On May 26, 1956, Florida A&M University students, Wilhelmina Jakes and Carrie Patterson boarded a Tallahassee city bus and sat in the only seats available -- next to a white female passenger in the front of the bus. The bus driver ordered the students to the back of the bus, but they refused to change seats. When the driver pulled over and called the police, the students were arrested. The next night, a cross was burned on the lawn of their off-campus home.

In response, FAMU students voted to stop riding city buses, sparking the ten-month-long Tallahassee Bus Boycott. It was the second major successful economic protest of the Civil Rights Movement - after the Montgomery Bus Boycott initiated by Rosa Parks in 1955.

Black community leaders embraced the boycott, which ended in March 1957, when activist C. K. Steele rode in the “white” section of a city bus.

The fortitude of Jakes and Patterson initiated a civil rights action that helped advance America’s promise of equal rights for all.

Courtesy of the Florida Department of State, Division of Historical Resources