Alberta Daisy Schenck Adams (June 1, 1928 – July 6, 2009) was a teenage civil rights activist in the struggle for equality by the indigenous peoples in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Territory of Alaska The Territory of Alaska or Alaska Territory was an Organized incorporated territories of the United States, organized incorporated territory of the United States from August 24, 1912, until Alaska was granted statehood on January 3, 1959. The ...

. Her 1944 challenge to segregation practices was cited during the Territorial Legislature's proceedings in passage of Alaska's 1945 anti-discrimination law, a decade before the ''

Brown v. Board of Education ''Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka'', 347 U.S. 483 (1954), was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court that ruled that U.S. state laws establishing racial segregation in public schools are unconstitutional, even if the ...

'' decision outlawed segregation in public schools, and before

Rosa Parks Rosa Louise McCauley Parks (February 4, 1913 – October 24, 2005) was an American civil rights activist. She is best known for her refusal to move from her seat on a Montgomery, Alabama, bus, in defiance of Jim Crow laws, which sparke ...

Alabama Alabama ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern and Deep South, Deep Southern regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gu ...

sparked a public bus boycott by refusing to give up her seat to a white person.

Early life and segregated Alaska

Alberta Schenck was born in

Nome, Alaska Nome (; , , also ''Sitŋazuaq'', ''Siqnazuaq'') is a city in the Nome Census Area, Alaska, Nome Census Area in the Unorganized Borough, Alaska, Unorganized Borough of the US state of Alaska. The city is located on the southern Seward Peninsula c ...

, on June 1, 1928, to Albert Schenck, a white

army An army, ground force or land force is an armed force that fights primarily on land. In the broadest sense, it is the land-based military branch, service branch or armed service of a nation or country. It may also include aviation assets by ...

veteran of

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, and Mary Pushruk Schenck of Inupiat heritage. She was born into an era when the indigenous peoples of Alaska were subjected to segregated practices that often left non-white children without an education for lack of facilities. Some segregated business establishments advertised that all their employees were white.

Alaska Dream Theatre incident

When Alberta was a high school girl in 1944, she had a part-time job ushering at the Alaska Dream Theatre in Nome, where part of her job was to make sure non-white patrons sat in their designated segregated area. She eventually registered a complaint with the theatre's manager and was fired. Alberta's response became an opinion article on March 3, 1944, in '' The Nome Nugget'' newspaper. She returned later with a white date, and the two of them sat in the "Whites Only" section. She and her army sergeant date refused to move when the manager demanded she move to the non-white section. The theater manager contacted the local police who arrested Schenck and placed her in jail for one night. Schenck's arrest rallied the local Inupiat community, who staged a protest at the theater until her release from jail the next day.

Anti-discrimination legislation

Indignant and determined not to be deterred, she wrote a letter to Alaska Governor Ernest Gruening and related the incident to him. The prior year, the Governor had seen his anti-discrimination bill be defeated in the Territorial Legislature. Her letter inspired the Governor to have the bill re-introduced in the Territorial Legislature, during which her experience was cited on the floor of the legislature. He answered her letter vowing that no one would again receive that kind of treatment in Alaska. The re-introduced bill passed both houses of the legislature and was signed into law as the Alaska Equal Rights Act of 1945 on February 16, 1945.

Death and legacy

Alberta Schenck married a man named Adams and moved to California. She died on July 6, 2009, in Anaheim of congestive heart failure. The role Alberta Schenck played in passage of Alaska's 1945 anti-discrimination legislation was part of the Civil Rights Movement. In 2011, Alberta Schenck Adams was inducted into the Alaska Women's Hall of Fame.

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