Fifty years ago, 12 parents challenged the “separate but equal” laws in the United States, but they had no idea how much their determination would impact the future of black students.

In a ceremony to honor the petitioners in the case of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, nine schools, including Iowa State, held candlelight vigils simultaneously Thursday night.

After a brief introduction by Tiana Williams, co-advisor for the Black Student Alliance, BSA President Sarai Arnold read “The Fight Must Go On,” a poem about the continuing struggle for equal rights.

“This program is about unity, honor and respect,” Arnold said.

Arnold’s voice reverberated through the Gold Room of the Memorial Union as she read a brief history of the Brown v. Board of Education decision.

“This fight is founded on the backs of those who gave their blood, sweat and even their lives to get us to this point,” Arnold said. “We cannot and will not forget … if we do, our children and their children will suffer.”

There was a moment of silence while the 50 candles were lit. The candles were arranged to spell out the number 50 and were encircled by 12 remaining candles representing the parents who fought the board of education.

After the moment of silence had concluded, George Jackson, Graduate College assistant dean for recruitment and outreach, said he remembered the day the decision was handed down.

“I can remember as a small boy waiting around the radio to hear that historical decision,” Jackson said. “It helped to define the legal status of ‘Negroes.’ I say Negro because that is what we were called at that time.”

Rest rooms were also segregated before the decision, he said.

“There were rest rooms for white men, white women, and if you were lucky, one for ‘colored.’ If there wasn’t one, you had to run to the woods,” Jackson said.

After the decision, America was a different place, and the legal status of blacks began to change, he said.

“America did not change immediately,” Jackson said. “It did, however, say that black people were citizens in this country.”

Jackson said people began to believe they had the right to be treated as the citizens the courts viewed them as.

“When Rosa Parks took her seat on that bus on Dec. 1, 1955, she said she was fed up,” Jackson said.

Black people felt they deserved fair treatment, Jackson said.

“The Brown decision is a very important document. It not only freed black people, it freed white people too,” Jackson said. “To keep people down in the ditch, you have to be down there too.”

Jackson recounted a brief history of the fight for equal rights. He mentioned the case of Dred Scott in 1857 and the 1896 “separate but equal” decision in Plessy v. Ferguson, which facilitated most Jim Crow laws.

“As we take time to pause, do not fool yourself, young people. The struggle did not start in 1954, it started in 1619,” Jackson said.

Aisha Mock, director of fundraisers for BSA, said she felt grateful for the decision.

“Fifty years ago, people who were trying to go to class, even 8 a.m. classes, were getting hit in the face with bricks,” Mock said.