An ad hoc committee headed by the most prominent local black activist, ED Nixon, was set up to discuss the possibility of making Colvin's arrest a test case. Join the conversation - find us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter. This much we know. 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. Colvin was the first person to be arrested for challenging Montgomery's bus segregation policies, so her story made a few local papers - but nine months later, the same act of defiance by Rosa Parks was reported all over the world. Claudette Colvin was an African American civil rights activist who pioneered the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s. .css-m6thd4{-webkit-text-decoration:none;text-decoration:none;display:block;margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;font-family:Gilroy,Helvetica,Arial,Sans-serif;font-size:1.125rem;line-height:1.2;font-weight:bold;color:#323232;text-transform:capitalize;}@media (any-hover: hover){.css-m6thd4:hover{color:link-hover;}}How the Greensboro Four Began the Sit-In Movement, Biography: You Need to Know: Bayard Rustin, Biography: You Need to Know: Sylvia Rivera, Biography: You Need to Know: Dorothy Pittman Hughes, 10 Influential Asian American and Pacific Islander Activists. They just didn't want to know me. [30] Claudette began a job in 1969 as a nurse's aide in a nursing home in Manhattan. In New York, Colvin gave birth to another son, Randy. "She was an A student, quiet, well-mannered, neat, clean, intelligent, pretty, and deeply religious," writes Jo Ann Robinson in her authoritative book, The Montgomery Bus Boycott And The Women Who Started It. Claudette Colvin, a civil rights pioneer who in March 1955, at the age of 15, was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a White person on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus, is seeking to get her . Respectfully and faithfully yours. New York, Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, This page was last edited on 1 March 2023, at 23:25. This led to a few articles and profiles by others in subsequent years. And that person, it transpired, would be Rosa Parks. The death news of Colvin, which has been going on the Internet, is untrue; she is alive and is 83. In 1956, Colvin gave birth to a son, Raymond. She is a civil rights activist from the 1950s and a retired nurse aide. [16], Through the trial Colvin was represented by Fred Gray, a lawyer for the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA), which was organizing civil rights actions. I had been kicked out of school, and I had a 3-month-old baby.. I didn't get up, because I didn't feel like I was breaking the law. During her pregnancy, she was abandoned by civil rights leaders. Ward and Paul Headley. For several hours, she sat in jail, completely terrified. She told me to let Rosa be the one: white people aren't going to bother Rosa, they like her". Gary Younge investigates, Original reporting and incisive analysis, direct from the Guardian every morning. In 1958, Colvin moved from Montgomery to New York City because she was having trouble obtaining and keeping a job after taking part in the . "I told Mrs Parks, as I had told other leaders in Montgomery, that I thought the Claudette Colvin arrest was a good test case to end segregation on the buses," says Fred Gray, Parks's lawyer. . Check below for more deets about Claudette Colvin. One white woman defended Colvin to the police; another said that, if she got away with this, "they will take over". Colvin was also very dark-skinned, which put her at the bottom of the social pile within the black community - in the pigmentocracy of the South at the time, and even today, while whites discriminated against blacks on grounds of skin colour, the black community discriminated against each other in terms of skin shade. I was afraid they might rape me. He was . She needed support. The leaders in the Civil Rights Movement tried to keep up appearances and make the "most appealing" protesters the most seen. Meanwhile, Parks had been transformed from a politically-conscious activist to an upstanding, unfortunate Everywoman. It is this that incenses Patton. The NMAAHC has a section dedicated to Rosa Parks, which Colvin does not want taken away, but her family's goal is to get the historical record right, and for officials to include Colvin's part of history. She said, "They've already called it the Rosa Parks museum, so they've already made up their minds what the story is. 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. A poor, single, pregnant, black, teenage mother who had both taken on the white establishment and fallen foul of the black one. We strive for accuracy and fairness.If you see something that doesn't look right,contact us! She was 15. Virgo Civil Rights Leader #2. ", But even as she inspired awe throughout the country, elders within Montgomery's black community began to doubt her suitability as a standard-bearer of the movement. "I recited Edgar Allan Poe, Annabel Lee, the characters in Midsummer Night's Dream, the Lord's Prayer and the 23rd Psalm." Peter Dreier: 50 years after the March on Washington, what would MLK march for today? 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. [15], In 1955, Colvin was a student at the segregated Booker T. Washington High School in the city. People often make death hoaxes of well-known personalities to get public attention and views. Colvin is not exactly bitter. Raymond D. Gunderson, age 91, of Hot Springs, passed away Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2023. In the nine months between her arrest and that of Parks, another young black woman, Mary Louise Smith, suffered a similar fate. Her rhythm is simple and lifestyle frugal. Her voice is soft and high, almost shrill. At the time, black leaders, including the Rev. Sikora telephoned a startled Colvin and wrote an article about her. First Name Claudette #1. In this small, elevated patch of town, black people sit out on wooden porches and watch an impoverished world go by. 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. The lighter you were, it was generally thought, the better; the closer your skin tone was to caramel, the closer you were perceived to be to whatever power structure prevailed, and the more likely you were to attract suspicion from those of a darker hue. [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. They forced her into the back of a squad car, one officer jumping in after her. He wasn't." [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. "I was really afraid, because you just didn't know what white people might do at that time," Colvin later said. 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At 82, her arrest is expunged", "Claudette Colvin's juvenile record has been expunged, 66 years after she was arrested for refusing to give her bus seat to a White person", "John McCutcheon sings Rita Dove's 'Claudette Colvin', Drunk History' Montgomery, AL (TV Episode 2014), "The Newsroom - Will McAvoy On Historical Hypotheticals", "Report: Biopic about civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin in the works", The Other Rosa Parks (Colvin interview with, Vanessa de la Torre, "In The Shadow of Rosa Parks: 'Unsung Hero' of Civil Rights Movement Speaks Out", "An asterisk, not a star, of black history", Let us Look at Jim Crow for the Criminal he is - Rosa Parks' bus stand and the long history of bus resistance, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Claudette_Colvin&oldid=1142354716. Nobody can doubt the height of her character, nobody can doubt the depth of her Christian commitment and devotion to the teachings of Jesus." When the white seats were filled, the driver, J Fred Black, asked Parks and three others to give up their seats. [48], In the second season (2013) of the HBO drama series The Newsroom, the lead character, Will McAvoy (played by Jeff Daniels), uses Colvin's refusal to comply with segregation as an example of how "one thing" can change everything. Rosa Parks stated: "If the white press got ahold of that information, they would have [had] a field day. The three black passengers sitting alongside Parks rose reluctantly. In 1960, she gave birth to her second son, Randy. Colvin left Montgomery for New York City in 1958,[6] because she had difficulty finding and keeping work following her participation in the federal court case that overturned bus segregation. The driver caught a glimpse of them through his mirror. King Hill, Montgomery, is the sepia South. In 1955, nine months before Rosa Parks' famous act of defiance, Claudette Colvin, a Black high school student in Montgomery, Alabama, was arrested after refusing to give up her seat on a public . "They'd call her a bad girl, and her case wouldn't have a chance. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. Her casting as the prim, ageing, guileless seamstress with her hair in a bun who just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time denied her track record of militancy and feminism. 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.'". Claudette Colvin's birth flower is Aster/Myosotis. Listen to Claudette Colvin's interview on Outlook on the BBC World Service. He was so light-skinned (like his father) that people frequently said she had a baby by a white man. Colvin was not invited officially for the formal dedication of the museum, which opened to the public in September 2016. The churches, buses and schools were all segregated and you couldn't even go into the same restaurants," Claudette Colvin says. "[37], In 2000, Troy State University opened a Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery to honor the town's place in civil rights history. "When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack. On 2 March 1955, Colvin and her friends finished their classes and were let out of school early. 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. But she rarely told her story after moving to New York City. "We had unpaved streets and outside toilets. The baby was fair-skinned just like his dad and people accused her of having a white baby. Before the Rosa Parks incident took place, Claudette Colvin was arrested for challenging the bus segregation system. But while the driver went to get a policeman, it was the white students who started to make noise. The legal case turned on the testimony of four plaintiffs, one of whom was Claudette Colvin. To the exclusively male and predominantly middle-class, church-dominated, local black leadership in Montgomery, she was a fallen woman. Second, she was the first person, in Montgomery at least, to take up the challenge. Claudette Colvin in 2009. James Edward "Jungle Jim" Colvin, 69, of Juliette, Georgia, passed away on Saturday, February 25, 2023. ", If that were not enough, the son, Raymond, to whom she would give birth in December, emerged light-skinned: "He came out looking kind of yellow, and then I was ostracised because I wouldn't say who the father was and they thought it was a white man. "I went bipolar. [16] On March 2, 1955, she was returning home from school. She works the night shift and sleeps "when the sleep falls on her" during the day. Raymond Colvin, age 62, a resident of Ft. Deposit, AL, died April 13, 2013. All Rights Reserved. "They did think I was nutty and crazy.". By Monday, the day the boycott began, Colvin had already been airbrushed from the official version of events. Taylor Branch. [27] During the court case, Colvin described her arrest: "I kept saying, 'He has no civil right this is my constitutional right you have no right to do this.' "She lived in a little shack. Biography and associated logos are trademarks of A+E Networksprotected in the US and other countries around the globe. Keep supporting great journalism by turning off your ad blocker. But Colvin was not the only casualty of this distortion. Angry protests erupt over Greek rail disaster, Explosive found in check-in luggage at US airport, 1894 shipwreck confirms tale of treacherous lifeboat. Raymond Colvin died in 1993 in New York of a heart attack at age 37. Phillip Hoose also wrote about her in the young adult biography Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice. She says she expected some abuse from the driver, but nothing more. "Aren't you going to get up?" Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. In 1969, years after moving to NYC, she acquired a job working as a Nurse's aide at a Nursing home. But also let them know that the attorneys took four other women to the Supreme Court to challenge the law that led to the end of segregation. When Austin abandoned the family, Gadson was unable to financially support her children. Colvin has remained unmarried all her life. Two years earlier, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, African-Americans launched an effective bus boycott after drivers refused to honour an integrated seating policy, which was settled in an unsatisfactory fudge. Or purchase a subscription for unlimited access to real news you can count on. With funding from church donations and activities organized by the chapter, Colvin had her day in court. Colvin says Parks had the right image to become the face of resistance to segregation because of her previous work with the NAACP. So he turned on the black men sitting behind her. - Claudette Colvin On March 2, 1955, an impassioned teenager, fed up with the daily injustices of Jim Crow segregation, refused to give her seat to a white woman on a segregated bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Her reputation also made it impossible for her to find a job. The driver wanted all of them to move to the back and stand so that the white passenger could sit. Similarly, Rosa Parks left Montgomery for Detroit in 1957. The bus driver had the authority to assign the seats, so when more white passengers got on the bus, he asked for the seats.". ", The upshot was that Colvin was left in an incredibly vulnerable position. I paid my fare, it's my constitutional right." I was glued to my seat. Colvins feisty testimony was instrumental in the shocking success of the suit, which ended segregated seating on Montgomerys buses. "She had been tracked down by the zeitgeist - the spirit of the times." But go to King Hill and mention her name, and the first thing they will tell you is that she was the first. "[4][5] Colvin's case was dropped by civil rights campaigners because Colvin was unmarried and pregnant during the proceedings. In court, Colvin opposed the segregation law by declaring herself not guilty. When Claudette Colvin's high school in Montgomery, Alabama, observed Negro History Week in 1955, the 15-year-old had no way of knowing how the stories of Black freedom fighters would soon impact . The young Ms. Colvin was portrayed by actress Mariah Iman Wilson. Unable to find work in Montgomery, Colvin moved to New York in 1958, while her son Raymond remained behind with family. A year later, on 20 December 1956, the US Supreme Court ruled that segregation on the buses must end. "I was really afraid, because you just didn't know what white people might do at that time," says Colvin. It was her individual courage that triggered the collective display of defiance that turned a previously unknown 26-year-old preacher, Martin Luther King, into a household name. The policeman arrived, displaying two of the characteristics for which white Southern men had become renowned: gentility and racism. ", Rosa Parks is a heroine to the US civil rights movement. "For a while, there was a real distance between me and Mrs Parks over this. "He wanted me to give up my seat for a white person and I would have done it for an elderly person but this was a young white woman. 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