John Howard Ferguson was born on June 10, 1838 in Chilmark, Massachusetts. He got his degree in law in Boston and then he moved to New Orleans. He served in the Louisiana Legislature as a Judge and in 1890 ruled the Separate Car Act, under which rail companies had to provide different accommodations for white and black people.
Homer Plessy was born on March 17th, 1862 in New Orleans, Louisiana. He worked as a shoemaker and then he took up social activism in 1887 by becoming vice president of the Justice, Protective, Educational and Social Club, a group dedicated to reform New Orleans' public education system.Then he became a member of the "Committee of citizens" a group of people that aimed to abolish segregation on railroads.