Civil rights pioneer Viola Desmond is being celebrated today with a Google Doodle slideshow.
The doodle on the Google.ca homepage was created by artist Sophie Diao and features 10 panels depicting Desmond’s life, from her childhood to her career as a beautician.
It also traces the now-famous incident when she refused to leave the whites-only section of a Nova Scotia movie theatre in 1946 — nearly a decade before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on a segregated bus in Alabama.
Desmond was dragged out of the theatre by police, arrested, thrown in jail for 12 hours, and fined.
WATCH: Viola Desmond honoured with Canadian Walk of Fame star
It would take 63 years for Nova Scotia to issue Desmond, who died in 1965, a posthumous apology and pardon.
Today would have been Desmond’s 104th birthday.
In March, a new $10 bill featuring Desmond was unveiled by Finance Minister Bill Morneau and Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz.
She is the first black person — and the first non-royal woman — on a regularly circulating Canadian bank note.
As well, Desmond is featured in a recent children’s book by Chelsea Clinton called “She Persisted Around the World,” which tells the stories of 13 women who shaped history across the globe.
The Canadian Press
