Streetcar Desired and the Ku Klux Klan
Ironically, in 1867, with the American Civil War ended and the slaves freed, two major events in Black American History occurred. That year, the Ku Klux Klan,organized in 1866 by Confederate veterans as a social club in Pulaski, Tennessee, held their first national meeting. Also that year, Black demonstrators in Charleston forced the railroad company to give everyone the right to ride in the streetcars. This was followed with similar protests in other cities.
A New Century of Protests
The turn of the century did not mean the end of Black protests in the Untied States. One spunky lady proved that to be true in 1955. It was that year that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat to a white man in Montgomery, Alabama.
Protests and Counter-Protests
What the new century did bring was not only Black revolt but also increased white protests. In 1961, the first bus load of Freedom Riders was bombed in Alabama. Then in 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated in New York City. Also the Watts riot, that same year, sparked off a new wave of "urban rioting." Three years later, in 1968 Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. This tragedy instigated even more riots in more than 100 cities.
Previous: African American Revolts: Four Centuries of Protests.
Recommended Reading:
Sources:
Boyle, David. African Americans: Coming to America. The Ivy Press Ltd., The Old Candlemakers, Lewes, East Sussex, 2002.
Faragher, John Mack, General Editor. American Heritage Encyclopedia of American History. Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1998.
Genovese, Eugene D. Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made. Random House, New York, 1976.
Styron, William. The Confessions of Nat Turner. Random House, New York, 1967.
