Mildred Loving, 1939-2008

She never saw herself as a trailblazer. Yet the 1967 Supreme Court case Loving v. Virginia, which struck down interracial marriage bans, was Loving's doing. Years after she and her white husband were thrown out of Virginia for having the gall to wed, Loving wrote Robert F. Kennedy, who was moved to action. Sometimes a single voice is all it takes.

—Gilbert Cruz

See pictures of the Civil Rights movement from Emmett Till to Barack Obama.

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