Advocating for Civil Rights – Norwalk Historical Society Museum

African-American Migration from the South, 1940-1970

ADVOCATING FOR CIVIL RIGHTS

In 1960, one hundred local N.A.A.C.P. members picketed the F. W. Woolworth store on Wall Street to protest four black students being denied service at the lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina | Local History Room, Norwalk Public Library

Norwalk’s N.A.A.C.P. and C.O.R.E. chapters were central in local battles for racial equality, even litigating the city over housing and school desegregation.

The N.A.A.C.P. picketed local businesses, held prayer vigils, marches and sit-ins over social injustices at home and across the nation.

In 1954-55 Norwalk’s N.A.A.C.P. supported black and white union workers in the heated labor strike against the Hat Corporation of America. In a strategic move, the N.A.A.C.P. convinced local blacks not to cross the picket line and work in place of strikers.