100 years before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, a 24-year-old Black New Yorker, Elizabeth Jennings Graham, stood her ground on a streetcar. With courage and perseverance, she won the first recorded legal victory for equal rights on public transportation.
On a hot Sunday morning in July 1854, Elizabeth Jennings, a 24-year-old Black schoolteacher on her way to church, boarded a Third Avenue Railroad Company horsecar at Pearl and Chatham Streets in lower Manhattan. Soon after boarding, Jennings was ordered to get off the horsecar and told to wait for a car that served African American passengers.
At the time, all public transportation in New York City was privately owned. Some omnibuses and horsecars displayed signs announcing “Colored Persons Allowed,” but these segregated vehicles were few and far between. New York City’s Black residents were expected to walk; public transportation was rarely available.
Jennings ignored the conductor’s orders and resisted his attempts to remove her physically. Finally, with the aid of a policeman, he succeeded in forcing her off.
“The conductor undertook to get her off, first alleging the car was full, when that was shown to be false. He pretended the other passengers were displeased at her presence. But [when] she insisted on her rights, he took hold of her by force to expel her. She resisted. The conductor got her down on the platform, jammed her bonnet, soiled her dress and injured her person. Quite a crowd gathered. But she effectually resisted. Finally, after the car had gone on further, with the aid of a policeman they succeeded in removing her.”
-New York Tribune, February 1855.