The first official ride for the Freedom Riders was on May 4, 1961 with thirteen riders. The students wanted to test the Supreme Court's new desegregation laws on traveling in interstate busses, to see if people in the deep South were really abiding to the laws. They used Greyhound buses and some planes to travel. These rides were modeled after the organization’s 1947 Journey of Reconciliation. Once they started the original ride it kicked off chains of other rides and eventually there were more and more rides. Their path was carefully planned out to hit main spots in the deep south and provoke the Southerners.
It was planned to be a nonviolent protest, but that is not what happened. They believed in nonviolence, so they all sat and took any violence towards them. They strongly believed in not using violence to get their way and wanted to prove they couldn’t be stopped by any amounts of harassment. The very first violence happened on May 12 in Rock Hill, South Carolina. John Lewis was the first to be attacked by a mob of twenty, and was beaten until unconscious and had to be taken to a hospital. In Anniston, KKK members boarded the bus and forced African Americans to get into the back, and continued to stay on the bus until it reached Birmingham. There a mob appeared and attacked the riders for fifteen minutes.
Not everybody believed that the Freedom Riders would succeed. Martin Luther King Jr doubted the successfulness of the rides and whispered to a friend that he thought they would never make it to Alabama. They also went to many restaurants and facilities to try to be served but were almost always turned down and kicked out. The Freedom Riders were arrested many times throughout the trip, but they were told by officials that it was for their own safety. Many civil rights activists were mad about the slow pace of the desegregation as the riders still trudged on down South.
Not every second of the tr ip was terrible, even though there was much violence. At the beginning of the trip, when they were not in the deep South, the riders were actually supported. In Augusta, Georgia, they were served kindly at the terminal lunch areas. With no problem, they drove through Athens to Atlanta. When they arrived, everyone was pleasantly surprised. There were actu ally crowds gathered to support them and cheer them on throughout the city. The Freedom Riders enjoyed a relaxing and fun meal with Martin Luther King Jr at a popular African-American restaurant.
In the end, they finally got the victory that they were looking for. They went through unwanted violence. People doubted them. Even through some of the most horrific sights they will ever experience, the riders made it. They did not stop. The final arresting of each Freedom Rider set off a chain off bombs that fired up the civil rights movements for more years to come. Eventually, segregated travel systems were fixed and protected.