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| In Memoriam |
| Letter to the Washington Post re Rosa Parks |
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By Terrence E. Carroll, MA
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| 2005/11/01 |
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| Memories of Rosa Parks and Coleman Young |
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| October 25, 2005
To the Editor
The Washington Post
1150 15th Street, NW
Washington, DC 20035
The report of the death of Rosa Parks brought memories to me. As the obituary noted, her heroism did not go unheralded but was only generally recognized after years had elapsed, when the civil rights movement was receiving media attention.
In 1960 my last act as Chief Executive Officer of League Life Insurance Company, a Michigan company primarily owned by the Michigan Credit Union League, was to hire her as the company's receptionist. (I left to initiate a national campaign to provide consumer-sponsored group health plans and rehabilitation in prepaid medical care programs.)
Bob Vanderbeek, who succeded me as CEO, not only continued her employment but also then hired Sam Carsman, an Abraham Lincoln Brigade veteran, as Vice-President of Sales and Coleman Young, who had become nearly unemployable after being cited for contempt of Congress by the House Unamerican Activities Committee, as an insurance agent. Bob took a lot of heat for his employment practices but the company prospered under his guidance. Coleman Young soon became a State Senator and then Mayor of Detroit and Rosa Parks went on to work for Representative John Conyers who could pay her a better salary. (At the timeinsurance companies did not pay clerical workers very well and probably still don't.)
Terence E. Carroll
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