BY LUCY MAY and STEVE KEMME
The Cincinnati Enquirer
A Montgomery, Ala., sheriff's deputy fingerprints Rosa Parks after her arrest in 1956.
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With a single, quiet act nearly 43 years ago, Rosa Parks launched what became this nation's modern civil rights movement.
On Dec. 1, 1955, she refused to give up her seat on a Montgomery, Ala., bus to a white man, defying the laws that gave whites more rights than blacks.
On Thursday, the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center in Cincinnati honored Mrs. Parks for that day and her lifetime of work for human rights by naming her the first recipient of the center's International Freedom Conductor Award.
In making the announcement, freedom center President and CEO Ed Rigaud noted that many people think Mrs. Parks refused to leave her seat because she was tired after a long day's work as a seamstress.
But Mrs. Parks had by then been active in the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People for 12 years, coaching young people on how to act peacefully if arrested.
Mrs. Parks last April.
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"She knew very well what she was doing," Mr. Rigaud said of her historic act. "Yes, she was tired. Tired of having to drink from separate water fountains. Tired of having to eat in separate restaurants. Tired of paying her bus fare and walking around to the rear entrance for blacks, only to have the bus speed off without her."
Mrs. Parks, 85, smiled as Mr. Rigaud spoke of her courage Thursday. She was present for the announcement through a satellite TV link from Detroit, where she lives and is recovering from a fall. She thanked him for the award and noted that her actions on Dec. 1, 1955, weren't her only contribution to civil rights.
"There were many things that I did in my quest for freedom and equality and being treated like a human being and a citizen," she said. "I have worked for a long, long time to try to bring freedom and equality to further our people."
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AT A GLANCE
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Facts about the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center:
Envisioned as national education center and museum, with anticipated opening in 2003.
To be on riverfront site between Vine and Walnut streets. Architect being selected.
Budgeted for $80 million with a $20 million endowment. Public and private funding.
Ed Rigaud, Procter & Gamble Co. executive, is president and chief executive officer. Co-chairmen of the board of trustees are Harry M. Whipple, president and publisher of The Cincinnati Enquirer, and Senior Judge Nathaniel R. Jones of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit in Cincinnati.
National advisory board includes Dick Cheney, Bryant Gumbel, Quincy Jones, Vernon E. Jordan Jr., Desmond Tutu and Elie Wiesel.
President Clinton expected to sign legislation Monday to commemorate national network of Underground Railroad sites, with the freedom center as likely centerpiece.
Web site: http://undergroundrailroad.com
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The intent of the freedom center is to highlight those very things, Mr. Rigaud said. Scheduled to open along Cincinnati's riverfront in 2003, the $80 million center will highlight the work of whites, freed blacks and Native Americans who helped slaves escape to freedom.
Mr. Rigaud said a committee chose Mrs. Parks because she embodies the spirit of the award, which center officials hope will one day be as well known and prestigious as the Nobel and Pulitzer prizes.
"The notion of a conductor is really a person who plays an active role in helping others to achieve freedom," Mr. Rigaud said. "Her courageous act actually led to major changes in the civil rights movement. It was a single act of courage that really led to freedom for a lot of people."
Mrs. Parks' arrest sparked the Montgomery bus boycott, when blacks refused to ride public buses for 381 days until the U.S. Supreme Court declared segregation on public transportation unconstitutional. The boycott also propelled the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. into national prominence.
"In one single act of defiance, Rosa Parks drew international attention to the injustice of racial discrimination, leading to the eventual end of segregation," Mr. Rigaud said.
Mrs. Parks wrote of her arrest in her book Quiet Strength: "Our mistreatment was just not right, and I was tired of it. I kept thinking about my mother and my grandparents, how strong they were. I knew there was a possibility of being mistreated, but an opportunity was being given to me to do what I had asked of others."
She will accept the award at a black-tie event in downtown's Westin Hotel Sept. 26. The award carries with it a cash prize, which has not yet been announced, and a special art object, to be unveiled this summer.
The selection of Mrs. Parks for the award thrilled local civil rights activists and those with personal connections to her.
The Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth, pastor of the Greater New Light Baptist Church in Avondale, was in Birmingham, Ala., on the day Mrs. Parks made history.
A close associate of the Rev. Dr. King, the Rev. Mr. Shuttlesworth didn't know Mrs. Parks until after her bus sit-down.
Her quiet demeanor and small physical stature have always belied her inner strength, he said.
"Rosa Parks is very quiet," said the Rev. Mr. Shuttlesworth, a major civil rights voice in Cincinnati since he moved here in 1961. "She looks as if she wouldn't do damage to a fly. But she has a big impact on the civil rights movement. You can never tell by people's appearances or countenances how much courage or determination they have."
He said Mrs. Parks is the perfect choice for the first International Freedom Conductor Award.
"She has aptly been called the mother of the civil rights movement," the Rev. Mr. Shuttlesworth said. "She sat down on the bus while standing up for civil rights."
Mabel Harris, a Silverton resident, was an eyewitness to Mrs. Parks' courageous act.
As a black Montgomery teen-ager, she watched in terror from the back of the bus as Mrs. Parks refused the bus driver's order to give up her seat.
Mrs. Harris saw two police officers handcuff Mrs. Parks and lead her away.
"I was scared they were going to kill her," she said.
Seeing the historic event changed Mrs. Harris' life.
"After I got over being scared, it gave me self-esteem," said Mrs. Harris, an information clerk at the Hamilton County Administration Building.
"It made me feel that I was a person like anybody else. I didn't have to bow down or knuckle down to anybody because of their race, religion or nationality. She's my hero."
Mrs. Harris first told Mrs. Parks of their historic link in 1985 when she asked her to come to speak at her church. Mrs. Parks was unable to come then, but the two women have met twice and have spoken over the telephone several times.
Mrs. Harris hopes to see Mrs. Parks once again when she comes to Cincinnati to accept her award.
The Rev. L.V. Booth, a former associate of the Rev. Dr. King and a former pastor of the Olivet Baptist Church in Silverton, said Mrs. Parks "typifies the spirit of the Underground Railroad." "She belongs to the world," said the Rev. Mr. Booth, who moved to Muncie, Ind., three months ago after living in Cincinnati for 45 years.
Mrs. Parks' simple act of defiance infused new life into the civil rights movement, said the Rev. Mr. Booth.
"She's just as important for Cincinnati as she is for every other city," he said. "She became a person for all seasons and for all localities."
Patricia Ellis, a Hamilton High School social studies teacher who specializes in African-American studies, met Mrs. Parks last year in connection with an Underground Railroad tour for students that Mrs. Ellis helped chaperone.
"She is the most gracious lady," said Mrs. Ellis, a member of the steering committee of the freedom center. "She was an instrument of God. I cannot think of anyone else in the world who would be better for that award."
Mrs. Parks, a 42-year-old seamstress when she boarded the bus on that now-notable day in American history, is an example of how common people can have a major impact on society, she said.
"That's what happened on the Underground Railroad," Mrs. Ellis said. "It was just ordinary people doing extraordinary things."
Metro riders admire Parks' brave act
