At 6:06 p.m. on Monday, Dec. 1, bells around the country chimed for 70 seconds to mark the 70th anniversary of the historic arrest of Rosa Parks that sparked the 382-day boycott of Montgomery city buses. At Troy University’s Rosa Parks Museum, located on the spot of Mrs. Parks’ arrest, those bells not only were a reminder of the past, but also a signal of things to come.
The museum, which opened on Dec. 1, 2000, has launched a fundraising campaign to create a permanent exhibit that reveals the full depth of Mrs. Parks’ lifelong activism and honors her as a global symbol of justice. In partnership with the Library of Congress, the museum is working to bring a significant portion of Mrs. Parks’ personal collection home to Alabama.
On Monday – Rosa Parks Day in Alabama — the temporary exhibit, “Rosa Parks: A Lifetime of Being Rebellious,” opened in the museum’s gallery to serve as a teaser to the planned permanent exhibit. The temporary exhibit will be on display for the next 13 months, the same length of time as the Montgomery Bus Boycott.
“We still have a lot of people that come to the museum who think that her only involvement was her arrest and what took place on this corner here in Montgomery. She had two decades of civil rights and social justice work that she was doing before the boycott and five decades after,” Beisel said. “The purpose of the exhibit is to show the breadth and depth of her activism and tease what we are working toward in the future. Today, we are kicking off our fundraising campaign to create a permanent exhibit that goes more into Mrs. Parks’ life and legacy and incorporates many of the actual items from the Library of Congress, bringing them back to Montgomery where we feel they belong.”
The exhibit provided the cornerstone for the museum’s commemoration of Rosa Parks Day, the 70th anniversary of the Montgomery Bus Boycott and the 25th anniversary of the museum itself.
Throughout the day, visitors took advantage of free admission to the museum and children’s wing, viewed the exhibit and had the opportunity to climb aboard the City of Montgomery’s 1950s-era bus. A large group of students from Montgomery’s Dozier Elementary School were among those there to learn about the “Mother of the Civil Rights Movement.”
Ann Clemons, who portrays Mrs. Parks at events in and around Montgomery, spoke with students and answered questions during their visit.
On Monday evening, marchers gathered at the Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church for a Unity March, organized by St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church, Mrs. Parks home church during her time in Montgomery. Marchers sang as they walked, making their way down Dexter, around Court Square and onto Montgomery Street, ending in front of the museum that is a part of Troy University’s Montgomery Campus. As they gathered steps away from the historic marker denoting the location of Mrs. Parks’ arrest, a light rain began to fall. It didn’t dampen the spirits of those there to celebrate and remember.
Doris Crenshaw, founder and CEO of the Southern Youth Leadership Development Institute, said having Dec. 1 recognized as Rosa Parks Day in the state, a move made by the Alabama Legislature in 2018, was a positive step, but still more needed to be done to honor her legacy and the memory of so many heroes of the Civil Rights Movement.
“Sometimes as the years go by, we tend to erase history, and we don’t talk about what happened 70 years ago,” she said. “So, I think that every year, we should support the efforts to get a national Rosa Parks holiday – not only that, but to teach about Rosa Parks’ history in our schools and in our nation.”
Beisel agreed that the commemoration of Rosa Parks Day was important, not only in Montgomery but throughout the country.
“It is important to remember this milestone, especially in the climate we are in today with stories being overlooked or purposely pushed to the side,” Beisel said. “This day gives us the opportunity to commemorate her legacy and her full life of activism. It also goes beyond Rosa Parks. It is about the whole community coming together to enact change.”
To support the Rosa Parks Museum’s expansion project, visit https://troy.scalefunder.com/cfund/project/46389.
