The wave of student sit-ins that started in Greensboro, North Carolina, on February 1, 1960, reached Baton Rouge on March 28 when seven Southern University (SU) students were arrested for sitting-in at a Kress lunch counter to seek service. Public education was still segregated and SU was a historically black college. The following day, nine more students were arrested for sitting-in at the Greyhound Lines bus terminal. The next day Major Johns, an SU student and Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) member, led more than 3,000 students on a march to the state capitol to protest segregation and the arrests.