Lazarus - Hail to the Redskins: Gibbs, Riggins, the Hogs, and the glory days of D.C.s football dynasty

LESS THAN a year after moving from Boston to Washington, D.C., in 1937, the Redskins won their first NFL championship, defeating George Halass mighty Chicago Bears at Wrigley Field. Five years later, led by quarterback Sammy Baugh, they won a second title, cementing their status as one of the leagues model franchises. At the same time, the teams owner, George Preston Marshall, developed a reputation of his own.

He was widely considered one of pro footballs greatest innovators, esteemed Washington Post sportswriter Shirley Povich wrote, and its leading bigot.

Hailing from segregated West Virginia, Marshall considered himself a southerner and held less than progressive thoughts on race relations: a Civil War Confederate flag was among his familys most treasured possessions. In the summer of 1959, as a challenge to the emerging civil rights movement, he ordered the lyrics of the Redskins fight song changed from Fight for Old D.C. to Fight for Old Dixie.

By then every other pro football franchise had already integrated their rosters to include at least one African American player. As Povich explained to his readers in 1960a season in which Washington would win just one gamegreat players such as the Baltimore Colts African American running back Lenny Moore were ineligible for the Redskins, whose colors are burgundy, gold, and Caucasian.

An all-white Redskins roster was no coincidence.

[Marshall] did not pretend there were no blacks good enough to make his team, wrote Andy Piascik, author of Gridiron Gauntlet: The Story of the Men Who Integrated Pro Football in Their Own Words. Unlike the others, he was honest enough to admit that he simply didnt want them around.

In 1961, pressure to integrate the Redskins mounted, from the public, media, and even the federal government. Throughout that year, United States Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall demanded the Redskins add an African American player. If they did not, Udall threatened to ban the team from using the federally owned National Park Service land where D.C. Stadium (later renamed RFK Stadium) had been built. Udall even hand-picked the perfect player to break the teams unofficial color ban.

Well, through no fault of mine, [Marshall] has the first choice in the draft, and it has been customary I think..... The Heisman Trophy winner is usually pretty close to the top, Udall told reporters, referring to Syracuse running back Ernie Davis. I am no football expert. But I think [Marshall] has a very nice solution. Unfortunately, I havent been able to go to many games locally this year. But I think he has a very nice solution that would be good for us and would be wonderful for the Washington Redskins club.

Davis, however, did not want to play for the Redskins. After they drafted him first overall, he hinted to the Associated Press that Washington wouldnt give him the contract he wanted. Shirley Povich later wrote that Davis simply didnt want to be on a team owned by George Preston Marshall, saying, I wont play for that SOB.

To resolve the standoff, the Redskins traded Davis to the Cleveland Browns, in exchange for a lower first-round draft pick and a twenty-six-year-old African American halfback named Bobby Mitchell. The former seventh-round pickwho that season was joined by African American Redskins teammates John Nisby and Ron Hatchertransitioned from a good runner, consistent pass catcher, and excellent return man for Cleveland into the NFLs best wide receiver. In his first three seasons with the Redskins, Mitchell twice led the league in receiving yards, once in receiving touchdowns, and was selected to the Pro Bowl each year.

Ive played Bobby many times, and its inevitable that youre going to be beat by a great one like him, said New York Giants Pro Bowl defensive back Erich Barnes, who watched Mitchell score 2 long touchdowns in Week Seven of the 1962 season. He can hold his own with anyone, anywhere, even on the moon. You blink your eyes and hes gone.

But total integration and the emergence of African American stars such as Mitchell, Moore, Jim Brown, Gale Sayers, O. J. Simpson, Deacon Jones, Paul Warfield, Mean Joe Greene, and others didnt exactly wash away the leagues history of racial bias.

Throughout the next two decades the quarterback fraternity remained the most segregated clubs in all of sports: few black quarterbacks reached the NFL and only a handful saw playing time. By 1977, only one African American had ever started a postseason game, and a sixth-round pick was the highest any NFL team was willing to spend on an African American quarterback.

There was a belief that blacks were not bright enough, that we didnt have the ability to lead, Marlin Briscoe said in 2004. Most of the players in the league were white, and most were from southern schools where they never had a black teammate, let alone a quarterback. I knew that if I didnt have success, it would be a long time before someone else got the chance. People would say, I told you so.

As a rookie for the Denver Broncos, Briscoe proved himself, throwing 14 touchdown passes in five starts during the 1968 season.

I played well enough, Briscoe later said, that nobody could say, I told you so.

So, too, would Doug Williams.

THREE MONTHS BEFORE Rosa Parks Montgomery bus boycott, Douglas Lee Williams was born on August 9, 1955. Raised in Zachary, Louisiana, a small town fifteen miles north of Baton Rouge, Williams experienced the Deep Souths racism from an early age.

I used to see crosses burning every Friday night, he later said. They burned a cross at each intersection. We couldnt go out of the house after dark because we didnt know what would happen.

In the daytime, however, he and his four brothers ran around outside for hours. Although they played football with a plastic Clorox bottle stuffed with a sock and enjoyed basketballDoug admired local legend Pete Maravich and wore floppy socks similar to the Pistolbaseball was his true love. Doug wanted to emulate his much-older brother Robert, who pitched in the Cleveland Indians farm system. Beginning as a six-year-old in Little League he did just that: the first team Doug played for was the Zachary Indians. And by age fifteen Doug was also a phenomenal pitcher for Chaneyville High.

Robert Williams retired from the minor leagues after a shoulder injury in 1965. He returned home to teach and coach at Chaneyville. In 1970, as part of an exchange program, he transferred to the predominantly white Central High in East Baton Rouge, becoming their first African American teacher and coach. That summer, he also took over as head coach of the local all-white American Legion summer baseball team, sponsored by Sealtest Ice Cream. Robert brought five players from Chaneyville, including Doug, onto the team.

Even Sealtest thought that Central was [still] an all-white team, they did not know, Williams said. All coaches had to show up for this meeting.... I showed up and a gentleman asked me why was I there. I told him I was there for a baseball meeting. He said, I think youre in the wrong place. I said, No, I think Im in the right place. He said, Who are you? I said, Im Robert Williams from Sealtest Ice Cream. Boy, you could hear a rat run across that floor.

To open the season, the integrated Central team played the leagues all-white defending champion. When Robert Williamss team arrived for the game, his players were told they could not take the field if a black man coached the team. The teams previous head coach, Archie McClure, was at the game and stepped in to resolve the situation.