Famous sit-in photo stumps Jeopardy! players
By DIONI L. WISE News & Record Staff Writer

November 24, 2009

A famous photo of the Greensboro sit-ins taken by Greensboro Record photographer Jack Moebes was featured Tuesday on the popular trivia show “Jeopardy!”

In the second round of questioning, contestant Ben Davis chose the $2,000 question under the “Newseum” category.

The photo featured on “Jeopardy!”
(John "Jack" Moebes/©News & Record)

Then show host Alex Trebek appeared in front of a blow-up of the photo at the Washington, D.C., museum for journalism.

The photo depicts N.C. A&T students Joseph McNeil and Franklin McCain — two of the original protesters — along with Billy Smith and Clarence Henderson at the Woolworth’s lunch counter at South Elm Street and what is now February One Place. McNeil, McCain, Ezell Blair Jr. and David Richmond started the sit-ins on Feb. 1, 1960.

“A key moment in the civil rights movement was a sit-in protest after four black students were refused service at an all-white F.W. Woolworth lunch counter in this North Carolina city,” Trebek prompted.

Instead of asking “What is Greensboro?” the contestants responded with blank stares.

“That was Greensboro, North Carolina,” Trebek said.

The photograph was published in the evening edition of The Greensboro Record, a predecessor of the News & Record, on Feb. 2, 1960.

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