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Claudette Colvin is an American pioneer of the 1950s civil rights movement and retired nurse aide. On March 2, 1955, she was arrested at the age of 15 in Montgomery, Alabama, for refusing to give up her seat to a white woman on a crowded, segregated bus. This occurred nine months before the more widely known incident in which Rosa Parks, secretary of the local chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), helped spark the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott.
Mary Louise Ware is an African-American civil rights activist. She was arrested in October 1955 at the age of 18 in Montgomery, Alabama for refusing to give up her seat on the segregated bus system. She is one of several women who were arrested for this offense prior to Rosa Parks that year. Parks was the figure around whom the Montgomery bus boycott was organized, starting December 5, 1955.
Fred David Gray is an American civil rights attorney, preacher, activist, and state legislator from Alabama. He handled many prominent civil rights cases, such as Browder v. Gayle, and was elected to the Alabama House of Representatives in 1970, along with Thomas Reed, both from Tuskegee. They were the first black state legislators in Alabama in the 20th century. He served as the president of the National Bar Association in 1985, and in 2001 was elected as the first African-American President of the Alabama State Bar.
The Women's Political Council (WPC), founded in Montgomery, Alabama, was an organization that formed in 1946 that was an early force active in the civil rights movement that was formed to address the racial issues in the city. Members included Mary Fair Burks, Jo Ann Robinson, Maude Ballou, Irene West, Thelma Glass, and Euretta Adair.
Rachel Bassette Noel was an American educator, politician and civil rights leader in Denver, Colorado. She is known for the "Noel Resolution", a 1968 plan to integrate the Denver city school district, and her work to implement that plan, as well as other work on civil rights. When elected to the Denver Public Schools Board of Education in 1965, Noel was the first African-American woman elected to public office in Colorado. In 1996, Noel was inducted into the Colorado Women's Hall of Fame.
Mahala Ashley Dickerson was an American lawyer and civil rights advocate for women and minorities. In 1948 she became the first African American female attorney admitted to the Alabama State Bar; in 1951 she was the second African American woman admitted to the Indiana bar; and in 1959 she was Alaska's first African American attorney. In 1983 Dickerson was the first African American to be elected president of the National Association of Women Lawyers. Her long legal career also helped to pave the way for other women attorneys. In 1995 the American Bar Association named her a Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement honoree.
Gladys Noel Bates was an African-American civil rights pioneer, and educator who filed a lawsuit, Gladys Noel Bates vs the State of Mississippi, in 1948 charging salary discrimination against black teachers and principals. Although her lawsuit was not successful, it brought enough attention to the issue of wage equality in education to begin to equalize salaries.
Howard University School of Law is the law school of Howard University, a private, federally chartered historically black research university in Washington, D.C. It is one of the oldest law schools in the country and the oldest historically black law school in the United States.
Dovey Mae Johnson Roundtree was an African-American civil rights activist, ordained minister, and attorney. Her 1955 victory before the Interstate Commerce Commission in the first bus desegregation case to be brought before the ICC resulted in the only explicit repudiation of the "separate but equal" doctrine in the field of interstate bus transportation by a court or federal administrative body. That case, Sarah Keys v. Carolina Coach Company, which Dovey Roundtree brought before the ICC with her law partner and mentor Julius Winfield Robertson, was invoked by Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy during the 1961 Freedom Riders' campaign in his successful battle to compel the Interstate Commerce Commission to enforce its rulings and end Jim Crow laws in public transportation.
Ruby Hurley was an American civil rights activist. She was a leader in the Civil Rights Movement and administrator for the NAACP, and was known as the "queen of civil rights".
Justina Laurena Ford was an American physician. She was the first licensed African American female doctor in Denver, Colorado, and practiced gynecology, obstetrics, and pediatrics from her home for half a century.
Reynelda Muse is a former American television news anchor. In 1969 she became the first woman and first African American television news anchor in Colorado, co-anchoring a newscast at KOA-TV in Denver. In 1980 she was part of the first group of anchors on CNN. She is the winner of many awards, including an Emmy Award, and has been inducted into numerous halls of fame. The Reynelda Muse Television Journalism Scholarship, annually awarded to an African American student majoring in television journalism, was established in her honor by the Colorado Association of Black Journalists.
Jean Dubofsky is the first woman to become a Colorado Supreme Court Justice and a former Deputy Attorney General for Colorado. She was the lead attorney in Romer v. Evans, the case that overturned Colorado Amendment 2 at the US Supreme Court, resulting in a landmark ruling for LGBT rights in the United States.
Mary Florence Lathrop (1865–1951) was an American lawyer. She was the first woman to open a law practice in Denver, Colorado, and one of the first two female members of the American Bar Association. She was inducted into the Colorado Women's Hall of Fame in 1987.
Edwin Henry Hackley, also commonly known as Edwin H. Hackley, was the first African-American lawyer admitted to the Colorado Bar Association (1883). Beginning in 1886, he worked as the Denver County Clerk, and then spent almost 14 years as an Abstract Clerk. He practiced law when he could, but after some time he closed his practice because it was not profitable.
Zipporah Parks Hammond (1924–2011) was the University of Colorado College of Nursing's first African-American graduate and the first Black Director of Medical Records in Colorado. She was a humanitarian, philanthropist, and civil-rights champion in Colorado.
Ruth Cousins Denny was a Black educator and civil rights activist in Denver, Colorado. Denny dedicated her life to combating racial injustice and educating young people. Denny was a founding member of the Denver chapter of Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and led direct actions around Denver.
Edna Wilson-Mosley was a prominent politician, civil rights activist, and educator in Denver and Aurora, Colorado. Wilson-Mosley was a civil rights specialist for Colorado’s Civil Rights Commission. She was the only Black founder of Women's Bank and served on the Board of Directors. She was married to John Mosley, a highly respected and original Tuskegee Airman.
Honorable Claudia J. Jordan is a retired judge in Colorado. Jordan was the first Black female judge in the Rocky Mountain region, seated in 1994. She retired in 2014.
References
- 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 "Velveta Golightly-Howell". Colorado Women's Hall of Fame.
- 1 2 3 "Velveta Golightly-Howell: Life-long champion for social justice and advocacy". Denver 7.
- 1 2 3 4 5 Pellant, Jessie. "2020 Mary Lathrop Trailblazer Award Winner: Velveta Golightly-Howell". Colorado Women's Bar Association.
- ↑ "About". Sister-to-Sister.
- ↑ "Velveta Golightly-Howell, J.D., M.P.A., Member-At-Large (she/her)". ACLU Colorado.
- ↑ "MARY LATHROP TRAILBLAZER AWARD". Colorado Women's Bar Association.
