At age 2, Rosa moved to her grandparent's house with her mom and brother. She helped to work around their farm and picked cotton for a white farmer to earn some extra money. With the payment of only 50 cents a day, it felt like slavery. When Rosa was old enough she went to the local school for colored children in Georgia. It was a one-room classroom in which over 50 kids were forced to cram in. The school had no money for a bus so young Rosa had to walk to and from school each and every day. However, white children could be seen riding a bus to a new brick building. When they passed by Rosa and her classmates, the white children called them names and threw garbage out the window. This made Rosa angry, but she knew it was rude to yell back. Rosa Parks had a rough childhood but that did not stop her from becoming great in her later years.
When Rosa was 18, she met Raymond Parks. He had been fighting for the rights of black people for a long time. The two were married in 1932. In 1943, Rosa joined the National Association for the advancement of colored people (NAACP). She hated how blacks were treated, and wanted to fight back. At first, she did things in silence, rather than taking a colored elevator, she would always take the stairs and would only drink water at home rather than from the ¨colored¨ drinking fountain. Even if she was thirsty, she would force herself to wait until she went home to get a glass of water.
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Buses in Montgomery were very segregated. The colored people had to give their tickets at the front and then enter from the back, one day while Rosa was boarding a bus she refused to enter from the back, and the driver grabbed her by the sleeve and shoved her. After that, Rosa did not like taking the bus often but one day after work she boarded one Because she needed to get home. The bus driver was the same one that shoved her a little while back. Usually, when she saw him she would get off the bus and wait for the next one to arrive, but this time she decided that she was just going to board anyway. At one of the stops, a white man boarded the bus and wanted the seat where Rosa was, but she refused. The driver threatened to call the police, but she wouldn’t budge. She was arrested later that day. This started both the Montgomery bus boycott and the fame of Rosa Parks.
Rosa Parks kept fighting for nearly all her life. After the boycott, Rosa Parks earned many awards for her role in the civil rights movement. These included the Presidential Medal of Freedom, as well as the Spingarn Medal. She has also won the Congressional Gold medal, The Golden Plate awards, and the NAACP award for outstanding support. Rosa Parks was a very brave woman who fought very hard for her rights.
Rosa Parks died in 2005 at age 92. She fought for the rights of colored people and sparked the Montgomery bus boycott as well as many new laws to be passed. What she thought was a small action to fight for her rights became a huge part of history. She fought day and night until blacks had all the same rights that white people did. Her calm nonviolent actions turned her into someone whom we learn about in school today. Rosa saw a problem in her community and did all she could to change it. The moment Rosa said “no” she knew she was taking a risk, but throughout the whole time, even after being threatened Rosa never once stopped fighting.
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