The demonstration took place on June 23, 1957 when a group of African American protesters, led by Reverend Douglas E. Moore, entered the Royal Ice Cream Parlor and sat in the section reserved for white patrons.
[5] It also helped to spark future protests such as the Greensboro sit-ins and to promote coordination among African American civil rights activists across the Southeast.
[6] In 1896, the United States Supreme Court decision Plessy v. Ferguson upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation of public facilities under the doctrine of "separate but equal".
[8] In Durham, racial conflicts were arguably less severe than in other Southern towns and African Americans enjoyed more opportunities, including in the city's many tobacco plants.
Prominent leaders established their own businesses and developed a prosperous black neighborhood called the Hayti District, which had its own store, theaters, restaurants and hospital.
[9] However, as in much of the South, Jim Crow laws were still rooted in Durham, with segregation resulting in inferior facilities and housing, fewer employment opportunities for African Americans.
[12][13] However, after World War II, much of the progress in blacks' professional advancement was reversed, and many from the young generation were forced back into lower-wage positions.
[18] Long before the Royal Ice Cream Sit-in, community leaders such as Moore began to form alliances in order to promote a national movement.
[6] This practice was later noted by one of Moore's activist compatriots, Gordon Carey, who stated: "…When we reached these cities we went directly to the movement oriented churches.
[16] They met Sunday afternoons at Asbury Temple United Methodist Church, where Moore served as pastor, to talk about how to "push the envelope of Jim Crow’s Law.
[1] Now known as "the Royal Seven," the group included Mary Elizabeth Clyburn, Vivian Jones, Virginia Williams, Claude Glenn, Jesse W. Gray, and Melvin Willis, in addition to Rev.
"[22] Sparked by the Royal Ice Cream incident, local protests continued in and around Durham for years, mainly led and inspired by Rev.
[24] This first attempt at desegregation provoked a controversy within the black community in Durham, because the young activists threatened the delicate balance that had been cautiously maintained by the leadership of DCNA.
[5] However, several committee members questioned the approach, because the owner of Royal Ice Cream Parlor, Louis Coletta, was an Italian Immigrant.
This unsuccessful attempt did inspire a surge of youth enthusiasm, as black students continued to carry out the most active protests and challenge the conservatism of Durham's elder and privileged African American circles.
[27] A group of high school NAACP members, more than half of them girls, organized regular pickets outside the Royal Ice Cream Parlor, under the direction of Floyd McKissick.
[30] It revealed the shortcomings of unpublicized, spur-of-the-moment protests and also highlighted the challenges faced by black protestors in the legal and media contexts of the time.
[31] While the Durham Morning Herald featured the sit-in on the front page, the story was buried inside the Raleigh News and Observer and did not appear at all in the Carolina Times until a month later.
[citation needed] In 1960, Moore famously attested to the seriousness of the sit-in movement with the statement: "If Woolworth and other stores think that this is just another panty raid, they haven't had their sociologists in the field recently.
[35] Initially, North Carolina's Highway Historic Marker Committee maintained that the Royal Ice Cream Sit-in "did not have enough significance.