Elizabeth Jennings Graham

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Elizabeth Jennings Graham, ca. 1895.

Elizabeth Jennings Graham made news as a black woman who refused to give up her seat on a bus 100 years before Rosa Parks. Rather than in Montgomery, Alabama, this earlier event took place on the streets of mid-nineteenth century New York City.

This was Sunday, July 16, 1854. It occurred when Miss Jennings, a 24 year old schoolteacher, was making her way to the First Colored Congregational Church on Sixth Street and Second Avenue where she was to perform as the organist. She was brutally attacked by the driver and ultimately, with the aid of a Police officer, ejected from the bus at the intersection of Pearl and Chatham streets. Undaunted, she took her case to court.

In the early 19th century, there were typically two modes of public transportation: omnibuses and railroad cars, both of which were pulled by horses. The first bus route probably began on 4th Avenue of New York in 1831. Omnibuses typically cost less to ride, whereas railroad cars were larger and heavier, had more entrances and exits, moved on fixed tracks, and were more comfortable.

In the 1830s, New York City barely reached 14th Street, but was growing rapidly. By the 1850s, Manhattan stretched to 59th Street and there were car tracks on most of the major avenues, from First to Eighth.

This created a dilemma for early nineteenth century African American New Yorkers. In the 1830s and early 1840s, African Americans didn't use public transportation. The driver decided if you could ride or not, and African Americans were not welcome. Bucking the segregated system was also dangerous. Drivers carried whips and used them to keep African Americans off. Threats of legal retaliation were laughed at. By the late 1840s, there were special public buses on which African Americans could ride. They had large "Colored Persons Allowed" signs on the back or in a side window. But these vehicles ran infrequently, irregularly, and often not at all.

Just as Rosa Parks was involved in the civil rights movement of her day, Elizabeth Jennings was part of a movement in her day too. Such notable black New Yorkers as her father Thomas Jennings, the Rev. J.W.C. Pennington, and the Rev. Henry Highland Garnet, were in the movement to end this discrimination. Frederick Douglass published her story, as did the renowned editor of the New York Tribune, Horace Greeley .

Jennings sued the company, the driver, and the conductor. Like Rosa Parks, Elizabeth Jennings won a landmark local judicial decision. Interestingly, the law firm of Culver, Parker, and Arthur represented her. Arthur was none other than Chester A. Arthur, then a novice 24-year-old lawyer and future President of the United States.

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Here is how the New York Tribune reported the Jennings incident in a February 1855 article: "She got upon one of the Company's cars last summer, on the Sabbath, to ride to church. The conductor undertook to get her off, first alleging the car was full; when that was shown to be false, he pretended the other passengers were displeased at her presence; but (when) she insisted on her rights, he took hold of her by force to expel her. She resisted. The conductor got her down on the platform, jammed her bonnet, soiled her dress and injured her person. Quite a crowd gathered, but she effectually resisted. Finally, after the car had gone on further, with the aid of a policeman they succeeded in removing her."