You are no doubt familiar with the story of Rosa Parks, the Black woman who, in 1955, famously refused to move to the back of a Montgomery, Alabama bus, sparking off one of the seminal moments in the Civil Rights movement. What you may not know is that, a decade before, Robinson did the same thing.

Specifically, as PBS reports, on July 6, 1944, Robinson, then a Second Lieutenant in the Army, was riding an Army bus from the “the colored officers club” when he made the decision to sit next to a woman he knew. The bus driver thought the woman was a white woman, and ordered Robinson to the back of the bus. The young officer refused, and what followed was some back-and-forth between the two men, with the driver at one point calling Robinson a word that will not be reprinted here, and it ended with Robinson being removed from the bus in handcuffs.

Robinson was then charged with two counts, both related to his alleged disrespect of a superior officer, and was soon facing a jury of nine men, eight of whom were white. Fortunately, at least four of the jurors saw Robinson’s side and he was found not guilty on all charges.

A few years later, then-President Harry S. Truman would sign a law effectively ending racial discrimination in the U.S. military.