GREENSBORO DAILY NEWS
Established July 18, 1909
W. SCOn TRUNDLE President
RICHARD L. HENDRICKS . . Vice President
RICHARD F. SPEARS Advertising Director
TERRY E. GANDY Circulation Director
WALTER RUGABER Executive Editor
WILLIAM D. SNIDER Editor
IRWIN SMALLWOOD Managing Editor
JOHN R. ALEXANDER Associate Editor
GREENSBORO DAILY NEWS
PAGE 4
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 4, 1980
The spark remains
The observance of the Woolworth's sit-
in anniversary last week was inspiring.
The spark was still there. Participants
who had not seen each other in years embraced and greeted as if 20 years ago were
still yesterday. The original four A&T stu-,
dents honored — Joseph McNeil, David
Richmond, Franklin McCain and Jibreel
Khazan, formerly Ezell Blair Jr. —
brought with them the same pride and
dignity that fueled the civil rights movement in the early 1960s.
Two of the events associated with the
celebration were especially moving: The
lunch with the four at the Hilton Inn and
the revival-like oratory of former UN Ambassador Andrew Young on the A&T campus. Unfortunately, the two events
overlapped; but neither could have accommodated a bigger crowd.
At the luncheon, key figures in the original Greensboro sit-ins joined with the
original four in a moving reunion. Dr.
Samuel Proctor, former A&T president
and pastor of New York's Abyssinian Baptist Church, praised the courage of the
four young A&T students whose public
protest expressed the long-held private
frustrations of older, middle-class blacks.
The change over 20 years, he noted, has
been dramatic.
But he also outlined the social agenda
that remains, and the difficulty of achieving those ends with the tactics of 20 years
ago. The struggle, he suggested, has
moved into the nation's classrooms and
boardrooms, where blacks are striving for
the same economic opportunities long ac- I
corded to whites. Andrew Young's mes-
sage, though more emotional in delivery,
expressed similar themes.
The civil rights movement of the 1960s
is no longer united around the single issue
of desegregation. The original four students stressed this in interviews during the
day. Each has gone his own way: Two are
in business, one has retired to a farm in
the mountains ("I'm a hermit now," he
said) and the fourth wears the traditional I
dress of Islam. The freedom to choose I
one's own path in life, they said, was an |
essential point of the early movement.
And so they sat at the refurbished Wool-
worth's lunch counter again on Friday and j
were served by a black vice-president of
Woolworth's from New York. History is a
study in irony. Thankfully in this case, history is also written by the victors.
Established July 18, 1909
W. SCOTT TRUNDLE Presid<
RICHARD L. HENDRICKS .. Vice Preside
I RICHARD F. SPEARS Advertising Direct
TERRY E. GANDY Circulation Direct
WALTER RUGABER Executive Editor
WILLIAM D. SNIDER Editor
IRWIN SMALLWOOD Managing Editor
JOHN R. ALEXANDER Associate Editor
PAGE 6
WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 23, 1980
Recalling the sit-ins
One unfortunate effect of the controversy over the scheduled February 2 anti-
Klan march is that a much more lasting
event is being overshadowed: Greensboro's commemoration of the civil rights sit-
ins begun here 20 years ago.
A committee of local citizens has been
working diligently to put together a lively
program of events beginning next week.
The honored guests, of course, will be
those four brave A&T students who took
their places in history at the Woolworth's
lunch counter on Feb. 1, 1960 — Franklin
McCain, Ezell Blair Jr. (now Jibreel Khazan), Joe McNeil and David Richmond.
One of the highlights of the celebration
will be the unveiling of a state historical
marker at the intersection of North Elm
and Friendly Avenues on Feb. 1. The marker will read, "Sit-ins launched the national drive for integrated lunch counters Feb.
1, 1960. in Woolworth's store two blocks
south."
Like almost everything else associated
with the original sit-in movement, the acquisition of this marker did not come easily or without controversy. It took the
intervention of Governor Hunt, a special
meeting of the Highway Historical Advisory Committee and the constant attention
of local people such as Guilford College
history professor Alexander Stoesen to get
the marker here on time.
But that's not all. Some folks in Durham
complained that Greensboro wasn't really
the first site of the sit-ins, that an earlier
1957 protest in their city started it all.
But as supporters of the marker here
note, that has never been the basis of
Greensboro's request. The sit-in was used
as a technique before 1960, and in other
parts of the country. Greensboro's claim
is that the sit-ins here launched a full-
fledged movement, spreading to other
parts of the state and the South as a
whole. In a real sense, it could be said that
the civil rights movement of the 1960s was
legitimately born at that lunch counter on
South Elm Street.
No wonder, then, that the Greensboro
committee has gone to such lengths to
bring back major participants and call attention to Greensboro's unique place in
the civil rights movement. On Thursday,
Jan. 31, for example, Bennett College will
honor Mrs. Gloria Eugenia Brown Wise,
the first female student to join the sit-ins.
That night a group of authors who have
written books about the sit-in will meet
the public at the downtown library. Friday, Feb. 1 will begin with breakfast at
Woolworth's, a convocation at A&T for the
original four students, a luncheon featuring former A&T president Dr. Samuel
Proctor, and the marker's unveiling in the
afternoon, among other gatherings.
It promises to be a memorable occasion,
and nearly every event is cordially open to
the public. Rarely can a city recall, much
less relive, such an immensely rich history. It would be a shame to let current
events win top billing over this meaningful
observance.
