Catalyst and Reaction:

The Story of the Petersburg Library

Sit-in
Historical Methods Archival
Research

Kayla Pinson
12-10-2015
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Abstract

This presentation explores a local Library Sit-in in Petersburg, VA occurring in the

course of a wave of sit-ins in the American South during the Civil Rights Movement. It discusses

how the unique characters, location, and documents surrounding this event created a political

situation provoking responses consistent with other areas of the United State where African

American youth had conducted sit-ins. However, while the political and social responses to the

library sit-in were consistent with others, the municipal agreements surrounding the public space

were unique. Unlike in any other c where private property protected segregation, this public

space was tied to a deed that stated its integration would result in the city losing the property.

This distinction gained recognition that led to the interaction between fiery local organizers like

Wyatt T. Walker’s and national organizers like Martin Luther King: this would eventually result

in the construction of an organizations that would last throughout the era ultimately organizing

thousands for nonviolent demonstrations. Not only was the library sit-in the first of its kind

during the Civil Rights Movement, but it was a catalyst to a local movement that drew national

attention to the city of Petersburg. By looking at this event we see how municipal agreements

and political prejudice construct the actions of demonstrators and how a small town’s reactions

to a nationwide problem influence the formation of a national organization.

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The Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s can be broken down into demonstrations that

occurred across the countries in waves. Marches, freedom rides, boycotts were techniques that

surged the country’s youth to demonstrate locally in cities around the nation. Demonstrators in

order to draw attention to the Civil Rights struggle as well as challenge the discriminatory

practices of their local communities and demonstrate for the right to be treated as equals. Often

these demonstrations would influence other in immediate proximity and would fan out until the

technique was used on a wide scale nationally. The Sit-In movement, with its own place in the

Civil Rights Movement, was no different as it began in Greensboro, NC and spread throughout

the Southern colleges with rapid fire.1 The individual demonstrations that make up this wave

have their own unique stories.

The Petersburg Library Sit-in was different from many of the other sit-ins in location,

background history, and intention, it was met with the same response of other sit-ins of the

movement and paralleled other protest along the lines of community organization, legislative

response, and continued demonstration.

The Sit-in wave began for Petersburg when black teenagers occupied lunch counters at 3

downtown restaurants. At around 3 p.m. teens went to S.S. Kresge Company, McLellan’s, and

W.T. Grant Company and demanded servicer. The news reports that most of these students were

from Peabody High School. In the days leading up to this demonstration there were protest

1
The first sit-in ever recorded was in a public library in Alexandria, Virginia that was only available to
whites. As replicated by the sit-ins of the 60s, five well dressed and well-mannered black men entered
the library, asked to check out a book, and when refused, sat down began to read the book. While they
were unsuccessful in making any headway in desegregation, the city built a separate library for black use
only. It is unclear if the 1939 event had ever been heard about by sit-in demonstrators during the early
sit ins in the 1950s and the surge in the 60s but the tactics and practices used by the five men in
Alexandria have been replicated in many movements and appealed to law makers.
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happening daily in surrounding cities in Virginia.2 Yet in the coming week, the spark these teens

ignited would grow into a fire that would reach all the way up to the Supreme Court.

On February 27th, 1960, twenty-one African Americans walked into the Petersburg Public

Library, flooded the aisle and began reading. Theresea Hodges asked the students to return to the

basement of the library which had been designated for blacks. The upstairs levels of the library

were dictated for white library users only, where they were free to walk through the aisle and

surf through the books, while blacks were confined to the basement and would have to choose

their books from a small section from or from a catalogue where they would have to ask the

librarian to retrieve it for them. When the librarian could not get the demonstrators to move to

the area designated for people of their race she called the police and the city manager Roy Ash

who then ordered the library to close.3

Ash ordered that the library remain closed until the city council met to discuss the matter

at their meeting the next Tuesday. At this meeting the council passed an anti-trespass bill which

set the fine to $1,000 and 50 days in jail.4After the library sit in, demonstrators and others

thought that at the city council meeting they were going to discuss the matter of desegregating

the library, instead the result of the meeting was a law that attacked the demonstrators and

discouraged them from demonstrating for their rights. The anti-trespass law passed hastily

through city council was a response to the library sit-in in order to discourage future and larger

demonstrations. This was a legislative response to incite the fear of punishment. While it can be

viewed as a preventative consequence it also shows the city’s dedication to segregation. Hasty

anti-trespass bills were common to other areas of mass demonstration, created with the intent of

2
“Negroes here Stage Sitdowns in Stores” Robert C. Smith, The Progress Index, Feb. 24, 1960
3
“Negroes Here protest segregation at Library” Ezzell, Jimmy, The Progress Index (Petersburg, VA), Feb. 28, 1960.
4
“ Anti trespass bill passed” The Progress Index (Petersburg, VA) March, 2, 1960
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discouraging protesters. They commonly had outrageous fines of $500 and up as well as time in

jail which warded off many college students who did not want to embarrass their family with the

stigma of prison. 5 Along with eight students from Virginia State College and two preachers were

arrested after testing the anti-trespass on March 7th. One of the preachers was the organizer,

Wyatt T. Walker.

Wyatt T. Walker, organized the protest for multiple reasons. While the fight for

desegregation was at the forefront of his motivations, he was also motivated by an external factor

caused by an unlikely group. In September 1959, a year prior to the library sit in, Rev. Walker

wrote a petition to desegregate the library and was scheduled to present the petition to the

Petersburg city council when the National NAACP chapter ordered him not to pursue it because

they would not be able to supply the lawyers to defend the case. Fifty years later, in a spotlight

review of the demonstration Walker reflects "I felt my credibility had been compromised….. So

I formed a Petersburg Improvement Association, and that was the umbrella group of the

community."6 His feeling of belittlement by the NAACP led him to organize a separate

organization through which he could freely pursue that demonstration but he in order to restore

his credibility he felt obligate to spearhead the movement for the desegregation of the library.

As detailed in Direct Action and Desegregation, “no spontaneously-generated

phenomenon can sustain itself without some form of organization.”7 The library sit in and the

support that it has garnered lead to the creation of an organization that would sustain the

movement and also organize the community boycotts and train sit-in participants. The PIA

5
Morgan, Iwan, and Phillip Davis. From Sit-Ins to SNCC: The Student Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.
6
“The 50th Anniversary of the Petersburg Library sit-in, the first of the civil rights era” Markus Schmidt, The
Progress Index, February 26, 2010
7
Laue, James. Direct Action & Desegregation, 1960-1962: Toward a Theory of the Rationalization of Protest.
Carlson Publishing, 1989. Pg. 72
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leadership roles were held by two people who has neem influential in the sit in: Rev. Wyatt T.

Walker and Virginus B. Thornton a Virginia State College student who had help to organize the

sit-in. The NAACP and the PIA were the main organizations that supported the library sit-in as

well as the movement in Petersburg. Wyatt T. Walker was a part of both of these organizations

serving as the founder of the PIA and the president of the Petersburg NAACP chapter.

Nationally many of the student led sit-in would bread community organization that would latter

culminate in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). This national

organization became the hub for black youth participation in the Civil Rights Movement and was

evidence of the commitment to continued demonstration of students around the United States.

There was an ideological break between younger and older demonstrators in the Civil

Rights Movement. The sit-in was a representation of the use of civil disobedience and blatant

divergence of the rules and breaking a law. Older demonstrators still viewed breaking the law as

criminal no matter how unjust the laws were and the leadership sought to use judicial decisions

and laws to enforce desegregation.8 This break between ideology and practice is the reason why

this sit in revitalized the movement. Through direct action and sitting in, there was contact

between dominate and subordinating groups and the act itself changed the narrative of

segregation being a system that was accepted by everyone since segregation was more customary

than lawful.9

The situation of the library was different from lunch counters because argument was the

rights of private property ownership even though the space was technically public. However, by

occupying a public space such as the library the state would have to uphold the law of

8
Morgan, Iwan, and Phillip Davis. From Sit-Ins to SNCC: The Student Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s.
9
Laue, James. Direct Action & Desegregation, 1960-1962: Toward a Theory of the Rationalization of Protest.
Carlson Publishing, 1989. Pg. 7
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segregation hence the passing of the trespass laws and the deed that dictated segregation in the

library facility were enough to arrest demonstrators. It is noted that this was the first library sit-in

of the civil rights movement that was rightfully chosen because it would have to be addressed

uniquely and for Rev. Walker to finish what he started when he began the petition in 1959. 10

The deed of the library was also a tool stifling desegregation not at the intent of the

original proprietor but because of the city council’s refusal to abate its dedication to the

segregated system. The library was a gift from the family of William R. McKenny, a well-

respected lawyer and Petersburg native. His widow and daughter gifted their old house to be

used as the public library in his name. In 1923, when the deed was written, the wife of William

McKenney added a provision that required the library facilities be segregated or else the

property be returned to the McKenney Family. After the sit-in and call for desegregation in by

the PIA in City Council meetings, the city council and its attorney used the deed to justify why

the facility could not be desegregated to the people of Petersburg and the PIA who was leading

the rally to desegregate the library.11

The daughter of William McKenney, who was still alive and had helped her then

deceased mother with the dedication of this gift to the city, actually wrote two letters to the city

manager informing them of her support of the desegregation of the library. She states that while

she does not agree with the tactics used to spark this discussion of desegregation she wished to

“back Petersburg Negros now that they have taken the initiative.”12 She then speaks to her

fathers and the original intention of the deed to no. She believed that a building in his name

10
Laue, James. Direct Action & Desegregation, 1960-1962: Toward a Theory of the Rationalization of Protest.
Carlson Publishing, 1989. Pg. 8
11
“McKenney Heir Favors Integration of Library” The Progress Index (Petersburg, Va), April 3rd, 1960
12
Ibid.
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should not humiliate anyone especially not a group of people that he had worked with in the

latter part of his life. McKenney had spearheaded a movement for the improvement and creation

of schools for black to close the achievement gap. The reason that the family suggested

segregation so that blacks would have a library facility they could use and in 1923 when they

were rarely opened to colored people at all it was the most logical to have it be available on a

segregated basis in order for the black users not to face any degrading acts while they are trying

to read. The intent of the provision is to give dignity to African Americans not demean them and

Mrs. Claiborne stated that the continuation to follow that provision written in a different social

time is to go against its original intent.13

It should be noted that first letter she sent to the city council was sent at the same time

which Rev. Walker was petitioning to have the library desegregated but was halted by the

National NAACP therefore when the calls for desegregation began, the city manager was already

aware of her position. However, the response of the city attorney that the matter of whether she

herself could solely give permission to desegregate the library would have to be settled by a

judge because she was not the last surviving heir as she had stated in her letter and one was an

infant. 14 He said that he writing was no more than opinion but it would not influence much.

In brief, the Petersburg library sit-in was chosen to challenge the custom of segregation in

Petersburg because it was the only space that belonged to the public and Rev. Walker’s sight had

been set on it for years. Ultimately, while the segregation stipulation was unique to the library,

13
“McKenney Heir Favors Integration of Library” The Progress Index (Petersburg, Va), April 3rd, 1960
14
“City Officials Decline Comment Pertaining to Library Integration” Marry Cherry Allen, Progress Index
(Petersburg, VA), April 4, 1960
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the city’s response of enforcing a trespass law to prevent demonstrations fit into the common

narrative of southern states being dedicated to segregation.

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Bibliography

Manuscript Collection

Virginia State University Archives

Robert P. Daniels Papers

Newspapers

Norfolk New Journal and Guide

The Progress Index

Published Primary Sources

The 50th Anniversary of the Petersburg Library sit-in, the first of the civil rights era” Markus
Schmidt, The Progress Index, February 26, 2010
“Anti-trespass bill passed” The Progress Index (Petersburg, VA) March, 2, 1960

Ezzell, Jimmy. “Negroes Here protest segregation at Library” The Progress Index (Petersburg,
VA), Feb. 28, 1960.
“McKenney Heir Favors Integration of Library” The Progress Index (Petersburg, Va), April 3rd,
1960

“Negroes here Stage Sitdowns in Stores” Robert C. Smith, The Progress Index, Feb. 24, 1960

Marry Cherry Allen, “City Officials Decline Comment Pertaining to Library Integration”, The
Progress Index (Petersburg, VA), April 4, 1960

Published Secondary Sources

Laue, James. Direct Action & Desegregation, 1960-1962: Toward a Theory of the

Rationalization of Protest. Carlson Publishing, 1989.

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Morgan, Iwan, and Phillip Davis. From Sit-Ins to SNCC: The Student Civil Rights Movement in
the 1960s.