greensboro sitins

• Segregation


  Separation of people based on race or ethnicity
• Segregation in the South affected many aspects of black people's daily lives
• Segregated lunch counters


  • Separate counters for black and white people
• Segregated lunch counter


  • Woolworth department store in Greensboro, North Carolina had a stand-up counter for black people and a sit-down counter for white people
• Sit-in movement


  1. 4 black students bought items from Woolworth's and sat at the white lunch counter

  2. They were refused service and the manager tried unsuccessfully to have them arrested

  3. They remained in their seats until the store closed

  4. More students joined them the next day

  5. The lunch counter was filled with black students

  6. Their story spread through media and led to more sit-ins around the South
• Start of the sit-in movement in Greensboro


  1 February 1960
• The sit-in movement challenged the segregated service at lunch counters in the South
• Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)


  An organisation set up by students to work on the civil rights campaign, separate from the SCLC
• SNCC


  • Included white and black students
  • Focused on voter registration (part of Freedom Summer)
  • Focused on direct action (sit-ins)
• How SNCC was founded

  1. Ella Baker from SCLC set up a meeting in 1960 to encourage students

  2. At the meeting, she helped the students to found SNCC, separate from SCLC

  3. Baker asked the students to work together as a group, rather than rely on strong leaders

  4. This was to encourage them to focus on work that would improve civil rights for the majority of their membership
• on February 2, 1960, more than 350 students participated in the second day of sit-ins
• by March 7, 1960, all Greensboro lunch counters had integrated
• 'GREENSBORO FOUR' supported by: NAACP, CORE, SCLC

  • the organisations helped establish a sit-in headquarters, where plans for direct action could be coordinated.
  • Actions like sit-ins or refusing to give up seats on segregated transport were carried out to challenge restrictions on civil rights.
  • As a result SNCC created as large number of students became involved
• Sit-ins


  • Usually carried out by young black people
  • Large number of white people inspired to join protest
  • Example of non-violent direct action
  • Held across North Carolina and the South
• Sit-ins


  • Largest number held in Nashville, Tennessee
  • Students coached to ensure success
• Black students held sit-ins

  • Responded calmly to violence and abuse
  • If arrested, stayed in jail rather than accept bail to overwhelm jails
• • large media coverage of the sit-ins, especially when some white customers reacted violently
  • Eisenhower expressed his support for the campaign
  • end of 1960, over 120 cities and towns in the South had desegregated their lunch counters
  • involved around 70,000 activists taking action
  • brought an end to a blatant example of this public form of discrimination
  • marked the start of a period of many highly effective student protests in the 1960s
  • were the first time white Americans in large numbers openly joined in protests by black Americans
  • Nashville first city to desegregate it's lunch counters