What happened to Linda Brown?

Linda Brown, who as a schoolgirl was at the center of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that rejected racial segregation in American schools, died in Topeka, Kan., Sunday afternoon. She was 76. Her sister, Cheryl Brown Henderson, confirmed the death to The Topeka Capital-Journal.

What did Linda Brown do?

Linda Carol Brown (February 20, 1943 – March 25, 2018) was an American campaigner for equality in education. As a school-girl in 1954, Brown became the center of the landmark United States civil rights case Brown v. Board of Education.

Did Linda Brown marry?

Brown was married three times, first to Charles Smith in 1963, whom she divorced to later marry Leonard Buckner. Buckner passed away in the 1980s, and Linda then married William Thompson. Linda Brown passed away on March 25, 2018, in Topeka, Kansas.

What was Linda Brown's famous quote?

As long as we are, there will always be those who feel the races should be separate.”

Did Brown win the case?

On May 17, 1954, a decision in the Brown v. Board of Education case declared the “separate but equal” doctrine unconstitutional. The landmark Brown v. Board decision gave LDF its most celebrated victory in a long, storied history of fighting for civil rights and marked a defining moment in US history.

Linda Brown: The Schoolgirl who Changed America

How far did Linda Brown have to walk to school?

Linda Brown went to Monroe School, which was a mile away from where she lived. Getting to school was not easy. She had to leave home by 7:40 each morning to walk to a bus stop that was six blocks away.

Who was Linda Brown and what happened to her?

Linda Brown, who as a little girl in Topeka was at the center of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court decision that ended school segregation in the United States, has died at age 75. Brown's sister, Cheryl Brown Henderson, founding president of The Brown Foundation, confirmed the death.

How many miles did Linda Brown walk?

Linda Brown walked about a mile each day in Topeka, Kan., crossing train tracks and bypassing the neighborhood white school, just to catch a bus the rest of the way to attend the all-black Monroe School, about two miles from her home. Her father, Oliver L.

How old was Linda Brown when she walked to school?

In September 1950, a black father took his 7-year-old daughter by the hand and walked briskly for four blocks to an all-white school in their Topeka, Kan., neighborhood. Sumner was the closest elementary school to their home, but Linda Brown was not allowed to attend because of the color of her skin.

How old is Linda Brown today?

Linda Brown, who at the age of 9 became the cornerstone figure in the landmark Supreme Court case that struck down segregation in the nation's schools, has died at age 76 in Kansas, according to published reports. Topeka's former Sumner School was all-white when Brown's father, Oliver, tried to enroll the family.

How many sisters did Linda Brown have?

Linda and Cheryl are two of the three daughters of the late Rev. Oliver L. Brown, who along with twelve other parents led by the NAACP, filed suit against the local Board of Education on behalf of their children.

Why couldn t Linda Brown go to school?

In the same interview, Brown's mother, Leola Brown, said she and her husband tried their best to help their daughter understand why she wasn't allowed in the school. She broke it down in simple terms: "It was because her face was black. ... and she just couldn't go to school with the white races at that time."

How far was the White school from Linda Brown's house?

The Brown v.

To do so, Linda walked six blocks, crossing dangerous railroad tracks, and then boarded a bus that took her to Monroe Elementary. Yet, only seven blocks from her house was Sumner Elementary, a school attended by white children, and which, save for segregation, Linda would otherwise have attended.

What happened to David and Cinnamon Brown?

At his trial in 1990, both Cinnamon and Patti testified that David Brown was the mastermind behind Linda Brown's murder, and he was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. He eventually died in prison in 2014.

Why did Linda Brown have to walk to school?

Linda Brown was born in February 1942, in Topeka, Kansas. Because she was forced to travel a significant distance to elementary school due to racial segregation, her father was one of the plaintiffs in the case of Brown v. Board of Education, with the Supreme Court ruling in 1954 that school segregation was unlawful.

What happened to Oliver Brown?

Brown abruptly died of a heart attack on June 20, 1961, when traveling with fellow pastor Maurice Lange to Topeka where his wife, Leola, and daughters were visiting her parents.

What is the doctrine of separate but equal?

Implementation of the “separate but equal” doctrine gave constitutional sanction to laws designed to achieve racial segregation by means of separate and equal public facilities and services for African Americans and whites.

Which court case allowed for separate but equal facilities?

Separate but Equal: The Law of the Land

In the pivotal case of Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that racially separate facilities, if equal, did not violate the Constitution. Segregation, the Court said, was not discrimination.

What happened to the naacp in the aftermath of the Brown decision?

By 1964, ten years after Brown, the NAACP's focused legal campaign had been transformed into a mass movement to eliminate all traces of institutionalized racism from American life. This effort, marked by struggle and sacrifice, soon captured the imagination and sympathies of much of the nation.

Which argument helped overturn the separate but equal policy?

Although he raised a variety of legal issues on appeal, the central argument was that separate school systems for Black students and white students were inherently unequal, and a violation of the "Equal Protection Clause" of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

What former Supreme Court decision did the Brown decision strike down?

In this milestone decision, the Supreme Court ruled that separating children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional. It signaled the end of legalized racial segregation in the schools of the United States, overruling the "separate but equal" principle set forth in the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson case.