[Mb-civic] An Overflowing Tribute to an Icon - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

An Overflowing Tribute to an Icon
Thousands Gather at D.C. Service for Farewell to Civil Rights Hero

By Debbi Wilgoren and Theola S. Labbe
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, November 1, 2005; Page A01

America's mighty and meek converged on a historic black church in 
downtown Washington yesterday afternoon for a hand-clapping, arm-waving, 
tear-inducing tribute to Rosa Parks, the civil rights matriarch who died 
last week at age 92.

It was the final segment of a 20-hour memorial visit that drew an 
estimated 40,000 people to the U.S. Capitol Rotunda, where Parks's body, 
in a polished wood coffin, had lain in honor overnight.

Mourners filled the 2,500-seat sanctuary of Metropolitan African 
Methodist Episcopal Church to overflowing, and hundreds crowded onto 
sidewalks and into the auditorium of a nearby office building to hear or 
see broadcasts of the 2 1/2 -hour service. As those outside sang along 
with "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and "We Shall Overcome," their voices 
could be heard inside the red-brick church.

In his invocation, the Rev. Grainger Browning of Ebenezer AME Church in 
Prince George's County, linked Parks, a deaconess in the denomination, 
to a pantheon of black American heroes: Nat Turner, Ida B. Wells, W.E.B. 
Du Bois, Lorraine Hansberry, Mary Church Terrell, Martin Luther King Jr. 
and many others.

The one-time seamstress was lauded by U.S. senators and representatives, 
civil rights leaders and pastors, actress Cicely Tyson and Alabama-born 
Johnnie Carr, 94, a friend of Parks's for more than 80 years.

After the service, the coffin and Parks's family and friends were flown 
to Detroit, where a funeral and burial are scheduled for tomorrow. 
President Bush has ordered that flags at federal buildings be flown at 
half-staff that day.

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/31/AR2005103100370.html?referrer=email
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