More often than not, most of the low paying cotton-field work jobs were occupied by Blacks, Hispanics and to a lesser degree its first peoples, Native Americans. Click here to read more about the impact of cotton on the lives of Arizona's African-American community. 1945 Opal Ellis and five other Phoenix Union Colored High School students sit in for 30 minutes six Sundays in a row at a coffee shop at Central Avenue and Adams Street. The Greater Phoenix Council for Civic Unity formed at the behest of Dr. Fred Holmes and attorney William P. Mahoney, Jr., both White. Their multiracial organization boasted nearly 500 members in its first year.
Local media reports the sit-in.
President Truman desegregates the armed forces. Carver Museum Photo Emerson Harvey was the first African American to play football at Arizona State University. 1950 Attorney H. B. Daniels and city employee Carl Sims are the first Blacks elected to the legislature by Phoenix's predominately black communities. 1951 Phoenix Council for Civic Unity, led by Lincoln Ragsdale, organizes a sit-in at Walgreen's lunch counter. Walgreen's agrees to open its lunch counter.