To be a Freedom Rider was to risk incarceration, beatings, and riots. Yet 450 men and women -- black and white -- took the chance by riding integrated buses into the Deep South. Their goal? To compel the federal government to enforce a U.S. Supreme Court decision that desegregated interstate travel, even when passing through segregated areas. The first Freedom Riders, including John Lewis (now a 21-year veteran of Congress), set off from Washington, D.C., for New Orleans on May 4, 1961.

Blood was first drawn in South Carolina, when Lewis and others were assaulted -- and the violence only escalated in Alabama, when angry mobs firebombed one bus in Anniston and beat everyone on another in Birmingham. The fledgling protest seemed over, but more Freedom Riders rose up to continue onto Montgomery, where they were severely beaten with baseball bats and iron pipes after the governor declined to provide police protection.

The latest round of brutality forced the Kennedy administration to strike a deal with Alabama and Mississippi: Each state would protect the riders from angry mobs, while the federal government would allow the local police to arrest the Freedom Riders. The rides continued throughout the summer, yielding more arrests and putting more pressure on the government. At last, the Kennedy administration was forced to take a stand, persuading the Interstate Commerce Commission to issue another desegregation order, effective November 1, 1961. This marked an important milestone in the civil-rights movement -- people could now sit where they wanted on interstate buses and trains, drink from any water fountain, and use any restroom, no matter what "race, color, or creed."