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When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack.

Claudette Colvin

When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Heart Mom Myself Pregnant
The light-skinned girls always thought they were better looking. So did the teachers, too. That meant most of the dark complexion ones didn’t like themselves.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Darkness People Skin
I was about four years old the first time I ever saw what happened when you acted up to whites.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Act Myself Time White
For African-Americans, it’s still going to be – some people say double hard – I’d say four times as hard. Be an opportunist. Take advantage of your resources, because the only way to win is with education, self-esteem, having value in yourself.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Difficult Education Opportunity People Value Win Yourself
There were many African Americans – many, many stories similar to my story.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Myself Race Story
I sleep when the sleep comes down on me.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Myself Sleep
New York is a completely different culture to Montgomery, Alabama.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Culture Different History
I’d like my grandchildren to be able to see that their grandmother stood up for something, a long time ago.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Family Myself See
When you’ve been abused daily and you see people humiliated and harassed, you just get tired of it.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Humility People Yourself
I became aware of how the world is and how the white establishment plays black people against each other.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Black Establishment Myself People World
As long as white people put people of color, African Americans and Latinos, in the same dispensable bag, and look at our children of color as insignificant and treat women of color as not as deserving of protection as white women, we will never achieve true equality.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Achievement Children Equality Person Protection True White
I’ve always told my children that once they go out into the world, they must have two heads and two minds: one to keep grounded, the other to deal with corporate America.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Children Deal Myself World
I always tell young people to hold on to their dreams. And sometimes you have to stand up for what you think is right even if you have to stand alone.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Dream Myself People Right Thinking Young
Young people think Rosa Parks just sat down on a bus and ended segregation, but that wasn’t the case at all.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

End People Young
A lot has changed since I grew up, but there’s still a long way to go. I don’t think we can move forward with Donald Trump as the president. There’s a disconnect there. We don’t want to regress, we want progress.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Change Grow Up Myself Thinking
I left the South in 1963 and was living in Morristown, New Jersey, when the March on Washington took place, so I watched it on television instead.
CLAUDETTE COLVIN

Live Myself Place

When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack.

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When I told my mother I was pregnant, I thought she was going to have a heart attack.

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