Because of segregation in her Topeka, Kansas, school district, Brown was forced to travel by foot and by bus to a school significantly out of the way.
The school district maintained four elementary schools for black children, compared with the 18 available for white children.
Her father, Oliver Brown, attempted to enroll her in Sumner Elementary School, which was a few blocks away from their home and all-white at the time.
At the request of the NAACP, Brown’s father and 12 other families similarly tried to enroll their children in all-white schools, expecting to be unsuccessful.
They were, and that gave the NAACP the leverage to file a lawsuit, led by future Supreme Court Justice
Thurgood Marshall.
Because Brown was the first name alphabetically on the plaintiff's list, the case was dubbed Brown v. Board of Education.