March 4, 1960 might not be a significant date to most, but to the students and residents of Texas Southern University in Houston, Texas, this date means the end of segregation. Thirteen students, determined to be treated equally, set off to a local lunch counter to be served. Their actions were simple, but the impact it had on Houston’s Jim Crow laws was profound.
“We felt our time had come,” said John Bland, TSU student and sit-in organizer. “We just wanted to be treated like American citizens.”
This was Houston’s fist sit-in, the first of many movements the students’ held in the city to speak out against the Jim Crow laws of the time.
Inspired by the Greensboro, North Carolina sit-in in February, TSU students formed the Progressive Youth Association and met at the YMCA located nearby on Wheeler Street to begin strategizing their plan of attack against Houston’s segregation laws. In their “war room”, law student Eldrewey Stearns served as leader of the group. Driven by a racial confrontation he endured with the Houston Police Department in 1959, Stearns was a strong advocate of the movement.
“We wanted change, and it had to be something you had to be willing to die for,” said Stearns. “And, I was willing to die for a noble cause.”
On the day of March 4, the students met at a flagpole that was located in center of campus to begin their 45-minute journey down Wheeler Street to Weingarten’s supermarket lunch counter. As they march towards their destination, others joined them in their effort for change.
“By the time we got there, we had a full group for a demonstration,” said Holly Hogrobrooks, organizer of Houston’s sit-in.
Arriving at Weingarten’s, the students assembled and began to sit at the lunch counter and patiently waited to be served. Policemen were called and some white customers appeared to be angry that the students were there. In the end, the sit-in ended without incident and the students set their minds on focusing on other lunch counters and businesses.
The students were praised in the black community and word of their actions soon spread across the city. The students held sit-ins not only at lunch counters, but at segregated libraries, movie theaters, and retail stores.
“I think the movement showed that you could get some things done by direct action that might also be accomplished by legal actions, but usually would take longer,” said Otis King, sit-in organizer and Houston’s first African-American city attorney.
Local business leaders, black and white, began to take note of the students’ action slowly began to dismantle Houston’s Jim Crow laws. Soon after the March 4 sit-in, many segregated business changed their policies and open their doors to customers of all races.
“It became apparent that there wasn’t a need for segregation because the most important thing was a person’s ability to pay for a service,” said Brooks.
March 4 of this year marks the 50th anniversary of Houston’s first sit-in and TSU journalism professor Serbino Sandifer-Walker is paying tribute to these history makers. Since learning of the story, Sandifer-Walker recreates the day every year with her students by marching the same route to the location where history was made. She is now working with the Texas Historical Commission to have a marker place to remember the actions of the brave students.
“The March 4 event really change this city--it helped us see hope, work together and made an impact on society,” said Sandifer-Walker. “It’s especially significant that youth were committed to a cause to make the world a better place”
Sandifer-Walker is diligently working on a full day of activities leading up to the anniversary of the sit-in. She believes the accomplishments of the students should be praised and recognized. In her journalism classes, she tells the story of the TSU 13 to invoke a sense of pride and determination in her students.
“Their story must be told to generations to come,” she said. “They are TSU’s story. They are Houston’s story. They are a great American success story.”
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