Ruby Bridges

   Ruby Bridges is one of the greatest civil rights activists around, and it all began when she was a small child, just six years old.  She was going into first grade in 1960, the year that it was ruled in New Orleans that schools must be desegregated.  She passed the test and was one of the first to be educated in an integrated school.  As a young African American girl in a mainly white school, there were many protestors.  All of the parents pulled their children out of the class and Ruby Bridges was all alone.  Slowly the number of protestors dwindled, and by the end of the year, things had quieted down.  The next year, her class was full of new children, both black and white, and nobody seemed to want to remember the previous year.  Ruby Bridges was a very big part of the integration of schools.  Ruby has gone on to be a prominent civil rights activist, helping children to understand that the color of a person's skin does not matter.  It's hard to imagine a world without Ruby Bridges' contributions to the civil rights movement.