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On February 12, 1909, a diverse group of social reformers including W.E.B. Du Bois, Ida B. Wells, Archibald Grimke, Mary Church Terrell, Henry Moskowitz, William English Walling, and Mary White Ovington founded the NAACP. The date was chosen to coincide with the birthday of President Abraham Lincoln. -
On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson stepped onto Ebbets Field for his first game with the Brooklyn Dodgers. It was the beginning of an unparalleled career in baseball. At the end of his explosive nine years as a Dodger, his record included a . 311 batting average, 137 home runs, 734 runs batted in, and 197 stolen bases.
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On May 17, 1954, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren delivered the unanimous ruling in the landmark civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas. State-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment and was therefore unconstitutional -
On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama. Her courageous act of protest was considered the spark that ignited the Civil Rights movement. For decades, Martin Luther King Jr.'s fame overshadowed hers. -
the United States Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, which was the first federal civil rights legislation since 1875, and it was signed into law by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on September 9, 1957.
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became a national crisis when nine African American students, known as the Little Rock Nine, attempted to integrate the previously all-white school, facing resistance from Governor Orval Faubus and a white mob, leading to federal intervention by President Eisenhower
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On February 1, 1960, four African American college students sat down at a lunch counter at Woolworth's in Greensboro, North Carolina, and politely asked for service. Their request was refused. When asked to leave, they remained in their seats. -
During the spring of 1961, student activists from the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) launched the Freedom Rides to challenge segregation on interstate buses and bus terminals. -
King and the Rev. Abernathy chose to lead a march in defiance of the injunction and were arrested on April 12, 1963. Dr. King spent eight days in jail before being released on bail, and during that time wrote his famed “Letter from Birmingham Jail." -
On August 28, 1963, more than a quarter million people participated in the historic March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, gathering near the Lincoln Memorial. More than 3,000 members of the press covered this historic march, where Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. -
Civil Rights Act (1964) | National Archives
Despite Kennedy's assassination in November of 1963, his proposal culminated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964. President Lyndon Johnson signed it into law just a few hours after it was passed by Congress on July 2, 1964. The act outlawed segregation in businesses such as theaters, restaurants, and hotels -
"Bloody Sunday" is most commonly associated with the event that occurred on March 7, 1965 in Selma, Alabama, where state troopers violently attacked civil rights marchers on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, marking a significant moment in the fight for voting rights; the event essentially ended on the same day as the attack took place, though its impact on the Civil Rights movement continued afterwards.
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On August 4, 1965, the United States Senate passed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The long-delayed issue of voting rights had come to the forefront because of a voter registration drive launched by civil rights activists in Selma, Alabama.
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Shortly after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was shot and mortally wounded as he stood on the second-floor balcony outside his room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn. He was pronounced dead at 7:05 p.m. at St.
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