Arthenia Joyner had had enough.
In February 1960, the 17-year-old could buy clothes at the F.W. Woolworth department store in downtown Tampa. But she was forbidden from trying them on first, in case she changed her mind and the garments went back on the rack where a white person would encounter them.
And there was no way she could eat at the store’s lunch counter, which was for whites only.
So when young Joyner’s peers planned to stage a series of sit-ins to peacefully protest the policy, she jumped at the chance to participate. By September of that year, a total of 18 department stores in Tampa had desegregated lunch counters.
The Tampa Woolworth store closed in the 1990s. Today, a historical marker stands on the site of those history-making sit-ins.
The events are also chronicled in the documentary Triumph: Tampa’s Untold Chapter in the Civil Rights Movement. You can watch the film for free at wedu.org/triumph.
Joyner went on to be an attorney, a Florida State Senator and an icon in Tampa’s civil rights history. There’s even a library named for her.
We recently visited Joyner at her office in Ybor City, where she still practices law.
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