The Vandy Project: My appearance debunking Bear Bryant myths spread at expense of 1960s true pioneers
PHOTO: The brand of research that confirmed Thomas Jefferson fathered Sally Hemings’ children is missing from exposing Bear Bryant fairytales.
Buy me a coffee to support my research to tell untold college football integration untold stories.
Thomas Shanahan | @Thomas-Shanahan-23
Order link:
Raye of Light: Jimmy Raye, The Integration of College Football 3rd Ed – August Publications
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By TOM SHANAHAN
Listen my appearance on The Vandy Project debunking the many Bear Bryant myths at the expense of the true pioneers of college football integration. The true pioneers did the dirty working, challenging Jim Crow and Ku Klux Klan, and got written out of history.
This is a long interview, so i broke down a few highlights as a guide:
— 2:30: I prove background on segregation and origins of Duffy Daugherty’s Underground Railroad.
— 5:40: Duffy ignored the unwritten quota college football followed limiting Black players to a half-dozen mor so. The schools included USC despite the misleading narrative told in the 1970 USC-Alabama myths.
6:50 Sports journalism failures in the 1960s are the reason for lost history in the 1960s.
— 9:50 Debunking the 1970 USC-Alabama game as a milestone and explaining integrated Tennessee routed Alabama 41-14 at Legion Field in Birmingham one year before USC arrived. Bryant was a footdragger on integration.
— 13:00: The injustice to the true pioneers of the 1960s who cleared a path to make the 1970 USC-Alabama game possible.
— 14:00: Los Angeles Times sports columnist Jim Murray was the only writer with the courage to confront Bear Bryant about Alabama trying to sneak in the back door of the Rose Bowl.
— 28:51: Based on Bear Bryant’s 1974 book, BEAR, he was tone death on integration in the 1960s.
— 34:50: Insight I gained from Ken Burns on why the Bear Bryant myths are spread and true stories are lost to history.
— 37:00 Sam Cunningham learned from Bob Grant and Reggie Berry about integration progress in the 1960s before USC played at Legion Field.
— 38:00: Bob Grant’s high school coach convinced him to attend Wake Forest and open doors rather than riding the Underground Railroad to Michigan State.
— 43:50: The backstory on Barry Switzer and Chuck Fairbanks at Oklahoma following Duffy Daugherty’s blueprint. I made one mistake reciting this story in the podcast. Oklahoma’s coach who died in 1967 was Jim Mackenzie — not Jim Tatum. That was a brain lapse on my part. Jim Tatum, who died suddenly while coaching North Carolina, was on my mind for another Daugherty milestones. He was the coach when the 1964 Michigan State-North Carolina game was scheduled. The September 26, 1964, contest at Kenan Stadium in segregated Chapel Hill marked the first time a fully integrated team played in the South.
— 48:00 :The ugly side of Bear Bryant is revealed in this story about Bo Matthews, who signed with Alabama but attended Colorado after Bryant withdrew his scholarship.
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— Watch a three-minute video to learn about our documentary at the fundraising stage, GAME CHANGERS OF THE CENTURY, and the Investment Deck.
I invite you to follow me on Twitter @shanny4055
I’ll put my facts on the true pioneers of college football integration versus Bear Bryant fairytales against anybody, anytime, anywhere. Watch here.
Click here for my story on the 1962 Rose Bowl and Segregation and Alabama that earned first place for Enterprise from the Football Writers Association of American.
— 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.” They are the most accurate accounts of college football integration in the 1950s and 1960s. They also debunk myths about the 1970 USC-Alabama game. The false narrative co-opted the stories of the true pioneers who stood up to Jim Crow and the KKK.
— Two children’s books also explain Michigan State College Football Hall of Fame coach Duffy Daugherty’s impact on integration through the Underground Railroad and the Hawaiian Pipeline: “DUFFY’S COLLEGE FOOTBALL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD” and “HOW DUFFY PUT HAWAII ON AMERICA’S FOOTBALL MAP.”
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PURCHASE LINKS, non-fiction books
— RAYE OF LIGHT,
Raye of Light: Jimmy Raye, The Integration of College Football 3rd Ed – August Publications
or on Amazon.
— THE RIGHT THING TO DO, August Publications or on Amazon.
PURCHASE LINKS, children’s books
— DUFFY’S COLLEGE FOOTBALL UNDERGROUND RAILROAD: Order from Barnes and Noble here and Amazon here.
— HOW DUFFY PUT HAWAII ON AMERICA’S FOOTBALL MAP. Order here:
How Duffy Put Hawaii On America’s Football Map by Tom Shanahan, Paperback | Barnes & Noble®
Amazon.com: How Duffy Put Hawaii On America’s Football Map eBook : Shanahan, Tom: Kindle Store
