NARRATOR: Today on The Daily Dose, the Greensboro Four makes civil rights history. When four Black college students refused to vacate a whites only lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, the Civil Rights sit-in movement of 1960 would spread across the South like wildfire, elevating the Civil Rights movement to a new level of national awareness.

Influenced heavily by Mahatma Gandhi's nonviolent protest philosophy, Ezell Blair, Jr., David Richmond, Franklin McCain, and Joseph McNeil refused to vacate a Woolworth lunch counter after they were refused service for the color of their skin. All four were students from the nearby North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College while their activist agenda was further inspired by the Freedom Riders, who tested the clout of the Supreme Court's recent decision banning segregation on interstate bus travel.

Other underlying motivation came from the brutal 1955 murder of Emmett Till, who had allegedly whistled at a white woman in a Mississippi store. Assisted by local white businessman Ralph Jones, on February 1, 1960, the four students sat down at the lunch counter at Woolworth's where the official policy was to refuse service to anyone but whites.

When the four young men refused to leave, police were called to the scene but were unable to take any action due to the complete lack of provocation on the part of the four students. By that time, Jones had alerted local media, who arrived in full force to cover the events on television. The four stayed until the store closed for the night, returning the next day with more student activists from other local colleges.

By February 5, some 300 students had joined the protest at Woolworth's, paralyzing the lunch counter and other downtown businesses. Heavy television coverage of the Greensboro sit-ins sparked a sit-in movement that spread rapidly to college towns throughout the South and then up into the north as young Blacks and whites joined in various forms of peaceful protest against segregationist policies, including libraries, beaches, hotels, and other whites only establishments.

While white pushback was frequently contentious, by the end of March, the movement had spread to 55 cities in 13 states, forcing previously segregated enterprises to quietly integrate by the summer of 1960. Today, the former Greensboro Woolworth's were the first sit-in took place now houses the International Civil Rights Center and Museum, which features a restored version of the lunch counter where the Greensboro Four first sat while part of the original lunch counter is now on display at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History.

And there you have it, the Greensboro Four moved civil rights to a national stage, today on The Daily Dose. Get your nerd on with The Daily Dose and learn something new every day. Subscribe to The Daily Dose on YouTube or sign up for emails at dailydosenow.com.