Rosa Parks – A Woman of Courage
By Tammy Scarbrough
1 Rosa Parks was born Rosa Louise McCauley in Tuskegee, Alabama in 1914. She is known as the "mother of the civil rights movement" and here is her story.
2 One fateful day in December of 1955, Rosa had just gotten off work as a seamstress in Montgomery, Alabama. She was tired and just wanted to go home. As she got on the bus to go home, she was told she had to give up her seat to a white passenger. Although she was not any more tired than usual, she refused to give up her seat because she was tired of black people being treated as "second-class citizens."
3 Rosa did not intend to cause problems that day. What should have been a normal ride on the bus ended up with Rosa being thrown in jail for not giving up her seat. Black people had been treated unfairly for a very long time. They could not enter "white" restaurants or drink out of "white" water fountains. This event in Rosa Parks' life began to change all of that.
