About Ruby Bridges

Ruby bridges american activist who became a symbol of the civil rights movement and who was at age six the youngest of a group of african american students to integrate schools in the american south.

About ruby bridges. Learn more about bridges s life and accomplishments in this article. She married malcolm hall and had four sons. Ruby attended integrated schools all the way through high school. Ruby bridges was the first african american child to integrate an all white public elementary school in the south.

She later became a civil rights activist. She was the first african american child to desegregate the all white william frantz elementary school in louisiana during the new orleans school desegregation crisis on 14 november 1960. Ruby bridges became another example of the power children have to stand up for what is right and help bring about change that makes our world a better place. She is the subject of a 1964 painting the problem we all live with by norman rockwell.

In the decades since she first stepped into that new orleans school ruby has become a civil rights icon and continued her work to create a more open and equal society. At the tender age of six ruby bridges advanced the cause of civil rights in november 1960 when she became the first african american student to integrate an elementary school in the south. Born on september 8 1954 bridges was the oldest of five children for lucille and abon bridges farmers in tylertown mississippi. After graduating from high school ruby worked as a travel agent for fifteen years.