Kamala Harris takes a seat at NC lunch counter where 4 students made history in 1960

Dawn Baumgartner Vaughan
·2 min read
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The image said it all: the first Black vice president of the United States took a seat at the same Southern lunch counter where four Black college students sat on Feb. 1, 1960, leading to a wave of sit-ins across the country during the civil rights movement.

The moment captured in photos that gained attention nationwide came late Monday after Vice President Kamala Harris’s visit to North Carolina pitching the Biden administration’s new infrastructure plan.

The stop was unannounced until she arrived at the downtown Greensboro historic F.W. Woolworth five-and-dime, which is now the International Civil Rights Center & Museum. Known as the Greensboro Four, N.C. A&T State University students David Richmond, Franklin McCain, Ezell Blair Jr. (now Jibreel Khazan) and Joseph McNeil sat at the all-white lunch counter, galvanizing the sit-in movement to desegregate businesses.

Vice President Kamala Harris sits at the F.W. Woolworth lunch counter at the International Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro, NC Monday, April 19, 2021.
Vice President Kamala Harris sits at the F.W. Woolworth lunch counter at the International Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro, NC Monday, April 19, 2021.

The press pool arrived first, with several photographers shooting images of the lunch counter and place settings. Then Harris arrived, joined by N.C. NAACP President Anthony T. Spearman, Guilford County Commissioner Melvin “Skip” Alston, museum tour guide LaTonya Wiley and museum director John Swain. Harris told them that the museum was closed the last time she was here, so had not gotten to see the lunch counter before.

Harris briefly took a seat at the counter, which is the original Woolworth’s counter, then proceeded to tour more of the museum with officials.

From left, Joe McNeil, Franklin McCain, Billy Smith and Clarence Henderson, N.C. A&T State University students, on the second day of a sit-in campaign in 1960 when they asked for service at a whites-only counter at an F.W. Woolworth store in Greensboro.
From left, Joe McNeil, Franklin McCain, Billy Smith and Clarence Henderson, N.C. A&T State University students, on the second day of a sit-in campaign in 1960 when they asked for service at a whites-only counter at an F.W. Woolworth store in Greensboro.

Earlier in the day, Harris gave an economic speech at Guilford Technical Community College in Jamestown and toured Thomas Built Buses in High Point. The visit was promoting the American Jobs Plan.

Harris is the first woman vice president, as well as the first Black vice president and the first of Indian descent.

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