York County Council honors Friendship Nine’s Clarence Graham

The York County Council on Monday marked the passing of a Rock Hill civil rights icon.

Council members unanimously approved a resolution Monday night expressing York County’s condolences to the family of Clarence Graham, one of the Friendship Nine arrested in Rock Hill during a 1961 lunch counter sit-in. Graham died on March 25.

“(T)hroughout the years, Mr. Graham served the Community by coordinating and providing educational talks to civic and school groups about the Friendship Nine, nonviolent protests, and civil rights,” reads the resolution introduced by Councilman William “Bump” Roddey.

A Rock Hill native, Graham was a student at Friendship Junior College when he and other African-American students staged a protest at a segregated McCrory’s Lunch Counter. Nine of the men were convicted of trespassing and breach of the peace in Rock Hill’s municipal court and sentenced to serve 30 days in jail or pay a $100 fine.

“Mr. Graham chose the 30-day sentence of hard labor at the York County Prison Farm, an action which marked ‘a first’ in the civil rights movement through the ‘jail, no bail’ protest strategy,” the resolution reads.

A year after his time in jail, Graham enlisted in the Air Force and went on to serve in Vietnam. He later returned to Rock Hill to work as a social worker.

In 2015, the convictions of Graham and the rest of the Friendship Nine were formally vacated in an emotional proceeding in the same Rock Hill court.

“Clarence Graham is remembered as an impeccable leader and mentor, a voice for the people, and as a man greatly influencing the civil rights movement, and whose legacy of selfless commitment to others will continue to positively impact the citizens of York County.”

This story was originally published May 17, 2016 at 10:28 AM with the headline "York County Council honors Friendship Nine’s Clarence Graham."