Ruby Bridges

Of all the figures in the American Civil Rights movement, perhaps one of the boldest was also a picture of naive innocence, a face of wisdom and purity thrown into a roiling cauldron of social unrest. That she existed and came out of the segregated South and was still able to thrive as a productive activist and member of society is a testament to the steely resilience of a child who found herself stepping on the right side of history.

We're talking about civil rights activist Ruby Bridges, who was only five years old when she was caught in the wake of desegregation, swimming against the tide of public opinion in her hometown of New Orleans, Louisiana. Read on to learn more about the extraordinary life story of one of our most cherished civil rights symbols.

Ruby Bridges Biography

Ruby Bridges was born on September 8, 1954, in Tylertown, Mississippi. Her parents were local farmers Lucille and Abon. Bridges was the first of five children. When Ruby was 2, the family uprooted and relocated to New Orleans, Louisiana, where they felt there were more opportunities.

Fig. 1 Ruby Bridges Speaking

Ruby Bridges Education

Louisiana schools were supposed to have integrated by the beginning of Bridges' first schoolyear, but many southern states were dragging their feet, refusing to comply with the law. Earlier that year the Supreme Court had delivered a clear verdict in the case of Brown vs. the Board of Education: schools must integrate nationwide.

Because of Louisiana schools' lack of compliance, for her first year of schooling, Bridges had to attend a segregated school when she went to kindergarten in 1959. However, once school began the following year, it was a different story.

Federal marshals were called upon to assist Bridges on her first day of school, escorting her to and from school. She said that her parents only told her that she would be attending a new school that day and that she should behave. When the four white marshals appeared at her door and she saw the commotion around the school, she said she thought she was going to a parade.

Fig. 2 Ruby Bridges and Kamala Harris in Alabama

Ruby Bridges Protest

When Bridges arrived at school on the first day, there were scarcely any lessons to be had–only life lessons. She sat the entire day in the principal's office along with the marshals while they waited for the chaos to subside. As it turned out, 500 students were withdrawn from school that day by angry parents.

Around 200 protesters waited outside the school to shower Bridges with death threats. To her dismay, protesters would appear with a small coffin inside of which lay a Black child. Bridges reported that though this was the only time she was scared, the image haunted her from then on.

Meanwhile, because the other teachers refused to teach with Bridges in the classroom, instead hiding the white students in another area, school officials sought a teacher for their new student. It would be a class of one. Taking up the challenge was her new teacher, Barbara Henry.

Bridges made an instant connection with the amiable Henry, and a friendship was forged. They spent the entire first year alone in that classroom as Bridges' education commenced. Bridges would occasionally step into a closet to hang up her coat, and she would hear other students in another room being taught in groups. She refused to eat until she was taken to the cafeteria with the other students. On arrival, however, the cafeteria was empty.

Henry finally pressured the principal to allow Ruby contact with the other students. She basically threatened to report him to the school superintendent for not following the newly minted law. He relented, agreeing to allow Bridges to meet with the rest of the student body.

Fig. 3 BLM Protest signs and posters

Bridges reported that the first student she met, who happened to be a little white boy, told her immediately that he would not be able to play with her because of the color of her skin. The little white boy also used a now-reviled racial slur that was then often thrown around in the American South. However, Bridges did not blame the boy, as in her young mind he was only doing what he had been told by adults and explaining the situation to her. In a way, she said, the boy was doing her a favor, illuminating an unfathomable situation.

Ruby Bridges Civil Rights

Let us take a look at the civil rights

Brown vs. the Board of Education

At this time, Bridges was riding the wave of the most seismic civil rights case the Supreme Court had yet seen which was Brown vs. the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas.

The provisions of the 14th amendment to the US constitution, which had granted citizenship rights to African Americans, had already undergone their first challenge in Plessy vs. Ferguson in the late 19th century. In that case, separate but equal provisions for whites and blacks had been deemed constitutional, thereby enshrining Jim Crow laws in the document. The 1892 decision led to years of segregation and discrimination.

Fig. 4 Segregation Image

Many schools used the "separate but equal" doctrine drafted in that earlier case to justify segregation in schools. The NAACP took matters into its own hands when it began to desegregate public schools in various states.

African American parents in Topeka, Kansas began to send their children to all-white schools with the support of the NAACP. When enrolment was denied, the civil rights group filed a lawsuit with the Supreme Court on behalf of the daughter of Oliver Brown, a local parent. Because the student was refused enrolment in the white public school, she had to attend a school untenably far from home. This fact was used as a basis for the lawsuit, which claimed that this was a denial of the provisions outlined in the 14th amendment.

Fig. 5 Terri Sewell at NAACP rights meeting

Finally, Justice

The first attempt at a lawsuit failed, with Brown losing the case and the Supreme Court declaring in 1951 that the schools were indeed separate but equal. On appeal, however, Brown prevailed, though it took four years before desegregation would become the law of the land.

Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren ruled that several intangible inequalities were found in the school system, not least among older students. Therefore, he issued the order that schools across the nation must integrate. Ruby Bridges would be the first test case of integration in the ultra-conservative Deep South.

Ruby Bridges Book

In her biography, This is Your Time, Bridges recounts with absolute clarity her experiences as a child, sharing that she never felt animosity towards the students who refused to play with her. In her mind, they were simply doing what their parents had told them.

She now has a family, a career in the travel industry, and attends speaking engagements all over the United States. Bridges credits her faith in God as a vital component in her journey and the struggle to end discrimination in America.