The 1960 sit-ins at segregated lunch counters in downtown Nashville are considered one of the most successful student-directed campaigns of the Civil Rights movement. The nonviolent sit-in protests lasted from Feb. 13 to May 10, 1960, with Civil Rights leaders James Lawson, John Lewis, and Diane Nash participating. Here’s the story of the Nashville sit-ins, and how we became the first major Southern city to begin desegregating public areas.
Practicing Nonviolent Protests
In 1959, Rev. James Lawson founded the Nashville Student Movement and began teaching workshops on nonviolent protests to students from our historically Black colleges and universities: American Baptist Theological Seminary, Fisk University, Meharry Medical College, and Tennessee Agricultural & Industrial (now called Tennessee State University). Lawson taught the students how to remain calm and turn the other cheek while experiencing physical and verbal abuse.
The Counter Sit-Ins Begin
Operating under Jim Crow-era laws, African Americans weren’t allowed to eat at public lunch counters in Nashville. After hearing about the Greensboro, NC sit-in on Feb. 1, 1960, the Nashville Student Movement decided to make their move. On Feb. 13, 1960, 124 students, a number that would continue to grow, went to Kress, Woolworth, and McClellan in downtown Nashville to sit at their lunch counters. They were denied service, but continued to return. In an interview about the protest, John Lewis said, “Altogether it was a moving feeling within me, that I was sitting there demanding a God-given right, and my soul became satisfied that I was right in what I was doing.”
Violence Breaks Out
Protestors were attacked for the first time during a sit-in not long after, on Feb. 27, at Woolworth’s. John Lewis recalls: “A young student at Fisk, Maxine Walker, and an exchange student named Paul LePrad were sitting at the counter at Woolworth's. This young white man came up and hit Paul and knocked him down and hit the young lady. Then all types of violence started.”
John Lewis and other protestors were arrested, but the sit-ins continued, with white people continuing to attack students. On Apr. 19, someone bombed local attorney Z. Alexander Looby’s house, who was representing many of the arrested students in courts. Thousands of protestors marched to demand answers from Nashville Mayor Ben West, with Fisk junior Diane Nash leading the way. With her prompting, West admitted that segregation was wrong, and that lunch counters needed to be desegregated.
Desegregation Begins
On May 10, six downtown stores opened their lunch counters to Black customers, and we became the first major city in the South to desegregate public spaces. The Nashville sit-in campaign became a model for other civil rights protests. This was only the beginning of the movement here in Nashville and beyond. The Civil Rights Movement ended when President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
