Born April 17, 1912
Culloden, Georgia

Civil rights activist and teacher

Jo Ann Gibson Robinson was one of the most important leaders of the 1955–56 Montgomery bus boycott. She had been standing up for the rights of African Americans for years before the boycott began. And her organization, the Women’s Political Council, had made preparations for a bus boycott months in advance of the arrest of Rosa Parks (1913–; see box in Highlander Education Center entry)—the spark that set the boycott in motion.

The best-known leader of the Montgomery bus boycott was Martin Luther King, Jr. (see entry). Yet Robinson, like other behind-the-scenes organizers (most of them women), deserves recognition for her invaluable contribution to the success of the event that began the civil rights movement.

Childhood in rural Georgia

Jo Ann Gibson was born in rural Georgia, near the...