Bear Bryant myths and sports journalism negligence: Mythmakers never read Tom Siler
PHOTO: Knoxville News-Sentinel sports editor wrote stories challenging segregation that most of the 1960s sports media avoided.
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“We have to repent this generation, not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people, but the for the appalling silence of the good people.”
— Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on the KKK bombings of Black homes and churches.
By TOM SHANAHAN
Tom Siler spoke up against segregation in his Knoxville News-Sentinel stories. The southern sports editor was ahead of his time in the 1960s.
He advocated for college football integration in the Southeastern Conference, even though his 1909 birth was just a decade removed from the 19th century. He applauded Kentucky and Tennessee for leading the way on two fronts – recruiting Black athletes and scheduling integrated opponents as home games.
Meanwhile, Alabama coach Bear Bryant, the most powerful voice in the South, remained silent until the 1970s.
In a Siler column dated January 29, 1965, he wrote, “Integration is no longer considered a stumbling block to football scheduling in the Southeastern Conference.”
But that didn’t stop Bryant from limiting his opponents to schools within the Mason Dixon Line bubble until the 1970 USC-Alabama game at Legion Field in Birmingham.
In the 1965 season, Tennessee scheduled two homes games against integrated opponents. Houston, with Warren McVea as its first Black player, played October 23 at Neyland Stadium. UCLA, with Mel Farr among its Black athletes, faced the Volunteers on December 4 at Tennessee’s home away from home, Memphis Memorial Stadium (later named the Liberty Bowl).
WHY IT MATTERS
This story is about more the falsehood of crediting Bear Bryant for leadership he did not demonstrate. It’s about the negligence of the 1960s sports media as a whole to properly report milestones that Tom Siler recorded in the Knoxville News-Sentinel. The modern-day media’s irresponsibility continues to regurgitate a fairytale at the expense of the true 1960s pioneers.
In 1966, Tennessee played a third integrated opponent as a home game. Army West Point, with receiver Gary Steele, faced the Volunteers in Memphis.
Well, now that the college football season is upon us, let’s recognize Siler for the 60th anniversary of his 1965 stories. His legacy needs to be pulled out of the shadows of Bryant myths. It’s a sports media failure that the false narrative of Bryant orchestrating the 1970 USC-Alabama game as a crusader overshadows the authentic first draft of history as reported by Tom Siler and others.
The real-time stories tell us by 1970 there was nothing new about USC’s integrated roster appearing in the South. But USC boosters — unaware of southern progress — crafted and spread a myth two decades after the 1970 USC-Alabama game was played.
Their purpose was embellishing USC’s dubious record on integration. History has overlooked the Trojans limited their roster to a half-dozen or so Black athletes until the late 1960s. But Bryant’s cult-like following embraced the story as their own. After all, it obfuscated Bryant dragging his feet into the 1970s. The media was quick to add the chapter to Bryant’s legend without proper research.
Siler’s stories were forwarded to me by John Park, a Memphis lawyer. Park is a Tennessee graduate and college football historian. He’s equally dismayed by Bryant narratives at the expense of true pioneers in the South.
Siler was consistent in his 1960s stories. On April 15, 1963, Siler wrote, “The University of Kentucky is to be commended for trying to force SEC friends and associates to face up to the race issue … This is the sort of thing that many would like to rake dirt over and pretend there is no problem. … Kentucky obviously has decided to rake dirt off as fast as someone else covers up.”
In story published on May 30, 1965, Siler noted Memphis State basketball signed Bobby Smith, a Black player out of Memphis Melrose High, to a scholarship. Siler cited Smith as evidence SEC schools could fall behind with talent. Bobby “Bingo” Smith went on to play 11 NBA seasons, although he ultimately played his college career was at Tulsa.
In 1966, Kentucky was the first SEC school to sign Black players, Nate Northington and Greg Page. Kentucky’s freshmen team with Northington and Page (the NCAA prohibited freshmen varsity eligibility until 1972) played a 1966 game against the Volunteers’ freshmen at Neyland.
Tennessee’s desegregation followed Kentucky with Lester McClain as its first Black player in 1967. McClain was the first Black player in the SEC to score a touchdown while catching six TD passes as a 1968 sophomore. In 1969, Tennessee, led by Black linebacker Jackie Walker, routed Alabama 41-14 at Legion Field. Walker was the SEC’s first Black All-American player in 1970 and 1971.
The result belies the USC booster-crafted myth’s claim that Alabama’s bigoted fanbase was shocked to see Black players dominating a 1970 game.
Siler’s 1965 column also noted Houston was scheduled to face Mississippi State. The teams played in Houston in 1965 and Starkville in 1967.
Between 1965 and 1968, Houston visited SEC turf at Tennessee, 1965; Ole Miss in Memphis, 1966; at Kentucky, 1966; at Mississippi State, 1967; Ole Miss in Mississippi Memorial Veterans Stadium in Jackson, 1968; and at Georgia, 1968.
Houston traveled in the same time frame to Texas A&M, Miami, Florida State, Texas, Memphis State (now Memphis) and North Carolina State.
Four years before USC played Alabama in 1970, Auburn, the Crimson Tide’s in-state and SEC rival, hosted integrated Wake Forest in a 1966 game and integrated Southern Methodist in a 1968 contest.
Wake Forest defensive end Bob Grant was ACC’s first Black all-conference player. Two years later, SMU’s Jerry LeVias, the Southwest Conference’s first Black player who went on to the NFL and the College Football Hall of Fame, led the Mustangs to a win at Auburn. LeVias caught a touchdown pass and a two-point conversion.
Auburn coach Shug Jordan, it should be noted, was ahead of Bryant by signing James Owens as its first Black player, in 1969. Bryant’s apologists claim he was prevented from signing a Black player earlier than Wilbur Jackson in 1970 because of racist Alabama Gov. George Wallace and Alabama’s bigoted fanbase.
Well, nobody fired Jordan.
In a Chicago Defender story published April 3, 1967, SEC commissioner A.M. Vance said, “There’s no longer any ban, written or unwritten, on Negro athletes.”
The myth Bryant’s hands were tied also overlooks Wallace wasn’t in office, 1967 to 1971.
But if we listen to Bryant’s mythmakers, the coach was searching high and low for an integrated opponent with no one accepting his invitation. Keith Dunnavant, an author and Bryant apologist, went so far as to dubiously suggest in the HBO film “Breaking the Huddle” that Boston College refused to travel, although there is no evidence to support his claim.
Why Dunnavant picked Boston College out of a hat to cite as his example is curious on its own. But it’s also bizarre for the simple reason in 1964 the Eagles ventured south to play Tennessee, losing 16-14 at Neyland Stadium. It’s also curious that HBO no longer makes the film riddled with holes available to watch.
It’s an injustice that in the 1960s true pioneers such as McVea, Grant, LeVias and Owens weren’t appreciated outside coverage in their local newspaper. There was no Internet then. ABC-TV aired only one national game of the week. The announcers avoided race. The milestones established at southern schools weren’t discussed. There was no sports radio as it exists today.
From the vantage point of USC’s mythmakers, it was if nothing happened before 1970. They viewed a convenient hole to fill. The driving force of the myths were USC’s John Papadakis and Craig Fertig. They didn’t read the work of Siler and other southerners. They were uninformed living on the West Coast about the 1960s progress in the South.
But since their fairytale fit the void so snugly, network documentaries nodded with a green light. They provided them a platform without proper research.
HBO, Showtime, EPSN and the SEC Network documentaries were complicit spreading the myth Bryant scheduled the 1970 USC-Alabama as a game to lose. The lynchpin to the myth was USC’s Sam Cunningham, a Black fullback, ran over Alabama in a 42-21 victory. The box score is the only accurate information from the game.
In the myth spread nationally in the early 1990s, Papadakis claimed Bryant took Cunningham into the Alabama locker room and told his players, “This is what a football player looks like.” But in a 2025 podcast, “100 Yards of Football,” USC tight end Charle Young revealed “This is what a football player looks like” was uttered by Fertig on the team’s bus ride after the game.
Cunningham and Alabama’s players said it never happened. But the tales remain entrenched due to journalism negligence.
Siler’s 1960s stories can be played to the tune of Bob Dylan’s 1964 song, “The Times They are a-Changin.” But it’s safe to say 1970 USC-Alabama mythmakers and Bear Bryant never read Tom Siler.
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Tom Shanahan is an award-winning sportswriter with two books on college football integration, “RAYE OF LIGHT, Jimmy Raye, Duffy Daugherty, the Integration of College Football and the 1965-66 Michigan State Spartans,” and “THE RIGHT THING TO DO, The True Pioneers of College Football Integration in the 1960s,” and a children’s book, “DUFFY’S COLLEGE FOOTBALL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD.” Shanahan’s 2022 story on the 1962 Rose Bowl, Alabama and segregation was awarded first place for Enterprise from the Football Writers Association of America.
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Click here for my story on the 1962 Rose Bowl and Segregation awarded first place by the Football Writers Association of America. I tell untold stories on Michigan State’s leading role and the true pioneers of college football integration. Click here to read the summary as a first-place story.
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Click here to purchase The Right Thing To Do
THE RIGHT THING TO DO
The True Pioneers of College Football Integration in the 1960s
Foreword by Ruffin McNeill
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RAYE OF LIGHT
Jimmy Raye, Duffy Daugherty, the 1ntegration of College Football and the 1965-66 Michigan State Spartans
Foreword by Tony Dungy
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