12/12/2024
ROSA PARKS COMMITTEE
December 11, 2024
Son of Mother Emanuel victim to speak in Huntsville
(HUNTSVILLE, AL) — Chris Singleton, the son of the late Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton – one of the nine people killed in the Mother Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C., in 2015 – will be the keynote speaker at this year’s celebration of Alabama civil rights icon Rosa Parks. Singleton is a motivational speaker, author, and former professional athlete. The celebration will be Sunday, Dec. 15th at 4 p.m. at St. John AME Church, 229 Church Street, Huntsville, Ala.
This commemoration service is being presented by the Rosa Parks Committee in Huntsville/Madison County and hosted by State Reps. Laura Hall and Anthony Daniels. It also will feature a Q&A discussion with Singleton, music, and the presentation of awards to the essay contest winners and others. The public is encouraged to attend this free event.
Rosa Parks was born Rosa Louise McCauley in Tuskegee, Ala. on February 4, 1913. She joined the Montgomery chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) in 1943. One year later, she was dispatched to Abbeville, Ala. to investigate the brutal, racially motivated gang r**e of Mrs. Recy Taylor.
Mrs. Parks entered civil rights history once again on December 1, 1955, when she refused to relinquish her seat on a public bus to a white man in violation of Montgomery’s racial segregation laws. This made her the symbol of a bus boycott organized by the Montgomery Improvement Association, which was led by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. One year later, the segregated seating on the Montgomery bus system was ruled unconstitutional by the federal courts, delivering a victory for Mrs. Parks, the city’s activists and black citizens. Mrs. Parks died on October 24, 2005, in Detroit, Michigan.


