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The Freedom Ride was a 15-day journey undertaken in February 1965 by a group of non-Indigenous and Indigenous Australians in a bus across New South Wales, led by Charles Perkins, an Aboriginal civil rights activist. Most were students from the University of Sydney, who had formed a group called Student Action for Aborigines (SAFA) the previous year. Partly inspired by the Freedom Riders of the American Civil Rights Movement, the group left Sydney in a hired bus on 12 February 1965 and returned on 27 February. What they encountered was de facto segregation; the students protested, picketed, and faced violence, raising the issue of Indigenous rights. They stood protesting for hours at segregated areas such as pools, parks, and pubs, which raised a mixed reception in the country towns. Some violence was encountered in Walgett and Moree. The Freedom Riders' aim was to bring to the attention of the public the extent of racial discrimination in Australia. With significant coverage by both national and international media, it succeeded in this, and is considered a significant event in the history of civil rights for Aboriginal Australians.
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