William Snoeyink (’18)

On September 23, 2023, a new North Carolina Civil Rights Trail marker was placed outside Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Chapel Hill, NC. The marker commemorates the 1964 Watts Grill sit-ins, which took place at Watts Restaurant and Motel on the stretch of highway where the church now stands. Calvin history alum William Snoeyink (’18) researched and wrote a short history of the events for his church website.

The post below contains an excerpt from his work. Read the full story on the Holy Trinity Anglican Church website:

In 1964, Chapel Hill was a small quiet college town in the South in the midst of the civil rights movement. In the 1960 US Census, the population was 12,573 people. The local black high school was Lincoln High School on Merritt Mill Road, while the local white high school was the old Chapel Hill High School. Chapel Hill had a reputation for being a liberal college town, even back then, but in 1964 a quarter of the restaurants and motels around the town were still segregated, refusing service to African-Americans. In 1963, a sit-in campaign was organized to try to convince local businesses to integrate, and to persuade the Chapel Hill Board of Aldermen (now known as the Town Council) to pass a Public Accommodations Ordinance requiring businesses to integrate.

Watts Restaurant and Motel was a white-only hotel and restaurant on 15-501, outside of the Chapel Hill town limits at the time. The restaurant had been rebranded as Watts Restaurant from Watts Grill in 1957 by husband and wife Austin and Jeppie Watts, but the restaurant was still known colloquially as Watts Grill. During the 1950s and early 1960s, the restaurant was a popular choice to host dinner banquets for fraternities and clubs at UNC. On the first weekend of January 1964, the restaurant was chosen by protestors to be the site of several sit-ins.

THE SIT-INS

On Thursday January 2, 1964, a group of student demonstrators entered Watts Restaurant aiming to be served. They included Lou Calhoun and Van Cornelius, two white UNC students, and black high school students from Lincoln High, Stella Farrar, Carolyn Edwards, and Mae Black, as well as James Foushee and Jerdene Alston from North Carolina Central University. When the demonstrators were refused service, they lay down on the floor, a common protest technique. At this point, Jeppie Watts hiked up her skirt and urinated on Lou Calhoun and James Foushee.

Lou Calhoun recalled that “I felt this stream coming down on me, and I thought ‘God, she’s got ammonia.’ I was holding my breath, trying to keep from breathing, and then she stopped, laughed and said, ‘Anybody that’d let somebody piss on them.’” Professor Al Amon from UNC, who accompanied them as a photographer, was spit upon by Mrs. Watts. Police were called, and the demonstrators were arrested for trespassing.

James Foushee was a veteran of numerous marches and sit-ins at Chapel Hill restaurants and businesses working with John Dunne, and Quinton Baker to organize them. He was arrested many times and participated in an eight-day hunger strike in 1963 in front of the Post Office as a way to change the minds of the merchants.

Jerdene Alston became a change-maker in the local civil rights movement when she was just a teenager. She recalls getting involved after seeing a flyer at her church advertising a meeting to train for the movement. As a freshman at North Carolina Central University, Ms. Alston began participating in non-violent demonstrations and sit-ins at segregated local establishments.

The following day, Friday January 3, 1964, a group of eleven, mainly professors from UNC and Duke, attempted a sit-in by going to Watts Restaurant. There were five Duke professors, Peter Klopfer (Biology), David Smith (Mathematics), Frederich Herzog (Religion), Robert Osborn (Religion), and Harmon Smith (Religion), and two from UNC, Bill Wynn and Albert Amon (both Psychology).

Alongside them were several UNC students, including Morehead scholar John Dunne, Tom Bynum, and Ben Spaulding. The final member of the group was Quinton Baker, president of the NAACP Youth Council, who was assisting the sit-in movement in Chapel Hill. The group didn’t even make it into the front door of Watts, as they were intercepted in the parking lot by the staff.

However, Professor Albert Amon, was identified from the previous evening, pulled in, and suffered severe physical abuse from Mr. Watts. During that time, the group outside was beaten and hosed down with water. While the peaceful group was being attacked both inside and outside of the restaurant, the police were summoned. Instead of being protected, the protesters were arrested and charged with a crime, while the violent attackers were not charged.

UNC student John Dunne stated, “I was brought up in a family which stressed Christian brotherhood, that emphasized that you treat everyone equally, that you don’t pick on the underdog… If one believes something, he should act according to it.”. When John Dunne came to Watts Restaurant along with Quinton Baker and others, he was not new to the risks and dangers of anti-segregation protests as he had been part of others. When Dr. Amon was pulled into the restaurant by Mr. Watts and assaulted, John ran inside and covered Dr. Amon’s prone body with his own.

Read the rest of the story and see images on the church website.

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William Snoeyink graduated from Calvin with a BA in History in 2018. He went on to complete an MS in Geographic Information Science, also from Calvin, and now works as a GIS technician in North Carolina, where he makes maps for soil scientists and agricultural engineers.