Search results
The Freedom Riders: The Civil Rights Musical is a theater musical retelling the story of the Freedom Rides. The musical was created by Los Angeles screenwriter/director Richard Allen, and San Diego native music artist Taran Gray.
- Civil Rights Activists Test Supreme Court Decision
- John Lewis
- Freedom Riders Face Bloodshed in Alabama
- Federal Marshals called in
- Kennedy Urges ‘Cooling Off’ Period
- Desegregating Travel
- GeneratedCaptionsTabForHeroSec
The 1961 Freedom Rides, organized by the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), were modeled after the organization’s 1947 Journey of Reconciliation. During the 1947 action, African American and white bus riders tested the 1946 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Morgan v. Virginiathat found segregated bus seating was unconstitutional. The 1961 Freedom Rid...
The original group of 13 Freedom Riders—seven African Americans and six whites—left Washington, D.C., on a Greyhound bus on May 4, 1961. Their plan was to reach New Orleans, Louisiana, on May 17 to commemorate the seventh anniversary of the Supreme Court’s Brown v. Board of Educationdecision, which ruled that segregation of the nation’s public scho...
On May 14, 1961, the Greyhound bus was the first to arrive in Anniston, Alabama. There, an angry mob of about 200 white people surrounded the bus, causing the driver to continue past the bus station. The mob followed the bus in automobiles, and when the tires on the bus blew out, someone threw a bomb into the bus. The Freedom Riders escaped the bus...
The violence toward the Freedom Riders was not quelled—rather, the police abandoned the Greyhound bus just before it arrived at the Montgomery, Alabama, terminal, where a white mob attacked the riders with baseball bats and clubs as they disembarked. Attorney General Kennedy sent 600 federal marshals to the city to stop the violence. The following ...
On May 24, 1961, a group of Freedom Riders departed Montgomery for Jackson, Mississippi. There, several hundred supporters greeted the riders. However, those who attempted to use the whites-only facilities were arrested for trespassing and taken to the maximum-security penitentiary in Parchman, Mississippi. That same day, U.S. Attorney General Kenn...
The violence and arrests continued to garner national and international attention, and drew hundreds of new Freedom Riders to the cause. The rides continued over the next several months, and in the fall of 1961, under pressure from the Kennedy administration, the Interstate Commerce Commission issued regulations prohibiting segregation in interstat...
Freedom Riders were civil rights activists who protested segregated bus terminals in the South in 1961. They faced violent attacks, arrests and federal intervention as they challenged the Supreme Court decisions on interstate transportation facilities.
Jun 15, 2024 · Freedom Rides, political protests against segregation by Blacks and whites who rode buses together through the U.S. South in 1961. Convinced that segregationists would violently protest this action, the Freedom Riders hoped to provoke the federal enforcement of the Supreme Court’s Boynton v.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Jul 18, 2020 · Representative John Lewis was among the 13 original Freedom Riders, who encountered violence and resistance as they rode buses across the South, challenging the nation’s segregation laws.
May 31, 2018 · Learn about the 1961 student activist campaign to challenge segregation on interstate buses and terminals, and the violence, media attention, and federal intervention it sparked. Explore the background, timeline, and legacy of the Freedom Rides and their impact on the civil rights movement.
A tribute to the activists who challenged racial segregation in the South in 1961, with portraits and interviews of 80 Freedom Riders. See how they faced violence, arrests and imprisonment, and how they changed America.
The Freedom Rides were the first nationally known interracial civil rights demonstration in the South. The legacies of the Freedom Riders changed the world and inspired others to end racial discrimination in public life and will never be forgotten.
