Martin Luther King Jr. wrote about her

Rosa Parks served as a spark for the protests, as well as a rallying point for individuals who were tired of the societal inequities of segregation, according to Martin Luther King Jr. He wrote, "Actually, no one can understand the action of Mrs. Parks unless he realizes that eventually, the cup of endurance runs over, and the human personality cries out, I can take it no longer.”

In his memoir, Stride Toward Freedom, King spoke of Parks' distinctive local significance, describing how her integrity and determination earned her widespread respect in the African American community.

One of Dr. Martin Luther King's first significant addresses was the Montgomery Bus Boycott speech. On December 5, 1955, Dr. Martin Luther King addressed a crowd of almost 5,000 people at the Holt Street Baptist Church in Montgomery, just four days after Mrs. Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a Montgomery city bus. That arrest sparked the Deep South's first significant civil rights campaign in half a century. In this address, King encourages the audience, which had just voted to boycott the buses, to keep up the pressure until they achieve their aim of stopping the humiliation and oppression of black individuals in Montgomery and elsewhere, or, in his words, “..to gain justice on the buses in the city.”