| 1950 |
Judge Sam Blair of the Cole County Circuit Court ordered the University of Missouri to enroll African American students (June 27). |
| 1954 |
The United States Supreme Court handed down its decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, stating that "separate educational facilities are
inherently unequal" (May 17). |
| 1954 |
In response to a State Commission of Education query, Missouri's Attorney General stated that the state's school segregation laws were null and void (June). |
| 1956 |
Governor Phil M. Donnelly appointed Theodore McMillen the first African American judge in Missouri. He moved from the circuit court to the Missouri Court of Appeals in
1972, and to the U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals in 1978. |
| 1957 |
The Missouri legislature created the Missouri Human Rights Commission, which effectively documented the reality of racial discrimination in Missouri (June 8). |
| 1960 |
Theodore McNeal, St. Louis, was elected Missouri's first African American state senator. |
| 1961 |
The St. Louis school board decided to bus pupils in an attempt to achieve racial integration. Over 4500 students participated during the 1961-1962 school year. |
| 1962 |
DeVerne Calloway was elected the first African American woman representative in Missouri's state legislature. |
Rep. DeVerne Calloway
|
| 1963 |
The St. Louis chapter of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) publicly boycotted Jefferson Bank, protesting the bank's discriminatory hiring practices (August; ended March
1964). |
| 1964 |
President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the federal Public Accommodations Act, prohibiting discrimination in public facilities (July 2). A local judge in Kansas City temporarily restrained
its implementation in the city. |
| 1964 |
ACTION members Percy Green and Richard Daly climbed the Gateway Arch, then under construction, to protest the exclusion of skilled black workers from the federally-funded
worksite: Green chained himself one hundred feet above the ground for four hours until police removed him (July 14). |
| 1965 |
The U.S. Congress passed the federal Voting Rights Act (August). |
| 1965 |
The Missouri legislature passed the Missouri Public Accommodations Act of 1965, ending discrimination in public facilities. |
| 1965 |
David E. McPherson became the first African American trooper on the Missouri State Highway Patrol. |
| 1968 |
Rioting began in Kansas City after local school boards refused to close schools after assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. (April). |
| 1968 |
Missouri's first African American United States congressman, William L. Clay, Sr., was elected. |
| 1968 |
Howard B. Woods founded the St. Louis Sentinel. |
| 1972 |
Militant civil rights group ACTION unveiled St. Louis' Veiled Prophet. |
| 1973 |
The Missouri State Penitentiary was integrated. |
| 1977 |
Gwen B. Giles became the first African American woman state senator. |
| 1978 |
Paula Woodruff became the Missouri State Highway Patrol's first female African American trooper. |
| 1980 |
Court-ordered desegregation began in Missouri, attempting to alleviate the racial isolation of African American students. The court determined that the State of Missouri
was required to pay half of the cost of school desegregation plans; numerous legal issues arose (May). |
| 1990 |
Miss Missouri Debbye Turner became Miss America. |
| 1991 |
Kansas City elected its first African American mayor, Emmanuel Cleaver II. |
| 1993 |
St. Louis citizens elected their first African American mayor, Freeman Bosley, Jr. |
| 1995 |
Ronnie L. White became the state's first African American Missouri Supreme Court justice (October). |
Civil War