On February 1, 1960, four Black teenage college students sat at a whites-only lunch counter and catalyzed the civil rights movement.
Sixty-five years later, hundreds gathered at the very college campus where it all began, to honor the life of Gen. Maj. Joseph McNeil, who died on Sep. 4. He was 83.
The memorial service was held at Harrison Auditorium just a short walk away from Scott Hall at North Carolina A&T State University, where McNeil and the other Greensboro Four members — David Richmond, Franklin McCain and Jibreel Khazan — first thought of changing history forever by sitting down and refusing to move.
"Maj. Gen. Joseph McNeil, one of the A&T Four, whose faith and bravery at the Woolworth’s lunch counter lit a flame of justice that still burns bright today," said Rev. Vicki McCain, pastor of Presbyterian Church of the Cross and Franklin McCain's daughter-in-law.
Rev. McCain said the service was taking place on "sacred ground," as it was "a place where courage took root and changed the course of our nation’s history."
In an open-casket viewing followed by a two-hour service that featured the A&T Fellowship Gospel Choir, McNeil was surrounded by his family and the families of the other Greensboro Four.
He was praised for his courage and eulogized as an architect of the civil rights sit-in movement.
"His sitting was a major act of moral and spiritual protest," said Bishop William J. Barber II, who delivered the memorial's main eulogy. "For four young men to sit, because the weight of history and hand of God pushed them in those seats, it was a miraculous act, it had to be miraculous."
The ceremony began and ended with a presentation of the colors by the NC A&T Air Force ROTC to honor McNeil's career as a decorated Air Force veteran.
It was his ROTC military training at A&T that is believed to have influenced his organizing and resilience in the Greensboro Four's planned sit-ins, as they endured being shoved, spat on, and harassed while sitting at the Woolworth's lunch counter.
Franklin McCain Jr. reflected on how McNeil would now be joining his own late father, Franklin McCain, in heaven.
"I am certain that Uncle Joe and daddy are united in heaven laughing, reminiscing and perhaps even planning another bold stand or sit-in from heaven," said McCain Jr. "Lord knows we need it, too. 2025 is starting to look a whole lot like 1960, if you ask me."
The program included McNeil's family, the McCain and Richmond families, and a family representative of Jibreel Khazan, the last surviving Greensboro Four member.
McNeil's son, Joseph McNeil Jr., read an obituary for his father.
He referenced the Indigenous ancestry of his mother, Ina Brown McNeil, of the Hunkpapa Lakota people of South Dakota, where McNeil was once stationed in the Air Force.
"My father worked hard, very hard. We didn't see a lot of him," said McNeil Jr. "Now, we are the tools to seek that justice, to make this family, our family, your family, the family yet to come."
He added: "We must make this heaven on earth. We must not wait until we pass on to make that heaven."
Barber, whose passionate eulogy drew roars and cheers, said he changed his schedule and traveled 16 hours by car to be present at the Greensboro memorial.
"If we are really going to testify about how we honor Brother McNeil and how we honor all the others, maybe we need to sit down, but not to rest," Barber. said "To raise a challenge to the things that are going on. Maybe we need to sit down and take some heroic acts to change history."
Barber referenced the current moment of political violence in the U.S., saying that the "spirit of anarchy" is loose in the country.
"McNeil, he lived with the struggle of how he felt about this country and how this country felt about him, but he was not an anarchist," said Barber. "It's one thing to have debate with your country, it's another thing to want to kill the debaters you disagree with."
A final public viewing for McNeil will be heldv tonight from 5 to 8 p.m. in Wilmington at Davis Funeral Home.
He will be buried at Pine Forest Cemetery in Wilmington and final services will be held Saturday from 1 to 3 p.m. at Macedonia Missionary Baptist Church.
