RALEIGH, N.C. — The Raleigh community said goodbye Friday to a local civil rights pioneer.

Former City Council member John Winters died Sunday at age 84. He was Raleigh's first elected black city council member in the mid-1960s.

Winters' funeral was held Friday at Sacred Heart Cathedral on Hillsborough Street in Raleigh, a nearly 90-minute service carried live by the WRAL NewsChannel and WRAL.com.

In the civil rights movement of the 1960s, Winters helped tear down the walls of racial injustice.

Winters also was a successful businessman. As a builder, he created affordable housing for African-Americans in Raleigh.

"We have lost a true icon, somebody who was a truly classy gentleman in the way he carried himself, in the way he embraced helping others and in the way that he cared about his community," State Auditor Ralph Campbell said.