On this day, Aug. 30, 1994, Rosa Parks, who helped touch off the civil rights movement by refusing to give up her bus seat to a white man in Montgomery, Ala., 40 years earlier, was robbed and beaten.
The attack sparked outrage throughout the United States.
The assailant, Joseph Skipper, broke into Parks’ Detroit home and recognized Parks, considered by Congress to be “the mother of the freedom movement.”
Skipper, who was black, asked, “Hey, aren’t you Rosa Parks?” to which she replied, “Yes.”
She handed him $3, and an additional $50 when he demanded more. Before fleeing, Skipper hit Parks in the face. Skipper was arrested and sentenced to 8 to 15 years for breaking and entering into Parks’ house and other nearby homes.
Parks died Oct. 24, 2005, at the age of 92.
— Scott McCabe
