Sit-Ins, 1960

What was the Greensboro Sit-In?

The Greensboro Sit-In was a protest against segregation at a lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina.

When was the Greensboro Sit-in?

The Greensboro Sit-In started on 1st February, 1960.

Why did the Greensboro Sit-in happen?

There were 2 main reasons:

• ❖ The students who were involved were inspired by the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the Freedom Riders, and non-violent civil rights protests. They were also deeply affected by the murder of Emmett Till.
• ❖ They wanted to end the segregation of the lunch-counters.

What happened during the Greensboro Sit-In?

There were 5 main events during the Greensboro Sit-In:

• ❖ Four male students from a local agricultural and technical college entered a Woolworth's store and sat at the whites-only lunch counter.
• ❖ They were asked to leave and the police were called when they refused.
• ❖ The police were not able to arrest them as they had not broken a law.
• ❖ The media was there to cover the story in the news.
• ❖ The students sat in their seats until the store closed.

What were the reactions to the Greensboro Sit-in?

There were 5 main reactions to the Greensboro Sit-In.

• ❖ The next day, the same students took 25 others with them and sat at the lunch counter.
• ❖ More students were inspired to join the protest, and within three days there were 300 students staging sit-ins at other locations. In a month, there were sit-ins in 54 cities across 7 states. By April, more than 50,000 people were involved.
• ❖ A non-violent student group, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), was set up to train students to carry out sit-ins peacefully in April 1960.
• ❖ The media was mostly supportive of what was happening and white people began to join in the protests.
• ❖ Lunch counters around the south started to desegregate by the summer of 1960. The Woolworth's lunch counter desegregated on 25th July that year.

Why was the Greensboro Sit-in significant?

The sit-ins were significant for 4 main reasons:

• ❖ Young people and white people joined the protest.
• ❖ While the protest was still a form of non-violent direct action, it was hard to ignore.
• ❖ They attracted a lot of media attention.
• ❖ The sit-ins led to similar protests around the country such as prayer-ins at segregated churches and wade-ins at segregated swimming pools.