The Montgomery Bus Boycott: A Story in Pictures

The Montgomery Bus Boycott was an effort by Montgomery, Alabama, blacks to end segregation on city buses by boycotting the vehicles that occurred from December 5, 1955 to December 20, 1956. At the time city ordinances requires blacks to ride in designated sections in the rear of buses and to give up their seat to the request of a white person. There was also rampant violent treatment of African Americans by white city bus drivers.

This first photo is the inside of an empty Montgomery City Bus courtesy of Africanaonline (www.africanaonline.com/Graphic/rosa_parks_bus.gif)

The final catalyst leading up to the Boycott was the arrest of Rosa Parks, forty-two-year-old black seamstress and former secretary of local NAACP, for refusing to surrender her seat on a Montgomery bus to a white male passenger on December 1, 1955. She was exactly the type of person that black leaders were waiting for to violate the Jim Crow laws to launch a massive campaign behind

This photo is of Rosa Parks being fingerprinted after her arrest on December 1, 1955. Courtesy of Wikipedia (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/d/d2/Rosaparksarrested.jpeg/225px-Rosaparksarrested.jpeg)

Finally with a respectable figure, E.D Nixon began organizing with other black leaders to begin a boycott of the Montgomery Municipal buses. What grew from a one day-day boycott extended until the city met the demands of the Montgomery Improvement Association. It also was the first place for Martin Luther King Jr to articulate his philosophy of nonviolent protest and gain experience using black church networks for strategy and motivational speeches.

Pictured here African American women walk along the sidewalk during a bus boycott in Montgomery, Ala., in February, 1956. Courtesy of USA today
(http://images.usatoday.com/news/_photos/2005/11/29/montgomery-inside.jpg)

This was not an easy road however. Several leaders of the boycott were arrested for causing disturbances and threatened with serious jail-time. Even some of the homes of boycott leaders were fire-bombed by white-extremists during the course of the boycott.

This next photo is of Martin Luther King Jr. on February 4, 1956 giving a speech about non-violence and urging peace from his porch despite his home just being fire-bombed. As provided by Corbis Corporation (http://pro.corbis.com/popup/Enlargement.aspx?mediauids=%7b6e11ed9f-a183-4e57-acc2-d7227c9b074d%7d%7bffffffff-ffff-ffff-ffff-ffffffffffff%7d&qsPageNo=1&fdid=&Area=Search&TotalCount=43&CurrentPos=18&WinID=%7b6e11ed9f-a183-4e57-acc2-d7227c9b074d%7d)

King was also charged and convicted for his role in the bus boycotts. However he took the conviction proudly and it was widely celebrated. This would be the first of many King arrests in his life of non-violent protest. The boycott would continue until the decision of federal district court, affirmed by the U.S. Supreme Court, declaring segregation on municipal buses unconstitutional, December 1956 (Browder v. Gayle).

The final photo is of Coretta Scott King, Martin Luther King Jr. and several others celebrating his conviction on March 23, 1956 in front of the Montgomery Courthouse. Courtesy of Corbis Corporation (http://pro.corbis.com/popup/Enlargement.aspx?mediauids={a2ca535a-94ef-44c7-8514-9d4ba4604896}{ffffffff-ffff-ffff-ffff-ffffffffffff}&qsPageNo=1&fdid=&Area=Search&TotalCount=43&CurrentPos=9&WinID={a2ca535a-94ef-44c7-8514-9d4ba4604896})