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Public buses could no longer separate people based on the color of their skin.

That was only the beginning.

Soon our peaceful protests sparked other peaceful protests.

At lunch counters, college students organized sit-ins where they would not stop until everyone could eat together.

Our methods of nonviolence were so powerful, I was invited to meet with the president at the White House.

But sometimes the hardest problems were right at home.

Daddy, look!

An amusement park!

Please, can we go?

I'm sorry, Yoki.

We can't.

Funtown is not open to black people.

Seeing my daughter cry was one of the most painful moments of my life.

It only made me work harder for change.

Was it easy?

Absolutely not.

During one protest in Birmingham, Alabama, the police again arrested me and locked me in a dark jail cell that had only one window.

Someone slipped me a newspaper in which white religious leaders had written an article calling us lawbreakers.

Someone then snuck me a pen.

In that jail cell, I wrote my own response in the margins of the newspaper, and even on toilet paper.