Today's Articles

People, Locations, Episodes

Wed, 03.02.1955

Black Teen Jailed for Bus Seating Violation

Claudette Colvin

*On this date in 1955, 15-year-old Black teenager Claudette Colvin was arrested for refusing to move out of her seat for a white woman on a public bus in Montgomery, Alabama.

She violated the same Jim Crow segregation law that Rosa Parks encountered nine months later. Colvin was the first person to plead not guilty to such a charge. Her attorney, Fred Gray, raised constitutional issues in her defense, but she was convicted.

New Poem Each Day

Poetry Corner

My old man’s a white old man And my old mother’s black. If ever I cursed my white old man I take my curses back. If ever I cursed my black old mother And... CROSS by Langston Hughes.
Read More