Tal Rutledge

Talmadge Rutledge (1929 – April 16, 2020) was an American civil rights activist who lived in Clearwater, Florida. He was the first president of the NAACP's Clearwater branch.^[1][2] His brother Charles was also a businessman and was a party to the lawsuit that precipitated the desegregation of Pinellas County Schools.^[3]

At one point he found three bullet holes in his home.^[4] He owned a laundromat and dry cleaning establishment.^[5]

In 1968, he was convicted and fined $35 for obstructing a school bus during a desegregation demonstration. The national president of the NAACP, Kivie Kaplan, attended the trial. Municipal Court judge Roland Fox presided.^[6]

He opposed the closing of a community center named for Martin Luther King Jr. in the North Greenwood section of Clearwater.^[7]