Just trying to get some fix on where we were and what we were about to do. I was trying to be slow and heavy so my anxiety would not get too high on me. I felt my temperature increase. I could feel my collar sweating, coming off the side of my face. I did not have to always ask joe what he was thinking. We looked at each other and both of us looked at the calendar at the same time. We just started to walk towards the counter, without a single word. That is how it happened. And we took our seats. University of massachusetts hammers professor, Tracey Parker, joins us now on cspan and cspan 3 for a discussion about the lunch counter citizens of 1960. Tracey parker, who were the greensboro for and why did they decide to sit down at that woolworths lunch counter on that february day in 1960 . Thank you for having me. Those greensboro four were four young men who were just College Freshman at North Carolina and tea state university. The three of them had met and high school, and so they already had a rapport. They met the fourth, Joseph Mcneill, as freshman in college. They had actually been thinking about racial injustices, how to integrate, how to push the movement along, for sometime now. But it wasnt until Joseph Mcneil is returning to school after christmas break in 1959, when he is refused a meal at a greyhound train terminal. He is just trying to buy a hotdog. And he gets back to campus, and he is emboldened. He says enough is enough, and so him and his four friends said they are going to target the wall worths and go stage a sit into desegregate eating facilities in greensboro, North Carolina. What i find interesting is y. A. Woolworths. Wool worths was a five in time that many people of a certain age probably still remember. It was a chain Discount Department store. And it was recognizable because it is a chain across the United States to people. There is a way in which you can recognize it and see yourself in, it and if you wanted to replicate a similar movement, you could. But also, will worth, slack Many Department stores of the time, operated a very contradictory policy when it came to African Americans. They were free to enter, brows, and purchase. However, they were not allowed to eat at lunch counters or other eating facilities. They couldnt use beauty shops. They couldnt try on or return clothing. They were denied credit. They could be provided uneven or Unequal Service at any moment at the whim of a sales worker. So woolworths becomes a place that is very visible for showcasing the Racial Discrimination and segregation of the time, of the country, and it also then for them could be one of the most ideal places to visibly dismantle the system of racial injustice. What was the state of segregation in 1960 . We are talking six years after brown v. Board of education. What was that like, especially in the retail and shopping realm . This is a huge moment, when the brown versus board of education decision comes down, outlying racial segregation in public schools. It overturns the 1896 plus versus ferguson decision that had stipulated that separate but equal was constitutional. After the brown versus board of education decision, the desegregation of schools a slow. It is extremely slow, very little done. Then in december of 55, rosa parks initiate this movement, which is the montgomery bus boycott movement, which last a year. But between the end of that movement in 1956 to 1960, very little had changed. And i think that there is, there was a generation of students, and these are generations of students who would have been the age of emmett till when emmett till was brutally lynched and murdered, who had been shaped by watching the death of emmett till, watching montgomery bus boycotts, understanding that when they go into a store, the rules for them are different. And when they went to go get something to eat, the lunch counter itself was a symbol of white supremacy. It was a symbol of how the country, how the marketplace, how these stores, try to keep them in second class citizenship. Tracey parker is our guest. This is a professor in the department of africanamerican studies at the university of massachusetts, amherst. We are talking about the 1960s lunch counter protests in this hour, and being joined by our friends on American History tv on cspan, inviting you to join the conversation. Phone lines are split up originally. There is a special line set aside for sitin participants and their family members. If you remember those days, those citizens, please call us. We would love to hear from you as we go about this hour of the washington journal. Professor parker, why did this movement become the one that gets pointed to, the greensboro protests in particular . Why is that the one that started this new round of sedans . This wasnt the first lunch counter protest. There had been other stool sedans that had happened, going back to the forties and fifties. Why is this the one that gets pointed to . Its a historical moment. There is an energy and a desire for immediacy among young people. We are in a moment after the second world war. The economy is prosperous. African americans have now relocated to urban centers. They are making more money. They are more educated. So the time is right. And then we have the emmett till, the montgomery bus boycott. They show us both the tragedies of the movement, the everyday realities for African Americans, but also the possibilities of movement. So i think for those Young Students they were tired. They were frustrated. I know that the greensboro for mention that they were not only motivated by the death of emmett till, by the montgomery bus boycott, but also, king had come to speak at their college in 1958. Listening to him speak about nonviolence and listening to him speak about the injustices of the world really motivated these young men. Well they are having this conversation at their university, women over at bennett college, which is a historically black Womens College, they are having similar conversations. So there is an energy. There is a conversation going on. And this seems to be the moment in which to do it. We are also at a moment where the federal government is arguably more supportive of civil rights than it had been probably since the reconstruction, those years between 1855 to 1877. How long did the greensboro said and last . How much attention did it get at the time . How did it start spreading to other cities . It lasted six months it ended july 25th. And it ends after will worth slant counter has lost approximately 200,000 dollars, which would be equivalent to roughly maybe 2 million today. They decide to finally integrate while the students are on summer break. When they left on summer break, it was black High School Students from the area who took over the reigns of this movement. The intensity continued. Finally, the manager of woolworths decides he will have three of his black workers dress and their sunday best, put on their street clothes, not their uniforms, and sit down at the lunch counter indeed. Ideally, by the time these College Students get back, business could return to normal. A minute, ago you mentioned the Womens College in greensboro and the participants there. Who is esther terry . Doctor esther terry was one of the participants of the greensboro sitin. She helped organize the sitin. She was a university student. She speaks quite openly about how she was influenced, not only by her colleagues, the other women, but also by her professor and by the president of the university. There is a true support system at bennett college, true encouragement that they had in this movement. So she participates and she is actually arrested at one point for her participation in the movement. But esther terry has gone on to be a leader of what historians call the second student movement, whereby students were not concerned necessarily about public accommodations, but this time they were concerned about integrating universities. There is more black faculty at these universities and not only that, but that the curriculum matches, reflects, the diverse population that they are hoping these universities will have. So she eventually moves to massachusetts after earning a masters of arts at the university of North Carolina chapel hill. And there she earns a ph. D. In american literature. She helped find and chair the deputy duboiss department of africanamerican studies, which i am a proud faculty member of. And she helps found one of the first black studies programs in the United States. One of the places where esther terry spoke about her experiences was in an oral history interview with the library of congress. Its Available Online in its entirety. We want to show viewers just a clip of that interview. And i think it is very important to note that woolworths became an ideal that you cannot sit down for a coke. You knew you could go into woolworths. Woolworths was not closed to black patrons at all. You could go into woolworths. You could buy anything you want to that they sold if you had money. He just couldnt sit down to get a sandwich at the lunch counter. It was the lunch counter. You can sit down there to beat. I think we might have been young, because honestly, i felt proud. I dont think my mother ever felt, maybe she felt proud, but i think that was not herman feeling. I think she was terrified. I know that now because i have a child. I think as a mother, i would be afraid. But im going to tell you. We were proud. I was proud to sit there. I was very, very proud. Ill tell you something else. I never, ever understood the hatred that came. It was absolutely surprising. I did not understand why people would glare at us with some hatred. That was a little unnerving, but i was basically very proud to have done that. Esther therrien that library of Congress Oral history. Tracey parker, she talked there about her mother being fearful of the danger that she was in. Can you talk a bit about the reaction to the lunch counter sit in . The reaction is mixed. Its interesting. When the first, when these young men first get to the lunch counter on the very first day, they encounter a white waitress who tells them that they dont serve African Americans here. That white waitress gets a little frazzled. She doesnt know what to do, so she calls over a black waitress. And the black waitress quickly tells them they are making trouble and instructs them to leave. You would assume by that statement that perhaps maybe she was anti protest. But i think in reality, what she is is she is scared. She is scared of what could possibly happen to these young men. She is scared of what could possibly happen to herself. Right . And so you see that type of sentiment going on, but increasingly, as the Movement Goes on, these four man this, movement itself, receives immense support from the surrounding community, from the black community. If they were not sitting in at the lunch counters, and i should say that this movement was not simply at the wolves department. It eventually spread to another five and dime. Increasingly, you have more students deciding to sit in. And for those who are not sitting in who may have been their parents, who may have been their pastors, their teachers, those folks participate by way of an economic boycott. So what they are doing is they are holding their dollars from these stores until these stores make substantial change. And together, it is the sit in. Its the notoriety of the sitin. Its being televised and reported in newspapers. And its the economic boycott that is damaging store profits and reputations that is central, integral to making change in these places. Professor Tracey Parker is our guest this morning with the university of massachusetts Amherst Department of African American studies. We should also note her book, the author of Department Stores and the black Freedom Movement. We are taking your questions and comments about the 1960 lunch counter citizens in this hour of the washington journal and on American History tv. We have that special line for sitin participants and family members. Bonnie is on that line out of miami. Good morning. Good morning. I wanted to share with you a very vivid memory from when i was 14 years old. I was living in new york city, and my friends and i had gone into town to see movies and shop and we came upon a large crowd outside our very popular woolworths. They were chanting, and immediately, i signed on, joined the chants, and i will share with you. One, two, three, four, dont go into woolworths store. Five, six, seven, eight, southern woolworths segregate. At that very young age, i immediately knew as a white girl this was wrong. There was something wrong with our country, which unfortunately, i would have to reiterate today. And these certain people who started the movement back then and succeeded, of course, with the integration of the lunch counters, we need them again today i am afraid. Thank you so much. Body, thanks. Tracey parker . I think thats a very typical story. This is why using a woolworths, a chain, is so important. You could have such a broad reach from not simply the one that woolworths you are protesting against, but also it cant connect to others. Now you have a movement in new york city. It is supportive, in alliance with those who are trying to integrate these public spaces in the south. What was core and how much involvement did National Civil Rights Groups have in these lunch counter sedans . The core was the congress of racial equality. It was founded in the 19 forties and one of their major tactics was the sitin. They have been employing the sitin in the 19 forties and fifties when the greensboro sitin began. Local naacp members actually call court with the understanding that they have a sense of how this should go. Right . How used train students to take the attacks, to stay nonviolent, to stay strong, and invited them in for support. But what they are also voting on, which is good, is a tradition of black protest in the community. They are drying on them but also the Labor Movement. The Labor Movement had been using sedans in the thirties, not only to rail against an equal, unfair employment treatment, but also to desegregate restaurants as well. Some of them were part of the congress of industrial organizations, the ceo. You talk about training. Can you talk more about how that worked and what people who are going to go and sit down at these lunch counters, how they tried to prepare for that experience . Sure. Nashville is one of the most, the students were the most trained there. They were quite meticulous in their preparation for the sitin. And what they would do is they would hold classes. When i teach these sit in movement in my civil rights class, i always use, there is a clip in the movie the butler, where the students i believe are in a basement. They are practicing. They are helping each other prepare. You have someone sitting in a chair and a friend of yours is going to act like they are counterprotesting and push the chair, spin on you, call you racial epithets, and it is to prepare one for what could happen. We know from various pictures, film, Television News reels, what these protesters went through was frankly horrific. We had students who had hot coffee thrown in their faces. They were spin on. Milkshakes were thrown on them. They were violently beaten. They were arrested. They were preparing these students for the fact that it might not simply be physical harm or arrest. But it could end in death. Was the whole idea to not react and to continue the tradition of nonviolent protest . Was the whole idea to hold that chair and to stay in that seat for as long as possible . Talk through the goals a little bit when it came to that training. The goal was really to stay nonviolent, to adhere to these nonviolent principles that gandhi and doctorate leave the king had been touting, because, and again, its important what moment we are. And we are in a moment where television is big. We are showing students dressed in their sunday vests. Theyre sitting with their schoolbooks simply trying to get school work done. They are staying polite, staying nonviolent, and just taking it and what then, what the whites look like, white segregation, they look barbaric. They look angry. They look as if something as simple as these young men and women wanting a coke or a sandwich results and brutal, this brutality. It becomes a very convincing argument that African Americans are in fact first class citizens. They are in fact respectable. They are dignified. They are humans. And that is the work of doing, of making this all very visible. February 1st, the day the greensboro lunch protests began. By april of 1960, some 70 southern cities had soft lunch counter sedans. Thats what we are talking about. Looking back 60 years to lunch counter protests in this hour of the washington journal and history tv. This is kathleen out of california. Good morning. You are next. Thank you. I am 58 years old. This is my history as well. I found the demonstrations so moving, so powerful, so effective, so glorious. For my 58yearold perspective, i dont see nearly as many peaceful protests any longer. Why this form of protest . Why does it affect you so much . Because it was so novel. Thats exactly what our society should look like. You should be free to go eat lunch, regardless of religion, color, anything. That was noble. Martin luther king was noble. When i went to public school, we were trained on his words and they were noble. I find so much nobility and i thought we were finding success. From todays perspective, i am very troubled. Professor parker . I think the sentiments you express are quite common. It is an interesting place that we are in. I think what students are doing now are picking up on what was unfinished of the Civil Rights Movement. With the tactics they are implying, its very much those of the 1960s, those that the students employed, picket lines, sedans. Making their presence and their voice heard, there are certainly outliers who have taken different approaches. But in my view, the core sentiments, the core philosophy of kang and his supporters, and even of the young men and women who participated at lunch counter sit in, i very much see in the protests today. Tina is out of milwaukee, wisconsin. Good morning. Good morning. Thank you for cspan and Tracey Parker. If i wore a hat, i would tip it to you. I am originally from the south, from mississippi specifically. But my contact that i want to bring up is woolworths. I wont go into all the details about my history because im in the process of trying to write my memoirs. My experience with woolworths came when i graduated from high school in jackson, mississippi. My mom could not afford to send me to college. My dad had left the family. I ended up in chicago with my mothers oldest sister. They sent me to a different location so i didnt have a chance to go to school. I got a job at wool worth. I thought i had died and gone to heaven. There was no such thing as a young black Woman Working with at a store of any type in mississippi. I was put on the candy counter and i was a cashier and everything on the candy counter was my responsibility. I felt really important. Thats what really got me going in life, giving me that confidence. I think thats whats happening nowadays with all of this animosity towards the races and all. Our children are losing confidence. And thank you for giving me the opportunity to speak this morning. I hope everything works out for everyone. Thank you for sharing your memories. What you are speaking of, i am fascinated. I lived in chicago many years. If you are talking about the woolworths on the south side of chicago, i have pictures of it at home. But you are also speaking about is the fact that in the south, the other part of discrimination, we speak often about the discrimination against black consumers and customers, but there was also discrimination against African American workers. At a woolworths in the south, an African American could not hold a job as a sales worker or as a clerical worker. These were historically jobs reserved for white women. These were status jobs. These were job that gave people a sense of responsibility, that gave people a sense of confidence, as the caller mentioned. Some sitin movements, and i dont have any evidence that this happened with greensboro, but others like the ones in charlotte, North Carolina not only advocated on behalf of African Americans, and the discrimination they faced, but also black workers and to ensure black workers could eventually be promoted from janitor and cook and maids and elevator operators to positions such as a saleswoman at the candy counter, or to work in the clothing the part mint. Those jobs were also reflect evolve or could showcase African American respectability, intellect, and they were markers of a move towards fair employment, more racial equality in the marketplace. Back on the customer side, on that experience that black customers had in 1960, can you talk more about rules regarding trying on clothing or returning clothing . What did they face . African americans were not ready to try on or return close. They were not permitted to hold credit lines. They were not permitted to use the beauty shops. They were not permitted to use the same water fountains. Many Department Stores, for some folks, my students, for example, it is hard for them to remember Department Stores having every amenity you could possibly think of. In Department Stores, there were also beauty shops that African American women were not allowed to attend, or barbershops that African American men werent allowed to use. Typically, what is going on is that while they are able to shop in places, and he placed that white americans believed black people could taint biologically, African Americans were not allowed to participate. The laureates is next out of trenton, new jersey, for the line for sitin participants and family members good morning. Good morning. Go ahead, dolores. You are on with professor parker. I just want to say that i went to morgan state college. It was called college at the time in 1959. I started as a freshman there. And we demonstrated as a little Shopping Center down the street. We could not eat at the counter. But she said we could buy anything we wanted, there but we couldnt sit down with the counter. And then the head company was a Department Store and we couldnt try on the clothing there. A fellow named Clarence Mitchell whose uncle i think became a representative for baltimore, clarence organized us and he instructed us not to interact with any of the people that would say anything to us. We had our little signs that we held up, and it was a wonderful experience for me. I could cry right now just thinking about it. They eventually opened up the drugstore and we could sit down and the Department Store, and i am so proud of you, listening to you. You are saying all the things we experienced at that time, and i thank you for letting me speak. Dolores, before you go. Do you remember how long that protest lasted . How quickly you said it eventually changed. How quickly did that take . I dont want to say, because i dont exactly remember. But i know that while i was, there and i was only there for a year and a half, and then i transferred to richmond, virginia. But it happened while i was there. Dolores, thank you for the call. Professor parker . Dolores, thank you. I am from baltimore, so the story of morgan state students doing that work, i have benefited from that. I think it was the northward Shopping Center that morgan state students tried to integrate and were successful at doing so. But those students were very well organized. They planned everything very well. And really, that was another protest movement that not simply leveraged picketing and sitin but also the use of the economic boycott. Greensboro, North Carolina is on next. Paul for the mine for family members and participants. Good morning. Good morning to you. I just wanted to chime in and say that both of my parents are graduates of North Carolina and my father in particular was on the Football Team. And those guys stage their placement within that time period and it was always amazing to me to hear my dad tell the stories about being on the sidewalks and the anti protesters videoing and yelling epithets. The key in those stories, it was amazing. I remember, i ended up going to the university of North Carolina, chapel hill. I remember sitting there and reading in my history book. They were talking about the Football Team in woolworths and outside of woolworths. And i remember at the time being 19 years old and writing in the margins of the book that this was my dad. He was a part of that team. I was hoping that sorrow down the line, we would see that and be inspired by it. I would also say that richmond sun and we are still friends to this day. We play golf. He is a great guy and a great legacy to his father. Thats wonderful to hear. Thank you for your story. There is some wonderful images of the Football Players helping to protect other protesters as they were trying to leave. They would circle around women, female protesters, circle around them so they could safely exit the will worth starting the protests without getting injured. I dont know if you have time, but there are some wonderful imagery used in newspapers and on television. You have the Football Players, very much a part of that movement. The caller mentioned david richmond, one of the greensboro. For what eventually happens with the greensboro . Fort they go on to become leaders in the wider Civil Rights Movement in the sixties and seventies . It depends on how you are defining the movement. They all to some degree had a difficult time. After the protest, theyre labeled radicals. And in some ways, they are somewhat blackball from local opportunities. David richmond remained in greensboro, i believe he ended up becoming a janitor at a nursing home. He refused to leave North Carolina because his family was there. His parents in particular, his children. Others left, however. And they are still around and exist. Some of them have gone on to have strong careers in military service. That would be Joseph Mcneill, there is another one that im blanking on. As hell blair junior. He moves to massachusetts and did some additional post graduate work. He became a teacher and counselor. He does oral histories. In a way, these men have kept the history alive and have passed along their understanding of racial equality there ideologies on to a subsequent generation. I would argue that has been essential to how we end up at a moment like this, when people are once again employing similar tactics that we saw in the 1960s to advance a movement that may have gotten slightly off track by the 19 eighties. This is sue in burke, virginia. Thank you for waiting. Good morning. I just have a quick question for professor parker. You mentioned something about the protests going on, for a long period of time. How long did it take from when it started to win it ended . Was it continuous . Did they suburban people . What was the process . The greensboro sitin began february 1st. It ended july 25th. Its pretty much continuous. There is a twoweek moratorium undoing any sort of picketing and sit in. This was an agreement made between protesters and the city. That is a tactic that has been used for decades. We often call it the use of persuasion. Right . These backdoor meetings with management to try to create change. That doesnt work. As a result, the protests pick up again. These students leave for college vacation. Local highschoolers decide to fill their shoes and continue that movement. So, its continuous but it ebbs and flows in different ways on tactics that is going on. On this idea of how long it took from lunch counter sedans to change coming in an area, not greensboro, but in richmond. This is from the oral history interview with gloria grenell. This is from the library of Congress Oral history interview. I thought the world was going to change. I was so naive. Gosh. The police were very nice to me. I thought it was so nice that they held my hand as they guided me into the paddywagon. My aunt said i was being helped into the paddywagon on the news. I was angry because i felt like they lived in virginia, they should. The first thing i remember when i got arrested, we went to a courthouse. I am sorry. We went to jail. They put us in the cell, all of us. And it was smelly. I thought, dog gone, its not even a clean so can you go in. And then even the court was segregated. I felt like a lion hell right now . What is happening . Even the courts are segregated. Then i remember a black man came in and he was a drunkard. You could smell him. And i thought why do the drudges have to come in . Im thinking it is just going downhill fast. And i thought, am i losing my mind . You know . Horrible. Horrible. But i just thought now that we have set in, we have attorneys and will go to court and everything will be right and its not going to be any longer. But you can change laws, but you cant change people. That comes about through your doing, individually. Gloria grenell from her library of Congress Oral history interview. Tracey parker on which she remembered. She is right. I think that there is, for some protesters, there was this notion that this would happen and there would be immediate change. But in reality, there had to be some sort of consistent pressure on merchants, on local government, to ensure that they held their word. While citizens may have ended in some places, what that meant is that African American movement groups, the court, whether it was the southern christian leadership conference, the naacp, or even snake, which had grown out of the student nonviolent coordinating community, these students are doing constant checkins with businesses to ensure that they are following the new rules, to ensure that a democracy of a quality is being actually practiced in these places. And theres also the difficulty that you could target one store and at one store could integrate, but that doesnt mean that the story next door is going to integrate. Oftentimes, however, businesses would say well worth integrated. I dont want to be next. I saw what happened to them. So i would just go ahead and quietly integrate. But its a movement that is difficult, because it is a constant. There is no true uniformity or umbrella organization, even with well worth. They say, we follow the customs, the local customs of the location of our stories. So the racial politics, the racial practices of a woolworths in greensboro could be drastically different than one that is in richmond, for example. Jacqueline is next out of new orleans. Good morning. Good morning. How are you both . Doing well. What is your question or comment . I think it is more like two statements that i have. I have several, but i will try to be as fast as i can. One, i want to mention to you that my mother, in the sixties, she had a job at the waldens, that was like our mall. The store name was kind of like a macys. My mother got a job, there and my mother worked for a very few days, and it was a weekend, she went to work that monday and the person that hired her said i thought i saw you dolores. She asked, where and she said it couldnt have been you, because the man you were walking with was a black man, and my mom said thats my husband. My mother was not a white lady, but she is very bright. Because she was not a white lady, because she was white, they fired her immediately for that. When you talk about woolworths hiring black people, i understand that. When people stop spending money, thats what made those people change their minds. It is sad that you have to heard a person in their pocket before they have a change of reaction. I want people to think about that. We should not have to boycott and not spend our money for you to change your policies. I just want to say thank, you and these last three, months i am 55 years old, i have learned more about black history ever. I hope and pray that this will get to the United States government. We need to have black history in every school in the United States of america. It should be mandatory. Thank you for your time, and god bless you. And i appreciate cspan for allowing us to say what we need to say. Thank you guys. Thanks, jacqueline. Professor parker . You are. Write the story about being fired after and a player learning that one is in fact black was actually quite common. It is something that started as early as when Department Stores were in business. In my family, there was a story where, its a great aunt who was very, very fair. She had gotten a job in downtown baltimore. But it was well known that when her daughter might see her on the street, her daughter could not speak to her because of her employer found out she was in fact a black woman, she would be fired. And so thats actually quite common and so disappointing. And with regard hurds to businesses and governments making change, and usually that change comes from their pockets verdict, thats the truth of the matter. Very few times are you seeing businesses change because of humanitarian efforts. Even as early as the 19 forties, 19 fifties, the quicker, is the American Friends Service committee, which was a quakers organization, whats going around throughout the country in large cities doing surveys with customers as they were leaving the stores. They would do the survey with white customers and ask, would you be bothered if a black person was your sales person value major purchase. Overwhelmingly, white customers would say, i wouldnt be bothered. I am really only in there for the goods that i need. I would tolerated. It would be fine. I wouldnt find a new story to shop in. And still, managers, retailers, business owners, were so fearful of alienating their desired clientele, the white, middle, upper classes, that they still refused to do so. 15 minutes left this morning with professor Tracey Parker, author of Department Stores and the black Freedom Movements. We are considering or post there at the university, and callers comments about schools not teaching black history. The problem is that, to my mind, teaching history in middle school and high schools is a political project. We are teaching citizens the way Larger Forces want us to understand citizenship. As a result, what African American students learn is that they are secondclass citizens. Its not until they get to colleges, universities, and, again this is so important, why we need ethnic studies departments, African American studies departments, women in gender sexuality departments, because i hear overwhelmingly when i teach my class on the history of the civil rights, movement are the history of black women, that students are craving this information. Students are craving to know this history, and theyre able to see how important this history is for this moment. Im teaching an online civil rights course right now, and we were having a discussion. The connections that these students are making between what happened in the sit in movement or what happened in birmingham and 63, and making these parallels between whats going on right now. And all honesty, i think a lot of those students were in awe. They were impressed. But they were also encouraged and motivated to actually take part and to do something to change the racial politics of our country. Why cant schools in this country bring what you are talking about down to at least a High School Level . Thats a good question. I dont work with highschoolers. I dont know. I suspect that this is probably a variety of reasons. This is issues of funding, feeling like you are teaching to a test system. And im sure there is also a blatant desire just to not teach it. But i do think that if students have a stronger understanding about where everyone in this country has come from, to understand the diverse backgrounds of this country, to understand the diverse influence of slavery. And the influence of black protest on other movements as well, such as the lgbtqia movement, the womens movement, native americans have their own Freedom Movement and continue to. This is really important to understand who we are as citizens. Brooklyn, new york, allen is on the line for sudden participants. Good morning. Good morning. You are gassed, professor parker, mentioned she was active in baltimore. That brought back a memory to me. I was very active in a group from judge or college. We were from oregon state. And we were in the Civic Interest Group and did some citizens and baltimore under very hostile conditions. I just wanted to add that to the mix here. And i believe that it was a mitchell who was mentioned. I believe he later went on and became a politician. Two things remain. When i was on these picket lines, a white man came up to me. Im white. He said to me with great hatred, i would rather see my daughter dead than on a picket line. I think up to that point, i hadnt realized the emotional dimension of what we were attempting there. The second thing is, we were arrested. We were put into a police van and taken for a very wild and bumpy ride through baltimore. And when the freddy gray case came up, that really rang a bell. They had done the same thing and really sped it up and knocked him around, because the same thing happened to us. This is a 1960. I just wanted to share this. Allen, thank you for the call and the memories. Professor parker . Thank you for that comment. And what you are also pointing out is the interracial nature of these protests. I mentioned it was a youth movement. I also mentioned it was intergenerational. If you think about, it its the generation of emmett till, but its also his mothers generation. But its also the fact that the citizens had white supporters. And many of them were white College Students. These were white members of religious communities. Many times, you had a white student College Students coming down from the north, increasingly after 1962, to help out with voter registration, help out with the desegregation of public accommodations, to help out with the education of African Americans, southerners. It is quite important. And i love this story, so i will be brief. When the four men sat down at the lunch counter on that very first day, and they are getting these looks from onlookers of white people sitting at the counter, and they are fearful that they might be physically harmed or killed, an elderly white woman came up to one of them and put her arm on his shoulder and said that she was so proud of them, and that she had wished that Something Like this had been done ten years prior. So, the amount of white support comes in a variety of ways. Right . Its not simply the white College Students to come in the case of greensboro. They are coming from the Womens College at u. N. C. , or in the case of jackson, the jackson sit in the 1963, reverend at king he was a white chaplain, a White College student participated and sad alongside and moody during the jackson sitin. White support was coming from a variety of places. In the montgomery bus boycott, you had white female employers driving their domestics to work because the black domestic was not taking the bus out of protest. And so the interracial nature of this movement in the 1960s is very important. And i think again its important to the movement going on right now, the diverse diversity of the protesters out there fighting. As we get closer to 10 am and the end of our program, i want to ask you, what happened to that will wear this and that lunch counter . What happens in greensboro today . Most woolworths have closed throughout the country. But that woolworths is now a museum. So you can go and they do fabulous multi media stuff. There are some actors of some sort who detail what happened at the lunch counter sit in. So it is definitely. I havent been in some time, but its definitely worth going and saying. I will say, a couple of the lunch counter stools are in the smithsonian, the black History Museum at washington d. C. , if you are interested in seeing that as well. Thats down the street from our studio here in washington, d. C. Time for a call from chester on the line for sitin participants out of kansas city. Good morning. Kansas city, kansas. Good morning. In february of 1960 through june, there were four females and two males you participated in a sit in, not at wool warts, but at a restaurant. However, the same year, when we sent out the call to pick it in front of wool worths, to protest what they were doing, we are in every kansas and thats where we got to touch officer its movement in kansas city, kansas. I might add that in 1952, im 87 years old, i was on my way to korea. I had been sent to korea. Im on my way, and the city of kansas was so segregated, as much as alabama. I went to a store similar tool worth. They had a counter. It was an African American sitting on the back. This is 1952. In kansas city, the kansas city Kansas Branch refused to pick it in front of will. Kansas city became the laughing stock of america. That is when some of the people who had sat on the sidelines got involved. We started working on the Department Stores. I was chair of the committee. I have the document for everything. Even today, youll both the black and White Community dont like to be reminded, because it was only a handful of us that really got involved in kansas city, kansas. My sister was named Francis Hayward who lives in california now. It is still very very active and the Civil Rights Movement. Im just going to make sure i got this correctly, because my earpiece was going out a little bit. From what i understand is that there was the local naacp was reluctant to participate in a protest movement against will worth. Does that sound right . Yes. That is not surprising. I believe he was talking about the early 19 fifties, is that correct . Yes. The naacps agenda in the 19 fifties was to take a more litigation approach. Brown versus education case and similar other cases around the integration of schools. They were reluctant to do anything that would involve direct confrontation. They sort of jump on the bandwagon or become more comfortable with it by the time they get to the students, in part because they see how effective it is. King himself even articulated the effectiveness of doing sit ends and direct confrontation, as long as it was non violent. But at that point in time in the 19 fifties, and when the cold war, the nbc feet sleepy felt as though they did not make to want to make any miss steps to be labeled as a communist, but the real goal, the real agenda at that point in time, where the major goal, i should say, was to approach civil rights through the courts. About a minute and a half left to the program. I wanted to give it to you to answer the question, the legacy of those citizens of 1960. We think about 1960, but the citizens went well beyond 19 sixties, and they were employed in different ways. By the time you get to somewhere around mid sixties, late sixties, in washington, d. C. , and maryland, and places in the upper north, we see sittings used in conjunction with the economic boycott to racially integrate workplaces to ensure that African Americans can be hired and skilled positions. I also think i feel strongly that the sit in Movement Really helped facilitate khoury and the civil rights of 1964. Title two of which the discrimination of public accommodations. Despite these major legal moments like the brown versus education being one of them, public accommodations are one of the most integrated places in america today. Schools and housing remained quite segregated. A lot can be said about the success and the longevity of that success when it comes to public accommodation and the efforts of the sedans. Tracey parker is assistant professor of the department of African American studies of the university massachusetts. We appreciate your time this morning. Thank you. Friday night on American History tv beginning at eight eastern, living historians from our american artifact series, physician jack moody portrays a world war ii u. S. Army Battalion Surgeon at the annual Army Heritage days and carlile, pennsylvania. Doctor modis medical tent was set up as a 101st airborne battalion aid station. A local emergency room that would have been located close to the front lines. Watch American History tv, friday night and over the weekend on cspan three. On february 1st, 1960, for College Students that down to eat at a woodworths lunch counter in greensboro, North Carolina. Joined by a black and white allies, they enjoyed harassment and threats, but the citizens continued for months. Next, on real america, february one, the story of the greensboro for. Extension interviews with three of the four students
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