], Through the trial Colvin was represented by Fred Gray, a lawyer for the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), which was organizing civil rights actions. "[4][5] Colvin's case was dropped by civil rights campaigners because Colvin was unmarried and pregnant during the proceedings. "And since it had to happen, I'm happy it happened to a person like Mrs Parks," said Martin Luther King from the pulpit of the Holt Street Baptist Church. Her first son died in 1993. The case went to the United States Supreme Court on appeal by the state, and it upheld the district court's ruling on November 13, 1956. "They lectured us about Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth and we were taught about an opera singer called Marian Anderson who wasn't allowed to sing at Constitutional Hall just because she was black, so she sang at Lincoln Memorial instead.". And, like Parks, the local black establishment started to rally support nationwide for her cause. ", Rosa Parks is a heroine to the US civil rights movement. The driver caught a glimpse of them through his mirror. For Colvin, the entire episode was traumatic: "Nowadays, you'd call it statutory rape, but back then it was just the kind of thing that happened," she says, describing the conditions under which she conceived. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus. I was crying," she says. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus. "[35], I dont think theres room for many more icons. I knew what was happening, but I just kept trying to shut it out.". Parks became one of Time Magazine's 100 most important people of the 20th century . She turns, watches, wipes, feeds and washes the elderly patients and offers them a gentle, consoling word when they become disoriented. He wasn't." I was afraid they might rape me. "So did the teachers, too. The decision in the 1956 case, which had been filed by Fred Gray and Charles D. Langford on behalf of the aforementioned African American women, ruled that Montgomery's segregated bus system was unconstitutional. "They'd call her a bad girl, and her case wouldn't have a chance. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus. On the night of Parks' arrest, the Women's Political Council (WPC), a group of black women working for civil rights, began circulating flyers calling for a boycott of the bus system. "[37], In 2000, Troy State University opened a Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery to honor the town's place in civil rights history. In March 1955, nine months before Rosa Parks defied segregation laws by refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, 15-year-old Claudette . . Second, she was the first person, in Montgomery at least, to take up the challenge. Colvin says that after Supreme Court made its decision, things slowly began to change. Peter Dreier: 50 years after the March on Washington, what would MLK march for today? The driver looked at the women in his mirror. Now 76 and retired, Colvin deserves her place in history. [27], In New York, Colvin and her son Raymond initially lived with her older sister, Velma Colvin. ", The upshot was that Colvin was left in an incredibly vulnerable position. "So I told him I was not going to get up, either. Charged with disturbing the peace, breaking the bus segregation laws and assaulting the officers who had apprehended her, she was released later that night. She made history at the young age of 15 by refusing to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama to a white woman. [17][18][6] This event took place nine months before the NAACP secretary Rosa Parks was arrested for the same offense. Growing up in one of Montgomery's poorer neighborhoods, Colvin studied hard in school. Claudette Colvin in 2009. It felt like Harriet Tubman was pushing me down on one shoulder and Sojourner Truth was pushing me down on the other shoulder, she mused many years later. And I just kept blabbing things out, and I never stopped. Claudette Colvin is an activist who was a pioneer in the civil rights movement in Alabama during the 1950s. That left Colvin. She sat in the colored section about two seats away from an emergency exit, in a Capitol Heights bus. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, at the age of 15, for refusing to give up her seat on a crowded, segregated bus to a white woman. Colvin and her friends were sitting in a row a little more than half way down the bus - two were on the right side of the bus and two on the left - and a white passenger was standing in the aisle between them. [44], Former US Poet Laureate Rita Dove memorialized Colvin in her poem "Claudette Colvin Goes To Work",[45] published in her 1999 book On the Bus with Rosa Parks; folk singer John McCutcheon turned this poem into a song, which was first publicly performed in Charlottesville, Virginia's Paramount Theater in 2006. She spent the next decade going back and forth like a yo-yo between the two cities, she said. But she rarely told her story after moving to New York City. Sikora telephoned a startled Colvin and wrote an article about her. [2] She was also a member of the NAACP Youth Council, where she formed a close relationship with her mentor, Rosa Parks. But people in King Hill do not remember Colvin as that type of girl, and the accusation irritates Colvin to this day. [Mrs. Hamilton] said she was not going to get up and that she had paid her fare and that she didn't feel like standing," recalls Colvin. I felt inspired by these women because my teacher taught us about them in so much detail," she says. She was 15. The driver kept on going but stopped when he reached a junction where a police squad car was waiting. Hearst Magazine Media, Inc. Site contains certain content that is owned A&E Television Networks, LLC. Phillip Hoose also wrote about her in the young adult biography Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice. She had sons named Raymond and Randy. It is time for President Obama to award Colvin the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nations highest civilian honor, to recognize her sacrifice and passionate dedication to social justice. But she rarely told her story after moving to New York City. Similarly, Rosa Parks left Montgomery for Detroit in 1957. Montgomery was not home to the first bus boycott any more than Colvin was the first person to challenge segregation. Click to reveal She sat down in the front of the bus and refused to move on her own will when asked. The Supreme Court summarily affirmed the District Court decision on November 13, 1956. She gave birth to a fair-skin child named Raymond in the year 1956 whose skin tone was similar to her partner. "I do feel like what I did was a spark and it caught on. So, you know, I think you compare history, likemost historians say Columbus discovered America, and it was already populated. Mothers expressed concern about permitting their children on the buses. Meanwhile, Parks had been transformed from a politically-conscious activist to an upstanding, unfortunate Everywoman. "I wasn't with it at all. Most Popular #5576. Broken-down cars sit outside tumble-down houses. Joseph Rembert said, "If nobody did anything for Claudette Colvin in the past why don't we do something for her right now?" She said, "They've already called it the Rosa Parks museum, so they've already made up their minds what the story is. Her political inclination was fueled in part by an incident with her schoolmate, Jeremiah Reeves; his case was the first time that she had witnessed the work of the NAACP. She prayed furiously as they sped out, with the cop leering over her, guessing at her bra size. A second son, Randy, born in 1960, gave her four grandchildren, who are all deeply proud of their grandmothers heroism. Raymond Colvin died in 1993 in New York of a heart attack at age 37. I don't know how I got off that bus but the other students said they manhandled me off the bus and put me in the squad car. Eclipsed by Parks, her act of defiance was largely ignored for many years. It is time for President Obama to. Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. '", The atmosphere on the bus became very tense. All I could do is cry. Blake approached her. [49], The Little-Known Heroes: Claudette Colvin, a children's picture book by Kaushay and Spencer Ford, was published in 2021. "I would sit in the back and no one would even know I was there. While this does not happen by conspiracy, it is often facilitated by collusion. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People briefly considered using Colvin's case to challenge the segregation laws, but they decided against it because of her age. Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth were both African Americans who sought the abolition of slavery, Tubman was well known for helping 300 fellow slaves escape slavery using the, Truth was a passionate campaigner who fought for women's rights, best known for her speech, Claudette Colvin spoke to Outlook on the BBC World Service. But somewhere en route they mislaid the truth. She was played by Mariah Iman Wilson. "We didn't know what was going to happen, but we knew something would happen. Colvin gave birth to her first son Raymond Jun 5, 1956. "They put him on death row." I paid my fare, it's my constitutional right." Video, 1894 shipwreck confirms tale of treacherous lifeboat, Claudette Colvin's interview on Outlook on the BBC World Service, Whiskey fungus forces Jack Daniels to stop construction, Harry and Meghan told to 'vacate' Frogmore Cottage, Rare Jurassic-era bug found at Arkansas Walmart, Havana Syndrome unlikely to have hostile cause - US, India PM Modi urges G20 to overcome divisions, Starbucks illegally fired workers over union - judge, NFL hopeful accused of racing in deadly car crash. In his Pulitzer prize-winning account of the civil rights years, Parting The Waters, Taylor Branch wrote: "Even if Montgomery Negroes were willing to rally behind an unwed, pregnant teenager - which they were not - her circumstances would make her an extremely vulnerable standard bearer. "So I told him I was not going to get up either. We used to have a lot of juke joints up there, and maybe men would drink too much and get into a fight. In high school, she had high ambitions of political activity. She is a civil rights activist from the 1950s and a retired nurse aide. he asked. This website is using a security service to protect itself from online attacks. "However, the black leadership in Montgomery at the time thought that we should wait. When a white woman who got on the bus was left standing in the front, the bus driver, Robert W. Cleere, commanded Colvin and three other black women in her row to move to the back. Her reputation also made it impossible for her to find a job. Austin, but she was raised by her great-aunt and great-uncle, Mary Ann and Q.P. Nine months before Parks's arrest, a 15-year-old girl, Claudette Colvin, was thrown off a bus in the same town and in almost identical circumstances. (Julie Jacobson/Associated Press). Claudette Colvin (born Claudette Austin; September 5, 1939)[1][2] is an American pioneer of the 1950s civil rights movement and retired nurse aide. Name: Claudette Colvin Birth Year: 1939 Birth date: September 5, 1939 Birth State: Alabama Birth City: Montgomery Birth Country: United States Gender: Female Best Known For: Claudette Colvin is. "We learned about negro spirituals and recited poems but my social studies teachers went into more detail," she says. King Hill, Montgomery, is the sepia South. "Move y'all, I want those two seats," he yelled. Colvin later moved to New York City and worked as a nurse's aide. The discussions in the black community began to focus on black enterprise rather than integration, although national civil rights legislation did not pass until 1964 and 1965. Until recently, none of her workmates knew anything of her pioneering role in the civil rights movement. "[33] "I'm not disappointed. For we like our history neat - an easy-to-follow, self-contained narrative with dates, characters and landmarks with which we can weave together otherwise unrelated events into one apparently seamless length of fabric held together by sequence and consequence. 9. From "high-yellas" to "coal-coloureds", it is a tension steeped not only in language but in the arts, from Harlem Renaissance novelist Nella Larsen's book, Passing, to Spike Lee's film, School Daze. Members of the community acted as lookouts, while Colvin's father sat up all night with a shotgun, in case the Ku Klux Klan turned up. "[38], Colvin's role has not gone completely unrecognized. asked one. ", Almost 50 years on, Colvin still talks about the incident with a mixture of shock and indignation - as though she still cannot believe that this could have happened to her. In 2016, the Smithsonian Institution and its National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) were challenged by Colvin and her family, who asked that Colvin be given a more prominent mention in the history of the civil rights movement. My mother knew I was disappointed with the system and all the injustice we were receiving and she said to me: 'Well, Claudette, you finally did it.'". ", Not so Colvin. You can't sugarcoat it. The United States District Court ruled the state of Alabama and Montgomery's bus segregation laws were unconstitutional. Virgo Civil Rights Leader #2. [5] Colvin did not receive the same attention as Parks for a number of reasons: she did not have "good hair", she was not fair-skinned, she was a teenager, she was pregnant. [6][7] It is now widely accepted that Colvin was not accredited by civil rights campaigners at the time due to her circumstances. CIVIL RIGHTS ACTIVIST, 81, BIRMINGHAM, AL. She has literally become a footnote in history. Black people were allowed to occupy those seats so long as white people didn't need them. So, Colvin and her younger sister, Delphine, were taken in by their great aunt and uncle, Mary Anne and Q. P. Colvin whose daughter, Velma Colvin, had already moved out. Months before Rosa Parks became the mother of the modern civil rights movement by refusing to move to the back of a segregated Alabama bus, Black teenager Claudette Colvin did the same. Those who are aware of these distortions in the civil rights story are few. [2][10] When Colvin was eight years old, the Colvins moved to King Hill, a poor black neighborhood in Montgomery where she spent the rest of her childhood. She says she expected some abuse from the driver, but nothing more. "They said they didn't want to use a pregnant teenager because it would be controversial and the people would talk about the pregnancy more than the boycott," Colvin says. He was . "Oh God," wailed one black woman at the back. 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