Why did Claudette Colvin remain silent about being the original for so many years?

Because she was an unmarried teanager and was reportedly impregnated by a married man.

Explanation:

Claudette Colvin is a retired American nurse, born on September 5, 1939. She pioneered the civil Rights movement and she was later arrested at age 15 in Alabama because she refused to give her seat to a white woman. She was one of the plantiffs in the first federal case filed by attorney Fred Gray to challenge the segregation of bus in the Alabama city.