Oct. 2011 made the Occupy movement national news - and it very soon spread from its origin in Manhattan. Fueled, ironically, by the same things that fueled the right-wing Tea Party movement - resentment of Wall Street and its role in causing the depressed economy, an abysmal job market for the middle class, and a perception that Washington just didn’t care about the plight of middle-class Americans as it did for its Wall Street cronies - Occupy was even here in North Carolina very soon. About two or three weeks after the flagship “Occupy Wall Street” was first national news, Occupies were founded in several North Carolina cities - Greensboro, Charlotte, and the “college town” of Chapel Hill.
I covered Occupy Greensboro by plan - and Occupy Chapel Hill while waiting to cover another story in that area of Chapel Hill. Occupy Greensboro I covered its first day - when it was a march from the area near City Hall, before it settled into a New York City-style encampment.. Occupy Chapel Hill was an encampment - if a tiny one - when I covered it, with all of 12 to 40 people depending on time of a weekend day present.
Occupy Greensboro attracted some 300 to its march that was its first day. People brought all sorts of homemade signs on all sorts of topics - again, ironically like any Tea Party rally that I’d covered. Like the Tea Party, Occupy was visibly fueled by unfocused rage - evident from the signs’ varied messages. The overall image, though - again like the Tea Party - was middle-class white people (mostly) who’d ended up poor through no fault of their own and were very angry (below).

This Occupy Greensboro member looks straight from a Tea Party rally.