Resigning from the Edwardsville basketball job after seven seasons was easy for one reason, I was constantly presented hurdles. The District charged me $200.00 a week to conduct summer "Tiger Pride Basketball Camps." The District took away coaches gym keys, which I never understood. The back-biting continued and it was obvious that I needed to step away.
The Jacksonville basketball position suddenly came open and the rest was history as they say. I was very familiar with Jacksonville and their administration was likewise familiar with me. My Edwardsville teams were a fixture in the Crimsons' Mid-Winter Tournament, a tournament our Edwardsville teams won five out of seven years.
The Jacksonville interview was done on 'the fly' one Friday afternoon on my way to umpire a weekend Western Illinois University baseball series. I visited at length with the athletic director and assistant superintendent for instruction, met the assistant superintendent for finance and the superintendent. All were cordial and the spoken and subliminal message was clear, 'What do you need to build a competitive basketball program?' I had struck Gold: summer camp programs> Go! Elementary basketball league> Go! I could bring in three hand-picked assistants>Go! There were some added incentives and as I stood to leave the interview, the assistant superintendent said, "By the way, we will give you keys to the gym." How 'bout that sports' fans?!
The 1977 Jacksonville high school enrollment was approximately 1250 students with an African- American number of less than 200 students. Jacksonville, however always had some outstanding Black athletes. I recall names like Ike Wright, Crest Whitacre, Merritt Norvell and Ken Norton. I rented an apartment the summer of 1977 while my wife remained in our Collinsville home before our family mover to Jacksonville. Aside from conducting a camp, I spent time surveying the socio-economic layout of the community. I wanted to come to understand and appreciate the peripheral towns feeding the school district i.e., Murrayville and Woodson and I wanted to get an overview of South Jacksonville, Jacksonville and the Northeast part of the community, which was primarily a Black housing area. I immediately knew what had to be done.
Once the family was settled into our South Jacksonville home, my sophomore son, Steve began making personal contacts with the roster names of returning players and he made a daily visit to Minnie Barr Park in the Northeast section where Blacks hooped nightly. My only advise to Steve, "Keep your mouth shut and let your game and hard play talk."
The school district administration supported my concept to have every one of the eight elementary feeder schools host fall league basketball games. I wanted young 5th and 6th grade boys (white and black) 'to 'see' all parts of their community. You gotta start 'coming together' sometime, someplace. In time our high school basketball program began reaping the fruits of the elementary League. I would also in time convince Bruce Surratt, Jacksonville Park Superintendent to see if we could construct a nice basketball court at Community Park which is in the center of town. I envisioned a racial mixture of youth playing on such a court. It happend when Bruce got the Pilot Club to sponsor the $8,000.00 project.
Phase one completed, I turned attention to other program builders to benefit more than basketball youngsters...all the while meeting the racial issues head on! I was on the mission I always dreamed.
Ps. I was in a wonderful position taking the Jacksonville head basketball job because I was permitted to bring three assistant coaches on board. Along with Ken Hickman, whom I brought from Edwardsville, I brought in a former Mason City player of mine, John Conklin and a SIUE basketball graduate, Sam Holmes. I had watched Holmes as a player and his personal mannerisms. I liked what I saw. Oh, by the way, Sam Holmes was the first Black man on a Jacksonville staff to my knowledge. It was time...the strong not-so-subtle messages had been sent to all.
Finally, I had the chance my ISU athletic director, 'Moose' Hancock said, "Make your job bigger than ever and your successor will have big shoes to fill meeting new standards. In education that means kids are the benefactors." If you address the racial factors then the entire community benefits.
Next: Dispelling Racial Street Myths
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