PARKS, ROSA

orig. Rosa McCauley

born Feb. 4, 1913, Tuskegee, Ala., U.S.

U.S. African American civil-rights activist.

She worked as a seamstress in Montgomery, Ala., where she was active in the NAACP (1943–56). In 1955 she was arrested after refusing to give her seat on a public bus to a white man. The resultant boycott of the city's bus system, organized by Martin Luther King, Jr. , and others, brought the civil rights movement to new prominence. In 1957 Parks moved to Detroit, where she was a staff assistant (1965–88) to U.S. Rep. John Conyers. She was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal in 1999.