Civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin, whose courageous refusal to surrender her seat on a segregated bus in 1955 helped ignite the modern civil rights movement, has died at 86.
Her passing was confirmed on Tuesday by the Claudette Colvin Legacy Foundation.
Colvin's act of defiance occurred months before Rosa Parks gained international recognition for a similar stand.
On March 2, 1955, a bus driver in Montgomery, Alabama called the police after two Black girls were observed sitting near two white girls, violating segregation laws.
The then 15-year-old Colvin refused to move to the rear, leading to her arrest; the other girl moved seats.
Colvin later became a named plaintiff in the landmark lawsuit that ultimately outlawed racial segregation on Montgomery’s public transport system.
It was subsequently declared that all segregation on public transport was unconstitutional.
Colvin’s actions were not publicized by Black leaders for many years.
“Young people think Rosa Parks just sat down on a bus and ended segregation, but that wasn't the case at all,” Colvin told the New York Times in 2017.
Colvin and Parks knew each other through the NAACP Youth Council, where Parks acted as a mentor to Colvin, who was 26 years her junior.
The older woman was seen as a more suitable candidate for a legal test case against segregation, and local leaders threw their weight behind her.
Colvin gave birth to a son, Raymond, in 1956, and two years later left Montgomery for New York City.
She later said she struggled to obtain employment in her home town after taking part in the court case.
In 1960 she had another son, Randy, and in 1969 began working as a nurse’s aide in Manhattan, a role she would hold until she retired 35 years later. Colvin has four grandchildren.
In 2021, the record of Colvin's arrest was expunged.
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