Changing Gallery I

New Exhibition at State Museum Commemorates the 50th Anniversary of Tennessee Sit-Ins

The landmark events that helped shape the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s are the focus of an exhibition opened at the Tennessee State Museum on February 4, 2010.
          The exhibit, entitled We Shall Not Be Moved: The 50th Anniversary of Tennessee’s Civil Rights Sit-Ins continues through May 16 and is free to the public.
           During the 1950s and 1960s, African Americans began mobilizing in a massive movement against segregation. This included non-violent, direct action campaigns, which culminated in sit-in demonstrations, economic boycotts, and marches.
          Fifty years ago, a handful of Nashville college students from Fisk University, Tennessee A&I (later Tennessee State), and American Baptist Theological Seminary along with religious leaders Kelly Miller Smith and James Lawson, began a sit-in campaign targeting downtown lunch counters. These actions sparked the formation of a mass sit-in movement, which became the model used across Tennessee and the rest of the South.
        These actions will be examined in this special exhibition, organized by the curatorial staff at the State Museum. The exhibit also looks at segregation in the state and how significant resistance developed in African American communities. 
         Visitors will be able to view a department store similar to those found in the downtown shopping districts of Tennessee cities during this era. Shopping during segregation was a humiliating experience for both black men and women because they were not allowed to try on clothes or shoes; dressing rooms were for “Whites Only.” Water fountains, which are included in the exhibit, often appeared in pairs designated for “Whites” and “Colored.” 
         Lunch counters were prevalent in downtown stores during this era and frequently did not serve anyone other than the white clientele. These segregated establishments became the targets of the first sit-ins. The original stools from the sit-ins that took place at Nashville’s downtown W.T. Grant’s store are held in the museum’s collection and are prominently featured in the exhibition.
       An eight-minute film about the Nashville Sit-Ins has been created for the exhibit. The film contains original news footage taken in Nashville during 1960. "We wanted to produce the film especially for school children to help them better understand what was going on at that time," according to Lois Riggins-Ezzell, the museum’s executive director, said.
        The Museum’s Public Programs staff has also developed a one-person play about the time period, geared for school audiences. The play, set in a church in 1960, re-creates a non-violence workshop. The actor, while teaching about non-violent techniques, will also offer reflections about the sit-ins. The play is available during the week by reservation only for groups of 10 or more. Contact the public programs department at 615-741-0830 or e-mail public.programs@tn.gov for reservations.
        Although the sit-ins were organized as a non-violent action, occasionally students were met with violence from white bystanders, however it was usually the protesting students who were arrested and taken to jail. The exhibit examines why these students were willing to face possible violence and endure incarceration, and how their parents reacted. 
         The African American community, who watched the young students go to jail, was moved to action. Under the leadership of black churches, African Americans boycotted downtown businesses. With many white patrons also avoiding downtown due to the threat of violence, the Nashville retail economy suffered a lack of business. 
         Finally, on April 19, after NAACP attorney Z. Alexander Looby’s home was bombed, thousands marched from Tennessee A&I to the courthouse demanding justice in what became known as “The Silent March.” A confrontation there with Mayor Ben West served as the catalyst to ending lunch counter segregation in Nashville.
        The exhibit also covers similar events, which occurred in Chattanooga, Memphis and Knoxville and other locales.
         Along with period photographs of these events, the exhibit includes such artifacts as signage, which has been preserved to show examples of segregation during this time. Other important artifacts include a letter from a sit-in participant describing a protest and other items related to the sit-ins. 
        We Shall Not Be Moved: The 50th Anniversary of Tennessee’s Civil Rights Sit-Ins will be on view through May 16, 2010 in the museum’s Changing Galleries. Located at Fifth and Deaderick Streets in downtown Nashville, the museum is open 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., Tuesday through Saturday and 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday and is free to the public.

Photo captions:
Above top right: Student protesters sit-in at Walgreens on Fifth Avenue in Nashville, February 20, 1960. Photo by Jimmy Ellis, courtesy of The Tennessean.
Above top left: Bertha Gilbert arrested by police, May 1964. Photo by Harold Lowe Jr.
Above lower right: Nashville students and residents marched in silence on April 19, 1960, from Tennessee A & I and Fisk campus to the downtown courthouse in protest of the Z. Alexander Looby home bombing that morning. Front row, left to right: C.T. Vivian, Diane Nash & Bernard Lafayette; second row, left to right: Curtis Murphy & Rodney Powell. Photo by Jack Corn, Courtesy of The Tennessean.