On May 4th 1961 a group of seven African Americans and six white people left on a greyhound bus. These thirteen people were part of a civil rights movement named the Freedom Riders to change the segregation in interstate transit terminals. This was a massive movement that changed equality rights and peoples lives around the world.

The reason this is important because recently in class we have started a new coarse called disruption. With the main idea question being: How has technology acted as a disruption with its creation throughout history?

We have also read Little Brother, a book about when a terrorist attack goes on in San Francisco and a teenage boy named Marcus uses technology to help and save the day. So what we were supposed to do is relate a real life event that happened in the book to our main question. In the book there is a big civil rights/humanitarian aspect which mentions the freedom riders. Here is the part in the book where they are mentioned:

“You’ve heard about the civil rights movement to end segregation, white and black kids like you riding buses into the South to sign up black voters and protest against official state racism. California was one of the main places where the civil rights leaders came from. We’ve always been a little more political than the rest of the country, and this is also a part of the country where black people have been able to get the same union factory jobs as white people, so they were a little better off than their cousins in the southland.
“The students at Berkeley sent a steady stream of freedom riders south, and they recruited them from information tables on campus, at Bancroft and Telegraph Avenue. You’ve probably seen that there are still tables there to this day.”

Excerpt From
Little Brother
Doctorow, Cory

What the freedom riders did was on may 4th 1961 thirteen activists left on a grey hound to travel across the southern states such as Alabama, South Carolina, and other southern states. They wanted to allow all people to access anywhere they wanted on busses and bus stations. This was based off of the 1947 Journey of Reconciliation. The main difference between the two though is that the freedom riders included women as well.
Here are some of the freedom riders, multiple of them being women.

Here is where they want across the United States:

These people and many others were treated terribly for what they were doing. On may 14 1961 a greyhound entered Anniston Alabama and was welcomed by 200 angry white people who surrounded the bus until the bus went past the station blew its tires and then once it stopped someone threw a bomb in the bus where the freedom riders left the bus in flames. And since the freedom riders didn’t believe in fighting back they couldn’t do anything.

After the bus was set on fire there was another bus that was coming into town. They had to take a detour and once they stopped were attacked and harmed by many other protestors.

There were multiple other incidents in the following six months of the freedom riders. Many freedom riders going to jail, being harmed and even being attacked by the group known as the KKK.

 

That very same night Martin Luther King Jr. had a sermon at a church where multiple freedom riders attended. That night Martin Luther King asked Robert Kennedy for protection. Mr.Kennedy helped and pushed for it.

 

The freedom riders lasted six months. By the end though they won when the inter estate commerce commission issued regulations prohibiting segregation in interstate transit terminals. Meaning after they changed the law anyone could sit or go in any area in public transit.

This was an amazing thing to learn about and I learned so much. It reminded me of Rosa parks and here sitting at the front of the bus. The reason for that is because not only are they both based on busses but these people made such a stance. They changed the world we live in today, showing that everyone should truly be equal. As for how has technology acted as a disruption with its creation throughout history? Though they may have not physically made technology they changed the world dramatically. Internationally equality improved because they made such an impact. It’s also similar to little brother because Marcus (the main character) improves and changes his environment even if many people don’t agree with him.

Overall this was an amazing thing to learn and I have so much respect for the people who changed the world we live in today.

 

Resources we used:
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/freedom-rides
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom_Riders
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/freedomriders/