quotes by Civil Rights Pioneer Quotes

“Am I going to change the world, or am I going to change me? Or maybe change the world a little bit, just by changing me?”

“When you get real old, honey, you realize there are certain things that just don't matter anymore. You lay it all on the table. There's a saying, 'Only little children and old folks tell the truth.'”

“Life is short, and it is up to you to make it sweet.”

“Have your own doctor, who answers to you. If you don't, when the time comes that you get mixed up with hospitals, they'll treat you like a fool. ... You're bound to lose your health at some point, but you don't have to lose your dignity, too.”

“Oh, Mama was a smart woman. It takes a smart woman to fall in love with a good man.”

“The world is a puzzling place today. All these banks sending us credit cards, with our names on them. Well, we didn't order any credit cards! We don't spend what we don't have. So we just cut them in half and throw them out, just as soon as we open them in the mail. Imagine a bank sending credit cards to two ladies over a hundred years old! What are those folks thinking?”

“I never let prejudice stop me from what I wanted to do in this life.”

“[On her 101-year-old sister and herself, at 103:] We have a lot to do ... People don't understand this. They think we're sitting around in rocking chairs, which isn't at all true. Why, we don't even own a rocking chair.”

“Life is a vapor. It passes in the blink of an eye.”

“In our dreams we are always young.”