Nearly fifty years ago, four well-mannered, well-dressed, and courteous Black college kids launched a lunch counter revolution in the United States. After the successful Montgomery, Alabama, bus boycott of 1955 and 1956 and the integration of Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas in 1957, the civil rights movement had come to a standstill. But on February 1, 1960, four 17-year-old freshmen at North Carolina A&T University in Greensboro decided to reignite the movement. In an act of unusual courage, the students, Franklin McCain, Ezell Blair Jr., Joseph McNeil, and David Richmond took seats at the segregated lunch counter of F. W. Woolworth's in Greensboro, N.C. This lunch counter only had chairs/stools for Whites, while Blacks had to stand and eat. They were refused service and sat peacefully until the store closed. They returned the next day, along with about 25 other students, and their requests were again denied. The Greensboro Four inspired similar sit-ins across the state and by the end of February, such protests were taking place across the South. Finally in July, Woolworth's integrated all of its stores. This protest sparked sit-ins and economic boycotts that became a hallmark of the American civil rights movement. The four have become icons of the civil rights movement.
In just two months the sit-in movement spread to 15 cities in 9 states. The media picked up this issue and covered it nationwide. The Greensboro sit-ins played a large role in spreading the civil rights movement to a larger audience and dramatizing segregation at a time when many, especially in the North, were not fully aware of its scope. The Greensboro sit-ins inspired civil rights groups to take up this tactic and use it to publicize segregation - beginning with lunch counters and spreading to other forms of public accommodation, including transport facilities, art galleries, beaches, parks, swimming pools, libraries, and even museums around the South. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 mandated desegregation in public accommodations.
The Timeline:
February 1: The four students enter Woolworth’s and make small purchases, saving their receipts to prove they are customers. The take seats at the Whites-only lunch counter. Denied service, they remain seated. Police arrive, but are unable to take action against the four students due to lack of provocation. Woolworth’s closes early to end the incident, but the Greensboro Four vow to return the next day.
February 2: The Greensboro Four returns to Woolworth’s and sit at the lunch counter. Reporters and local TV news crews gather at the store. The intense television coverage helps spread the protest to High Point, NC by the next day.
February 3: By opening time, students are scrambling to get seats at Woolworth’s, but there is also a growing opposition of Whites who taunt the demonstrators. National news begins to carry the story and the protests spread to Winston-Salem, NC.
February 4: Female students from Bennett College as well as three white students from Greensboro Women’s College join the sit-in. The protests effectively paralyze Woolworth’s and other nearby businesses.
February 5: About 300 students are now protesting at Woolworth’s. The sit-in movement spreads to almost 40 other cities across the country.
February 6: An estimated 1,000 protesters and observers fill Woolworth’s. The sit-in spreads to the nearby Kress department store, bringing downtown Greensboro to a virtual standstill. Both Woolworth’s and Kress close early after receiving a bomb threat.
February 7: A&T students vote to suspend demonstrations to give city and store officials a chance to comply. Negotiations fail, and students resume the sit-in.
February 26: Woolworth’s integrates its lunch counter.
Meet the members of the Greensboro Four.
Joseph McNeil: A Wilmington, North Carolina native, McNeil moved with his family to New York after graduating high school. He soon returned the Carolinas to attend North Carolina A&T State University on a full scholarship, but found it difficult to live in the segregated South. McNeil’s frustration came to a head after returning to North Carolina from New York after Christmas vacation, and was refused service at the bus terminal in Greensboro. This event led him and his friends to stage the sit-in at Woolworth’s. McNeil earned a degree in engineering physics from A&T in 1963. Thirty minutes after graduating, he was commissioned by the U.S. Air Force and spent six years as an officer and attained the rank of captain. During his tenure in the Air Force, he started a series of diversity programs and also worked in computer sales for IBM, as a commercial banker for Bankers Trust in New York City and as a stock broker for E.F. Hutton in Fayetteville, NC. He recently retired from Air Force Reserves, having achieved the rank of Major General, and now resides in Hempstead, NY with his wife Ina, with whom he has five children.
Jibreel Khazan (formerly Ezell Blair, Jr.): Born Ezell Blair, Jr., in Greensboro, NC, Khazan received a B.S. in sociology from North Carolina A&T State University in 1963. While a student at A&T, he was president of the junior class, the student government association, the campus NAACP and the Greensboro Congress for Racial Equality. He attended law school at Howard University and found it difficult to get a job in Greensboro because of his reputation as being one of the Greensboro Four. In 1965, Khazan moved to New Bedford, MA. Three years later, he became a member of the New England Islamic Center and took on his present name. Khazan now works with developmentally disabled people in New Bedford, and has also worked with the AFL/CIO Trade Council in Boston and at the Opportunities Industrialization Center and at the Rodman Job Corps Center. He and his wife Lorraine have three children, one of whom graduated from A&T.
Franklin McCain: McCain was raised in Washington, D.C. and received a B.S. in chemistry and biology from North Carolina A&T State University in 1964. While he was an A&T student, he roomed with David Richmond, around the corner from Ezell Blair Jr. and Joseph McNeil. After graduating from college, he stayed in Greensboro for graduate school and married Bettye Davis, with whom he had three sons. In 1965, McCain joined the Celanese Corporation in Charlotte, NC as a chemist, and is now retired. As a resident of Charlotte, he has served on many boards and worked towards changes in local educational, civic, spiritual and political life.
David Richmond: Richmond was born in Greensboro and graduated from Dudley High School, where he set the state high jump record on the track team. At North Carolina A&T State University, he majored in business administration and accounting. After leaving A&T, he became a counselor-coordinator for the CETA program in Greensboro. Forced to leave Greensboro because his life was threatened, he lived in the mountain community of Franklin for nine years, returning to Greensboro to take care of his elderly parents. Fighting against the stigma of being one of the Greensboro Four—and therefore labeled as a “troublemaker,” Richmond found it extremely difficult to get employment in Greensboro, finally finding work as a janitor for the Greensboro Health Care Center. In 1980, the Greensboro Chamber of Commerce awarded him the Levi Coffin Award for leadership in human rights. Richmond was married and divorced twice and had three children, but battled many demons, including alcoholism and a sadness that he could not do more to improve the world he in which he lived. He died in Greensboro on December 7, 1990, at the age of 49, and A&T awarded him a posthumous honorary doctorate degree.
This was not the first sit-in to challenge racial segregation. As far back as 1942, the Congress of Racial Equality sponsored sit-ins in Chicago, St. Louis in 1949 and Baltimore in 1952. On August 19, 1958, the Oklahoma City NAACP Youth Council began a six-year long campaign of sit-ins at segregated lunch counters, restaurants, and cafes in Oklahoma City. The Greensboro, North Carolina sit-in, however, was the most influential.
In 1993, an 8-foot section of the counter, four stools, a soda fountain, pie case and other articles from the Woolworth's store in Greensboro where donated and is now on display in the Smithsonian Institute’s Museum of American History in Washington, DC.
