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Rosa Parks has passed at the age of 92
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Posted by: diamondcreates
Hello Annointed Family -
I just wanted to passed this along and express at this time my deepest sympathy towards the Parks family. Though Mrs. Parks has passed on she will not be forgotten in the least. She was a very humble woman whom at that time in 1955 was fed up and just tired. May God bless her family - give them the strength to go through these times of loosing the Mother of Civil rights.
Thank you all in advance of posting something here in tribute to Mother Rosa Parks.
Be Blessed and Be encouraged in the Blood.
Posted by: youngijp
http://content . scholastic . com/browse/article . jsp?id=4809
Meet Rosa Parks
Rosa Louise Parks has been called the "Mother of the Modern-Day Civil Rights Movement." By not giving up her seat to a white passenger on a city bus, Rosa Parks started a protest that was felt throughout the United States. Her quiet, courageous act changed America and redirected the course of history.
Name: Rosa Louise McCauley Parks
Birth: February 4, 1913, in Tuskegee, Alabama, to James and Leona McCauley
Childhood: Grew up on a small farm with her brother, mother, and grandparents.
Childhood Fears: Hearing the Ku Klux Klan ride at night, listening to lynchings, and being afraid the house would burn down.
School: Attended a school for African-American children. The old, one-room schoolhouse was only open five months a year and just went up to sixth grade. In 1924, at age 11, she was sent to Montgomery to continue her studies. Five years later, she left school in order to care for her sick grandmother, and later, her mother.
Marriage/Young Adult Years:
Married barber and civil rights activist Raymond Parks in 1932. With Raymond's support, Rosa finally graduated from high school in 1934. Together, they worked for the Montgomery chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
Jobs:
1930s - 1955: Seamstress
1943: Appointed secretary of the NAACP's Montgomery branch and later its youth leader.
1965 - 1988: Worked as a receptionist and office assistant for John Conyers, an African-American congressman. Part of her job involved helping homeless people get housing.
1987 - Present: Established the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. Its ongoing mission is to motivate and direct youth to achieve their highest potential.
Greatest Achievement: Sparking the modern civil rights movement in the United States by refusing to give up her bus seat to a white passenger. Rosa Parks's arrest for breaking Montgomery segregation laws started a boycott of the city bus line that lasted 381 days. This eventually led to the 1956 Supreme Court ruling declaring segregation illegal on public buses.
Later Adult Years: After moving to Michigan in 1957, Rosa Parks continued the fight for equal rights and treatment for African Americans. On several occasions, Mrs. Parks returned to Montgomery to support Dr. King in demonstrations and civil rights marches.
Awards: Over the years, Rosa Parks has received hundreds of awards and honors, including the Medal of Freedom Award, presented by President Clinton in 1996.
http://teacher . scholastic . com/scholasticnews/news/archive . asp?archive=102605
Civil Rights Leader Dies
By Ezra Billinkoff
October 26—Rosa Parks, who inspired a generation to fight for civil rights, died on Monday at age 92. Parks, a black woman, refused to give up her seat on a city bus to a white man in Montgomery, Alabama, nearly 50 years ago. She was arrested and fined for breaking the law.
In response to her arrest, black men and women in Montgomery boycotted, or refused to use, the city buses. They demanded an end to segregation, or laws that denied equal rights to black people. A young pastor at the local church named Martin Luther King Jr. led the boycott. Because of the protesters' refusal to ride the buses, the bus system nearly went out of business.
Many believe that Parks's bold decision triggered the civil rights movement, a struggle to grant Americans the same rights, regardless of their color. "She sat down in order that we might stand up," said civil rights leader Jesse Jackson yesterday. "Her imprisonment opened the doors for our long journey to freedom."
Parks's action showed how one person could make a big impact. She inspired others, including Martin Luther King Jr., to use nonviolence and civil disobedience as a way to protest problems in society.
After Montgomery
The Montgomery bus boycott lasted 381 days. Throughout those months, churches and homes in the black community were attacked. Despite threats to their lives, the community continued to refuse to ride the buses. In November 1956, the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed segregation on buses. After the court order arrived in Montgomery, blacks began riding the buses again, sitting wherever they pleased.
Following the boycott, Parks moved with her family to Detroit, Michigan. A newly elected member of the House of Representatives named John Conyers Jr. hired her as a staff assistant. She remained there until 1988, when she retired.
"There are very few people who can say their actions and conduct changed the face of the nation," said Conyers. "And Rosa Parks is one of those individuals."
On December 1, Montgomery will celebrate the 50th anniversary of Parks's stubbornness. Thousands of children from the area will participate in the Montgomery Children's Walk, beginning in the spot where Parks was arrested and ending at the state capitol.
http://www . gopusa . com/commentary/dpatton/2005/dp_11081 . shtml
Like Many Who Changed History, Rosa Parks Was a Christian
By Doug Patton
November 8, 2005
When civil rights icon Rosa Parks died last week at age 92, she passed into history as a woman who stood up for what she believed in and refused to back down at a pivotal point in our country's evolution toward racial equality. Her one act of defiance was a catalyst that sparked a movement and brought about unprecedented changes in our nation.
Upon her passing, her body lay in state in the rotunda of the U.S. Capitol for the public to pay their respects, an honor normally reserved for presidents and Supreme Court justices. Before she could even be laid to rest, a bill had been introduced in both houses of Congress to erect a monument to her in the Capitol's Statuary Hall. Every politician and news commentator spoke of her with a reverence akin to Martin Luther King, Jr. and Pope John Paul II.
Ironically, hardly a word was said about the true impetus behind her actions on December 1, 1955.
Yes, she was exhausted that day. Yes, she chose not to give up her seat, knowing fully well that she might be arrested. But by her own admission, she would never have had the courage to remain seated had it not been for her unwavering faith in God.
This is more than just an historical footnote, and it is not just a case of tangential nitpicking. She understood that her faith and her God were greater than the white man who wanted her to move to the back of the bus, greater than the Montgomery police, the mayor, Jim Crow, the whole structure of institutional racism and oppression....
It is unfortunate that few in this generation who honor Rosa Parks know about the spiritual dimension of her long life, because it was Christ who was the guiding light of her years on this earth.
"As a child," she wrote in 1994, "I learned from the Bible to trust in God and not be afraid. I felt the Lord would give me the strength to endure whatever I had to face."
Once, knowing that her presence would overshadow a lesser known author at a joint book signing, Mrs. Parks requested that her colleague switch seats with her so that the public would talk to him first. That kind of humility cannot be conjured from a human heart devoid of God's influence.
Rosa Parks has passed into history. More important, she would have told you, her spirit has passed into eternity with Jesus Christ.
http://www . montgomerychildrenswalk . org/
The Montgomery Children's Walk was a huge success!
....The Montgomery Children’s Walk commemorated the fiftieth anniversary of her arrest and the human rights victory that followed by bringing together thousands of youth from local areas. Thousands of students walked from the Rosa Parks Museum –- the site of Mrs. Parks’ arrest -- to the Alabama state capitol building nearby on December 1, 2005.
Moreover, it is hoped that the legacy of Rosa Parks and the lessons of the Montgomery Bus Boycott will encourage today's youth to walk forward in bringing about positive social change affecting individuals and communities....
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