Sarah Keys Evans was a courageous African American woman who played a significant role in the civil rights movement. In August 1952, while serving as a member of the Women's Army Corps (WAC), she boarded a bus in North Carolina and refused to give up her seat to a white Marine. This incident occurred several years before Rosa Parks famously refused to give up her seat on a bus in Montgomery, Alabama.

Keys was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, but she fought back with the help of the NAACP and her case eventually reached the US Supreme Court. In a landmark decision, the court ruled in her favor in 1955, declaring racial segregation in interstate bus travel unconstitutional.

Sarah Keys's brave actions helped pave the way for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which prohibited segregation in public places and banned discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. She is remembered as a trailblazer who stood up against injustice and played a crucial role in the fight for equality and civil rights.