Ruby Bridges: The Six-Year-Old Who Desegregated New Orleans Schools

Six Years Old and Braver Than a City

On November 14, 1960, a six-year-old girl named Ruby Bridges walked into William Frantz Elementary School in the Upper Ninth Ward of New Orleans and changed the course of American history. She was the first Black child to attend an all-white elementary school in the South, and she did it flanked by four federal marshals who were there to protect her from the mob of white parents and protesters who had gathered outside to scream at a child for the crime of wanting to go to school.

Ruby Bridges was one of six African American students who had passed a test designed to determine which Black children would be allowed to integrate the city's public schools. The test was deliberately made difficult — the school board hoped that no Black students would pass, providing a convenient excuse to maintain segregation. Six children passed. Ruby was assigned to William Frantz, a school near her home in the Ninth Ward. She was the only Black student sent to that school, and she faced the full fury of a community that was not ready to share its classrooms.

The Walk

The image of Ruby Bridges walking to school — a tiny girl in a white dress, clutching a book bag, surrounded by towering federal marshals — became one of the defining images of the civil rights movement. Norman Rockwell painted it. Photographers captured it. The nation watched a little girl demonstrate more courage than most adults would show in a lifetime.

Inside the school, the situation was hardly better. White parents pulled their children from Ruby's class, leaving her as the sole student of teacher Barbara Henry, a young woman from Boston who had come to New Orleans specifically to teach in an integrated classroom. For an entire year, Ruby sat alone in a classroom with Mrs. Henry, learning to read and write while the rest of the school's white families boycotted. She ate lunch alone. She played at recess alone. She was six years old.

The Courage of a Child

Ruby's mother, Lucille Bridges, made the decision to send her daughter to William Frantz knowing the risks. She believed that education was worth fighting for and that her daughter's courage would help open doors for other Black children. She was right, though the cost was enormous. The family received death threats. Ruby's father lost his job. The Bridges family endured a level of harassment that would have broken most adults, let alone the parents of a first-grader.

Ruby Bridges went on to become a civil rights activist, author, and speaker, dedicating her life to promoting tolerance and equality. She has written books about her experience, spoken to audiences around the world, and worked to ensure that the story of what happened at William Frantz Elementary School is never forgotten. She was six years old when she changed the world. She has spent every year since making sure the world remembers why it needed changing.