African-American civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin pictured in 2021 when she petitioned a district court for her juvenile record to be expunged over her 1955 refusal to give up her seat on a segregated bus when she was 15 years old

African-American civil rights pioneer Claudette Colvin pictured in 2021 when she petitioned a district court for her juvenile record to be expunged over her 1955 refusal to give up her seat on a segregated bus when she was 15 years old

 Julie Bennett

Claudette Colvin, who refused to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Alabama in 1955 and became a US civil rights pioneer, has died aged 86, her foundation said Tuesday.

Colvin, then aged 15, made her protest several months before Rosa Parks' similar act of defiance became a key moment in the birth of the modern civil rights movement in the United States.

Originally published on doc.afp.com, part of the BLOX Digital Content Exchange.