Skip to Main Content
Archives & Special Collections (ASC)

Louisville's 1961 Civil Rights Demonstrations: Headlines

50 Years Later...
Examining Louisville's 1961 Civil Rights Demonstrations

Headlines

Louisville's African American newspaper The Louisville Defender covered the student protests and the Nothing New for Easter Campaign extensively. The following are a sampling of the headlines from that period. Full articles are available on microfilm at the University of Louisville's Ekstrom Library.

February 16, 1961. Cross burned at home of CORE member. Stand-ins continue at Kaufman's and Stewarts.
February 23, 1961. Stewart's has CORE-NAACP members arrested. NAACP starts Easter Non-Buying Protests. Students pushed, fall during demonstrations. Nothing New for Easter Says NAACP.
March 2, 1961. Stores to integrate by April 1. Police arrest 72 pickets. Chief terms protests as mob violence. Segregation destroys the Louisville image. Negroes urged not to buy at Algonquin. 118 restaurants, six theaters are segregated.
March 9, 1961. Stand-in cases pending in courts.
March 16, 1961. Six hundred students-adults march on downtown. Three Negro leaders, 175 students-adults are jailed during mass arrest by police. Marchers parade singing to City Hall prayer meeting.
March 23, 1961. Negro leaders warn demonstrations to continue unless progress made. Nothing New for Easter Campaign still in effect.
March 30, 1961. Author Lillian Smith urges teenagers to support sit-ins.
April 13, 1961. Judge fines student stand-ins. Attorneys cite cases as unconstitutional.
April 20, 1961. Police arrest 38 juveniles and 1 adult. Demonstrations resume after no progress. Students integrate 17 restaurants in 4 days. Total desegregation by Derby.
April 27, 1961. What a record?- Louisville leads nation in sit-in arrests. Police brutality, racial violence now very evident. Mayor asks for integration by May 1.