(CNN) – In the wake of Barack Obama’s second inauguration, it is easy to forget about the daily indignities and terror African-Americans have endured; easy to forget that simply surviving segregation required ordinary people to engage in extraordinary acts of courage every single day.
Like so many African-Americans who came of age during the era of Jim Crow laws, Rosa Parks’ courage was not limited to one day or one act. Parks cultivated courage throughout her life. She called on it during the darkest days of the Depression when African-Americans were targeted for lynching and rape; deployed it throughout the civil rights era when white vigilantes burned crosses and bombed churches to thwart struggles for justice; and armed herself with it to battle inequality and lack of opportunity on the dusty backroads of Alabama and the broad boulevards of Detroit.
Monday, on the 100th anniversary of Rosa Parks’ birth, let us remember how brave she was to continuously defy the segregated system that denied her humanity.
Opinion: On Rosa Parks’ 100th birthday, let’s remember her courage