Brown, Linda (1942-2018), was the focus of a 1954 landmark decision of the Supreme Court of the United States to end racial segregation in schools. Racial segregation is the forced separation of groups of people based on race. In 1951, when Linda was in the third grade, her father, Oliver L. Brown, became the lead plaintiff (person filing the suit) in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka. The court’s decision advanced the legal movement to integrate U.S. society.
Linda Brown was born on Feb. 20, 1942, in Topeka, Kansas. When Linda was in elementary school, many areas of the United States required Black and white students to attend separate schools. Linda lived near the all-white Sumner Elementary School. Because she was Black, however, she had to walk about a mile (1.6 kilometers) each school day to catch a bus that took her to the all-Black Monroe Elementary School.
In 1950, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) of Topeka asked Linda’s parents and 12 other Black families in Topeka to try to enroll their children in white schools in their neighborhoods. The NAACP is a civil rights organization. The white schools refused to enroll the Black students. In 1951, the NAACP filed a lawsuit against the Topeka Board of Education. The NAACP’s lawyers listed Linda’s father as the lead (first) plaintiff.
In 1952, the Kansas case was combined with four other cases and brought before the U.S. Supreme Court. The cases represented plaintiffs from Delaware, Kansas, South Carolina, Virginia, and Washington, D.C. In 1954, the court ruled unanimously that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. The decision ended laws in 21 states that allowed racial segregation in public schools.
By the time of the ruling, Linda was 12 years old and preparing to enter junior high school. Because junior high and high schools in Topeka were already integrated, Linda did not benefit from the ruling. However, her two younger sisters attended integrated elementary schools. Linda Brown later attended Washburn University in Topeka and taught in a Head Start preschool program. Head Start is a United States government program that provides educational, social, and health services to young children from the nation’s lowest-income families. Brown died on March 25, 2018.
See also African Americans (The civil rights movement); Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka.
