Ruby Bridges: a Civil Rights Icon

On January 29, 2025, Ruby Bridges will speak on her experiences as a civil rights pioneer, activist, and author at UChicago’s 35th annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration Celebration. The event will take place at Rockefeller Memorial Chapel at 6 p.m. See this UChicago News article for more information.

Ms. Bridges is maybe best known for being the first Black student to integrate William Frantz Elementary School, an all-white school in New Orleans, Louisiana, in November 1960. At the time, Ms. Bridges was only 6 years old.

White parents pulled their children from the school, and even the school's principal isolated her; Ruby Bridges was in a class of one for a year with her teacher, Barbara Henry. During that year, Ms. Bridges was escorted to school by U.S. Marshalls every day and never missed a day of school.

Now, Ms. Bridges continues to be an anti-racism advocate, visiting schools and talking to young students. Ms. Bridges also authored several children's books, including This is Your Time, where she vividly describes that fateful first year at William Frantz Elementary School (the book is available at the Library).

For more information about this civil rights icon, check out the Library's collection, which includes Congressional documents honoring Ruby Bridges, children's books and videos such as Civil Rights pioneer Ruby Bridges on activism in the modern era (PBS Newshour, 2021), A Class of One - Ruby Bridges (PBS Newshour, 1997), and Teaching Ruby Bridges (Barbara Henry; Untold: Hidden Figures, 2022).