Year later, AP reporter recalls origins of Ferguson movement

ST. LOUIS (AP) — EDITOR'S NOTE — A year ago, most Americans had never heard of the St. Louis suburb called Ferguson. But after a white police officer fatally shot a black 18-year-old in the street, the name of the middle-class community became virtually a household word. From the first hours after Michael Brown's death, Associated Press reporter Jim Salter watched as a neighborhood protest launched a national movement.

___

Until August 2014, Ferguson, Missouri, wasn't the kind of place that generated much news. It was a mostly quiet suburban town of 21,000, a mix of beautiful old homes and working-class neighborhoods. Like a lot of communities in north St.