C k steele biography for kids
•
Steele, Charles Kenzie
February 7, 1914 to August 19, 1980
The first vice president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), Reverend C. K. Steele shared Martin Luther King, Jr.’s vision of social equality through nonviolent means. As president of the Inter-Civic Council, Steele led a successful bus boycott in Tallahassee, Florida, in 1956, based on the example set by the Montgomery Improvement Association (MIA). Although not widely noted, the efforts of the Inter-Civic Council offered hope to those engaged in what Steele described as “the pain and the promise” of the civil rights movement (Steele, 27 September 1978). He later stated: “Where there is any power … as strong [and] as eternal as love using nonviolence, the promise will be fulfilled” (Steele, 27 September 1978).
Born on 7 February 1914, Steele was raised in the predominantly African American town of Gary, West Virginia, by his parents Lyde Bailor and Henry L. Steele, a
•
Charles Kenzie Steele
American civil rights activist (1914–1980)
For other people named Charles Steele, see Charles Steele (disambiguation).
Charles Kenzie Steele (February 17, 1914 – (1980-08-19)August 19, 1980) was a preacher and a civil rights activist. He was one of the main organizers of the 1956 Tallahassee bus bojkott, and a prominent member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. On March 23, 2018, Florida Governor Rick Scott signed CS/SB 382 into law, designating portions of Florida State Road 371 and Florida State Road 373 along Orange Avenue in Tallahassee as C.K. Steele Memorial Highway.
Background
[edit]Steele was the son of a coal miner, an only child. At a young age, he knew that he wanted to be a preacher, and he started preaching when he was 15 years old. Steele graduated from Morehouse College in 1938. He then began preaching in Toccoa and Augusta, Georgia, then in Montgomery, Alabama, at the Hall Street Baptist Church (1938–1952).[1] • The Tallahassee bus boycott was a citywide boycott in Tallahassee, Florida that sought to end racial segregation in the employment and seating arrangements of city buses. On May 26, 1956, Wilhelmina Jakes and Carrie Patterson, two Florida A&M University students, were arrested by the Tallahassee Police Department for "placing themselves in a position to incite a riot". Robert Saunders, representing the NAACP, and Rev. C. K. Steele began talks with city authorities while the local African-American community started boycotting the city's buses. The Inter-Civic Council ended the boycott on December 22, 1956. On January 7, 1957, the City Commission repealed the bus-franchise segregation clause because of the United States Supreme Court ruling Browder v. Gayle (1956). Not only were buses segregated, with white riders at the front and black ones in the back, if there were no free black seats black riders had to stand, even if there
Tallahassee bus boycott facts for kids
History