Ruby Bridges Quotes

Every day, I would show up, and there were no kids, just me and my teacher in my classroom. Every day, I would be escorted by marshals past a mob of people protesting and boycotting the school. This went on for a whole year.

Kids come into the world with clean hearts, fresh starts.

My message is really that racism has no place in the hearts and minds of our children.

It’s not who you’re going to sit beside at school that matters now: it’s what resources will your school have.

None of our kids come into the world knowing anything about disliking one another.

We must absolutely take care of one another.

I felt like there was something I needed to do – speaking to kids and sharing my story with them and helping them understand racism has no place in the minds and hearts of children.

My mother and our pastor always said you have to pray for your enemies and people who do you wrong, and that’s what I did.

If we are about what is good today, then we that are good need to come together to fight what’s bad out there.

There are all kinds of monuments to adults – usually dead and usually white. But we don’t often lift up the extraordinary work of children.

I remember turning onto the street. I saw barricades and police officers and, just, people everywhere. When I saw all of that, I immediately thought that it was Mardi Gras. I had no idea that they were here to keep me out of the school.

As African-Americans, people of that generation felt pretty much if they were going to see changes in the world, they had to make sacrifices and step up to the plate. I’m very proud that my parents happened to be people who did. They were not privileged to have a formal education.

From age 7 to about 37, I had a normal life and not a very easy one.

Our babies know nothing about hate or racism. But soon they begin to learn – and only from us.

I’m not a very public person.

I was the first black child to desegregate the all-white William Frantz Elementary School in Louisiana in 1960.

A lot of my strength came from my upbringing.