parks, and claudette coleman and her family, who wanted something done about the buses.s robinson had a personal experience in 1948 on the buses. we were keeping record of it and i knew there were people who wanted it and there would be a later date and another opportunity. that later date and opportunity came with ms. parks, on december 1, 1955. >> that is a great segue. i know you said you were meeting with her, having lunch. one of the perceptions was she was this quiet, timid, seamstress who decided she did not want to get up but in fact you said she was involved with the naacp and you two were talking about what to do and what not to do. when she sat down, were you ready and waiting for the call? tell us about that. >> on december 1, it was a typical december day in alabama. i told miss parks, when we finished, i had to go out of town. i wanted her to know that i would not be there. while she never told me that if she received the opportunity that she was not going to get up, i believed all the time that if that opportunity presented itself to ms. parks, she wasn't

the montgomery bus boycott, nine months before that, claudette coleman didn't give up her seat. i know there's been over the last probably five, ten years a little bit more press about that. but you were on the ground. why didn't that start the boycott? >> because that was -- a lot of things happened between that and the reserve university law school and my graduation and preparing myself to pass the alabama bar exam. i was able to get that done. after getting that done, i had met ed nixon who was a black crop holder in montgomery alabama and was a friend of our family, who had been the president of naacp in montgomery. he had encouraged me to go to law school because he was always trying to help black people who had problems with whites and trying to improve conditions. so when i got back, he helped me to get lawyers so i could be able to take the bar exam. and once i took the bar exam, and i took the ohio bar exam first, in june, and then the alabama bar in july, just in case, and when in august i was told i had passed both. of course i had no intention of practicing law in oh