by Dick Mac
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Claudette Colvin, was born on September 5, 1939. On March 2, 1955, at the age of 15, she was arrested in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus. This occurred nine months before the more widely known incident in which Rosa Parks helped spark the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott.
She then became a plaintiff in the federal Browder v. Gayle lawsuit challenging the bus system's policies, which resulted in the end of segregation on the Montgomery Bus System.
Claudette was branded a troublemaker by many in her community. She dropped-out of college and was unable to secure employment. In 1958, she relocated to New York City.
In 2005, se said: "I feel very, very proud of what I did. I do feel like what I did was a spark and it caught on. I'm not disappointed. Let the people know Rosa Parks was the right person for the boycott. 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."
Claudette Colvin is an American hero.
See this Democracy Now! report on Colvin, Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott: https://youtu.be/pW80tV31eL0
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