OU and Prentice Gautt and me....

[CTOkie]

In 1957, Bud Wilkinson had Prentice Gautt on his roster and a year later added Wallace Johnson....both from OKC Douglas.
Given the racial climate at the time nation wide, I can only imagine the ridicule Coach Wilkinson, Gautt and Johnson must have had to deal with and no doubt opposing coaches used OU's inclusion of two black players against OU in recruiting.
A decade later in 1967 when Jack Mildren became one of the top two quarterbacks in the nation coming out of Abilene Cooper, many schools (and no doubt Darrell Royal) "warned" Mildren that he would have to play with black players if he went to OU.
A few random things to share:
In my years of following OU athletics I have never been aware of any racial turmoil at OU, even during my time as a student there in the late 1960's. Mostly all I heard were complaints about how these liberal Yankees were coming to OU and causing problems. My ROTC instructor would kid me about being from New Jersey, even after I told him I was born in Wichita Falls and had lived the first 11 years of my life in Texas and Oklahoma. No one, however, complained about the out-of-state tuition my family was shelling out, which was twice as much.

It's always been strange to me that UT integrated its football team some 15 year AFTER Bud Wilkinson did so at OU in 1956.....UT, in the liberal "mecca" of Austin. It took a long time for coaches like Royal and Bryant to discover the advantages of integrating their programs. Evidently the Darrell Royal of the 1950's and 1960's was not the same Darrell Royal who persuaded Earl Campbell's mother to allow her son to come to Texas.

I believe OU is doing what it has to do at this time in trying to restore its image, but whatever measures are allowed to be put in place may not protect OU from a damaged image. OU's intense effort to put out this fire reflect that.

As a kid living in Houston from 1956-1960, my following (and obsession) of OU football began.....I taped a picture of Prentice Gautt on a wall in my bedroom as he was my favorite Sooner. When I looked at that picture the only colors I saw or cared about were crimson and cream.....and I vividly remember watching on television Gautt's 58 yard run against Syracuse in the 1959 Orange Bowl for OU's first score in a 21-6 win.

Anyway, whatever faults my parents had, their efforts to raise me in a good home and to consider the rights and welfare of people were successful. Not until I lived in New Jersey from 1960-1969 did I really become aware of how rampant racial hatred really was.....nation wide. What I saw on the news of lynchings, murders, bombing a Sunday school killing 4 little girls, riots and King's assassination in 1968 were one thing. When I attended a church sponsored summer camp near Albany in 1963 (I was 14), I was the only white kid there among 200 or so black and Puerto Rican kids from the NYC area. I had fun and was accepted with no problems. When I came home and told where I had been to a friend across the street, whose parents were dedicated church goers, he would have nothing more to do with me. It was also a time when I began to question just how "Christian" church going people really were....and to this day, I still do. I have never understood that kind of "mental agility".

 

[gsxrace01]

Originally posted by CTOkie:
In 1957, Bud Wilkinson had Prentice Gautt on his roster and a year later added Wallace Johnson....both from OKC Douglas.
Given the racial climate at the time nation wide, I can only imagine the ridicule Coach Wilkinson, Gautt and Johnson must have had to deal with and no doubt opposing coaches used OU's inclusion of two black players against OU in recruiting.
A decade later in 1967 when Jack Mildren became one of the top two quarterbacks in the nation coming out of Abilene Cooper, many schools (and no doubt Darrell Royal) "warned" Mildren that he would have to play with black players if he went to OU.
A few random things to share:
In my years of following OU athletics I have never been aware of any racial turmoil at OU, even during my time as a student there in the late 1960's. Mostly all I heard were complaints about how these liberal Yankees were coming to OU and causing problems. My ROTC instructor would kid me about being from New Jersey, even after I told him I was born in Wichita Falls and had lived the first 11 years of my life in Texas and Oklahoma. No one, however, complained about the out-of-state tuition my family was shelling out, which was twice as much.

It's always been strange to me that UT integrated its football team some 15 year AFTER Bud Wilkinson did so at OU in 1956.....UT, in the liberal "mecca" of Austin. It took a long time for coaches like Royal and Bryant to discover the advantages of integrating their programs. Evidently the Darrell Royal of the 1950's and 1960's was not the same Darrell Royal who persuaded Earl Campbell's mother to allow her son to come to Texas.

I believe OU is doing what it has to do at this time in trying to restore its image, but whatever measures are allowed to be put in place may not protect OU from a damaged image. OU's intense effort to put out this fire reflect that.

As a kid living in Houston from 1956-1960, my following (and obsession) of OU football began.....I taped a picture of Prentice Gautt on a wall in my bedroom as he was my favorite Sooner. When I looked at that picture the only colors I saw or cared about were crimson and cream.....and I vividly remember watching on television Gautt's 58 yard run against Syracuse in the 1959 Orange Bowl for OU's first score in a 21-6 win.

Anyway, whatever faults my parents had, their efforts to raise me in a good home and to consider the rights and welfare of people were successful. Not until I lived in New Jersey from 1960-1969 did I really become aware of how rampant racial hatred really was.....nation wide. What I saw on the news of lynchings, murders, bombing a Sunday school killing 4 little girls, riots and King's assassination in 1968 were one thing. When I attended a church sponsored summer camp near Albany in 1963 (I was 14), I was the only white kid there among 200 or so black and Puerto Rican kids from the NYC area. I had fun and was accepted with no problems. When I came home and told where I had been to a friend across the street, whose parents were dedicated church goers, he would have nothing more to do with me. It was also a time when I began to question just how "Christian" church going people really were....and to this day, I still do. I have never understood that kind of "mental agility".

i went to a church from birth to 16 that didn't allow black people,they were racist,and oklahoma is full of them,sorry,but it's true.

This post was edited on 3/14 8:18 AM by gsxrace01

 

[WhyNotaSooner]

Nice post CT.

As a kid growing up in Houston, I clearly remember my earliest grade school years before integration. And while I'm sure it was a 'hot' topic, I can't ever remember my parents openly discussing it in front of myself and three sisters except one time. I remember being over at my Aunt's house for dinner one time. The discussion at the table turned to the subject of black kids coming into classes. My Aunt & Uncle were very vocal against. I was about 6 ot 7 yrs or so, and it was the first time I can recall hearing the N-word. Even weirder, looking back, they didn't have any kids, so I'm confused on their concerns. But I remember my Dad spoke up and asked them not to discuss the subject in front us. But yet they continued to do so. Dad simply stood up and very calmly said, "It's time to go". We left immediately. There was no yelling etc. as Dad was always a soft spoken man, a pretty calm & collected guy but he sent a message to us kids whether he knew it or not. At least me anyway.

Fast forward to Jr High 5 or 6 years later, by this time, JFK & MLK were shot. There was some serious fighting in the streets as there was constant fights at school. White against Black and vice versa. I was fortunate in that I was never hassled and I always stayed out of the frey somehow. But it was a pretty bad time in the late 60's at my school. Fights occurred daily. The only place I felt comfortable at was with the football team. It was comprised with both Black & White kids and we all got along pretty good. Looking back, I don't ever recall a fight between the team.

When my Dad left East Texas and moved to Houston to find work after WW2, he was much older than his 7 sisters. Eventually, one by one, sometimes two by two, all seven of his sisters moved in with him as they left for Houston to make their way to adulthood and find work. He was very close to his sisters. He practically raised them as their Dad died when they were all very young. Having said this, we never completely stopped seeing my Aunt & Uncle, although we did not visit with them as often. I've always wondered if it was my Uncle that influenced my Aunt because I'm pretty sure that her hate and racism did not come from her surroundings at home.

I'm not sure why I'm sharing this, other than to this day, I'm proud of my Father and how he raised us. I'm not saying that all of us are taught hate from our early home lives, but looking back, IMO there is no doubt that we as humans are programmed by our immdeiate surroundings at all stages.

I'm also not sure we as people will ever see racism subside. All I know is that the world is full of hate and seems to constantly foster growth. But somehow as a people, we all must do better and send the message that it can't be accepted. Boren did that this week. Whether one accepts it as a political move or a PR move is irrelevant. The only thing that matters is like my Dad, Boren basically got up from his desk and said, "It's time to go." I'm very proud that he did this.

Boomer Sooner.

 

[CTOkie]

Realistically, the world is becoming more and more a place of conflict and nothing can stop the trend.....not the glowing declarations made by church leaders, college students demonstrating or politicians....and we keep electing "leaders" who continually get us into reckless and costly wars and who are too often sociopathic. Case in point: look who is running for the 2016 presidency from either party. 320 million people here and we keep recycling a Clinton or a Bush for most of 23 years along with the other rodeo clowns.
I'm tired of voting for the lesser of two or more evils.

 

[sybarite]

I wonder if this thread will last, being of the type that is often considered political, although race shouldn't be.

I think most people my age grew up as racists. That doesn't mean that we would have hung a black man. I'm not sure how many would have had the guts to stop a lynching. It might disturb the neighbors. It doesn't even mean that we would insult an African-American or belittle him. We just found ways that they were different, and we found excuses for our behavior, justifying what was really somewhat racist behavior. The racist rarely knows that he is a racist, or would want to be known as one.

I think it was the draft that began a transformation. For the first time, I was in the same boat as a bunch of black kids. They treated me like dirt, just as they did the black kids. We were draftees, trainees, and other deplorable kinds of trash. It took a couple of comments for me to understand that when I got out of the Army, I would be white again. My friends would still be black. They would always be the draftees or trainees, those who were inferior. I would return to being white.

I was tentative in my actions at first, working with some fair housing groups. I got to know the people that I worked with. After a few months, a black civilian asked me for some help in getting a group off the ground that would assist young kids that might be missing a parent, etc. They had tried to get the kids to come to the basement of a church after services, but nobody came. I suggested that they take them to a baseball game. When they couldn't get anyone to commit, I paid for I think it was twenty-five kids to go to a Baltimore Orioles game. All were black. It got the group off the ground. I later got a lot of educated military to act as big brothers to tutor and advise these kids, most of whom were black. But, there were probably about ten percent poor whites. I didn't really know that we had a group until someone showed me my picture, along with that of the black civilian, in the local county newspapers. We were the "co-founders" of an organization called The Concerned. I didn't know that. He had made up the name and released the story. The Sun picked it up along with a local congressman. That led to the Pentagon picking it up. We got a congressional citation. The military people who had worked with us got pentagon citations. Imagine, military personnel benefiting a community. But, that we really a start in understanding racial disparity, not a conclusion.

I had the experience of being the only white at an all-black fraternity party at Morgan State as an Army friend let me become aware of what he faced every day as a black man in a mostly white educated scientific community. He was the best man at my wedding, which also led to some interesting stories that I won't tell until after certain people are dead. My in-laws had never met me. My best man was black. Any pictures growing in your minds? OK. Since my parents couldn't come, I had the ushers sit may major professor and his wife, both of whom were black, in my parents seat. Picture becoming clearer?

I have spent the past forty-five years learning about race and racial differences. I'm still white. I recently had a very good black friend tell me that he considered me the least racist person he had ever met. But, he said, that in the back of his mind, there could come a time when, under stress, I would call him a n............ The anxiety of dealing with whites and being betrayed by them so often made even the best of friends cautious.

Now, regarding the liberal mecca of Austin. It really is. In some ways, Norman is. That doesn't mean that Austin is purely liberal. The legislature of Texas is as absurd as the Oklahoma legislature. The powers that be behind UT are probably as bigoted as they were fifty or a hundred years ago. But, the student body of Austin and the surrounding supporting system is somewhat of a mecca in that there is actually a social community for blacks and mixed students. That didn't exist when I was in Norman, but that is a few years back.

I think it is something that we have to admit and work on. After years of working in groups to promote race relations, I still make mistakes and assumptions that are incorrect. I look back at things that I did or said twenty years ago with horror, and I had been working in race relations for twenty years prior to that. There are differences.

But, let me make you aware that two garden clubs are competitive and learn to hate and distrust each other if they are competitive. Differences of all types are problems. There are places that it is not safe to be a Christian or a Muslim. I don't know of anywhere in the world that it is safe to be a woman.

 

[Plainosooner]

You guys can't just confine your discussion to race issues. It is not the act of conservative legislators that have gotten the country into an economic mess that will likely cause our demise at some future time.

And there is some sort of implication that conservatives are responsible for most racism. And that is nonsense. CT's rant about war is shallow. We didn't go choosing to be belligerent. It just seems that when a former KKK leader in congress is from the left side of the aisle, then his past sins are glossed over, even when his track record of graft and corruption of across the board issues are well known. He was just a curmudgeon doing what Senators do. But when the other party has something akin to that sort of exercise of power, it is dissected piece by piece in the national liberal media. It is not just confined to Austin.

African American conservatives are particular targets of the same. Let's not go messing with an important power base.

Changing over, I can testify that things did get a little testy in the athletic department and specifically in the late 60s. It was a hard time to be a young male in America anyway. JFK got is into Vietnam, and as things escalated many young men had the draft hanging over their lives. It affected everything.

And those feelings of uneasiness spilled over into other relationships. Every OU football player was required to be in ROTC as a freshman. Mostly, that was about managing their future availability. Then came the draft lottery.

Chuck Fairbanks had a policy of no facial hair for his athletes. But it was said that it was part of African American culture, so all black players were excepted. You can imagine how that went over with the white guys. When Barry took over, btw almost simultaneously with the national announcements to end our involvement in Vietnam, one of his early acts was to take away the facial hair rules. Seems sort of silly today, but that's the way it was.

When I was in high school in Plano, the eighth grade was in high school and it was my families first year there. It was also the first year of integration. 1964. The school district did things right mostly. In the planning, they included black leaders in the process. There were very few overt issues. Part of that was because of the football program. By the time I had my minimal little involvement in Plano Wildcat football, John Clark was the head coach and his leadership made it clear that there was no such thing as color. Now this was Texas and there was plenty of subtle racism when whites were together. I suspect there were similar things on both sides.

My junior year was Plano's second state title. 1967. We had an African American quarterback whose 93 yard TD run in the state title game fourth quarter was the game's key play. Two white kids who'd been the starting quarterback in their JV teams, quit football when it became obvious that he'd win the job in August having played halfback earlier. All kinds of messages were sent.

In those days, UIL rules were that any transfer for any reason, could not play varsity football or basketball for a year. So there were no African American athletes until 1965. It is not a coincidence that what became known as a top level program statewide, had their first state championship that season. Six more followed over the years. That team had a tackle fast enough to be part of the sprint relay team that went to state. He went to juco, and then ended up an answer to an OU trivia question.

He was the guy who replaced Granville Liggins. Started one game, the 1968 opener at Notre Dame. Did not provide nearly the nose guard disruption that Granny had, and never saw the field again. One of the sad things about integration and its original aftermath was that the all black schools around the state were almost always providing a substandard education. And that put those kids in an almost impossible situation academically. Ken dropped out of OU after that season. He was a bright man, but his academics needed some additional help for him to survive. He'd been poorly prepared and that was the norm in those first ten to 15 years of assimilation..

There were all sorts of other things that bred resentment at deep levels. In larger cities, like Dallas, busing kids across town was a lightning rod. UT still has arguments, and spends time in court, arguing about racial preferences in admittance decision makng. And those sorts of events still have impact today as generations pass down their stories of mistreatment on both sides. Or just live in a way reflecting that.

If the racial issues that obviously still linger in the country are going to see real progress, then part of that has to include changes on both sides. Everything is not the fault of conservative white males as the media so frequently like to portray it. The shootings this week in Ferguson show that. Public attitudes that the police officers had it coming are surely as big a problem as NWord use behind closed doors.

Until both sides admit their faults, ask for, and receive real forgiveness, then the embarrassing incidents like the one on the SAE bus are going to show up occasionally. And until the hateful rhetoric from those "who marched with Dr King" are shown for the same sort of stupidity, then it will also continue to breed resentment. This isn't a one sided issue. Until there is a fair presentation of both sides, then the brewed resentments will never stop simmering. Or worse.

 

[CTOkie]

I think it would help if, quite simply, everyone could accept that people of different races do not exist for the purpose of generating hatred.....that none of us had any predetermination in being born the race, nationality or gender we are, so why let racism, sexism and other differences be a part of our lives ? Why can't we play nice with the hand we have been dealt ? There's really no option. We can try to bond peacefully under the guise of religion, but that historically has not been the answer....and has caused even more division among us.
Racism can be several ways. My grandmother would tell me as a child not to but coins in my mouth because the coins may have been handled by, in her words, "Negras and Chinamen".....this to me did not mean that she hated blacks and Orientals.....this told me that she was ignorant and that such beliefs were all she had ever been acquired during the turn of the 20th century, having migrated from Georgia and settling in southern Oklahoma, near Healdton. I do not believe there was a hatred within her about anything or anyone.
Northerners look down on Southerners.....and vise versa.
Older generations look down on younger generations.
Race, religion, political affiliation, the two genders, sexual persuasions and nationalities are at odds with each other.
And it's all so pointless and costly.....but it's human nature and it won't change except to grow even more turbulent.

 

[CTOkie]

Plaino, we never learned from the reckless foreign policy of Vietnam and now we are repeating it with our reckless foreign policy in the Middle East and other areas of the world. Terrorism is much more of a threat now than it was 14 years ago, so how's that war on terrorism working out ? We have entangled ourselves in terms of lives and our economy in a conflict in which no end game was ever considered.....and it (the build up and implementation of the "vast industrial military complex") is something Eisenhower warned against in his last days as president in 1960.
I drank the Kool Aid of Bush in two elections (2000 and 2004) in the wake of 9/11....which I now regret. (note, there was no way I would have voted for Gore or Kerry either). But you keep voting for neocon politicians so we can continue such tragic and senseless follies. Dick Cheney, who received five deferments during the Vietnam folly because he "had other things to do" would like it if you did.

 

[Oklabama]

CT, what you say sounds like a reasonable solution but I've found that once you start giving your employees a Christmas turkey, you can't quit.

Regarding your OP topic, I have enjoyed the different posts and remember the way it was growing up in Alabama during the early '50's before moving to Oklahoma. Those were bad times, but today is bad in an altogether different way.

 

[Sunburnt Indian]

It was the late '90s when I ordered a Whopper at Burger King on I-10 in Alabama. 22 white people received orders while I stood waiting like an idiot. I approached the order taker with the "manager" label on his shirt. I told him about my missing order. He refunded my money. I didn't want a refund. I wanted a stupid Whopper.

I visited a Tallahassee Chinese restaurant in late 1965 in route from Homestead AFB to Clinton-Sherman AFB, OK. The menu said $1.15 for tea. Tea cost 15 cents in that era. I learned later the menu was designed for someone like me showing up.

Different world today.

 

[Oklabama]

The late '90s! It's crazy that something like that could have still been going on such a relatively short time ago.