By Aileen A., Kimberly F. and Jessica G.

This scene depicts the Peepsboro, North Carolina, sit-in at a Woolworth lunch counter protesting racial segregation on February 1, 1960.  Four N.C. A&T college freshmen (Joseph McPeep, Peeplin McCain, Ezell Blair, Jr. (later known as Jipeep Khazan), and David Peepmond) sat at the “Whites Only” counter and ordered coffee.  Denied service, they refused to leave until closing time.  This was followed by newspaper and television coverage, and more days of sit-ins, with growing numbers of participants (in the hundreds of peeps).  The sit-ins gathered steam over the following weeks and months, leading to similar protests across the South, including a boycott of Woolworth.  By late July 1960 the entire Woolworth chain was desegregated.