2005 letter to Darrell Royal

April 27, 2005

Darrell Royal
University of Texas
University Station
Austin, TX 78712

Dear Coach Royal:

I am prompted to write this letter because of the recent death of Prentice Gautt, the first black football player at your alma mater, the University of Oklahoma.

If you recall, I am the author of Breaking the Ice/Racial Integration of Southwest Conference Football, as well as three other books on sports history. Nobody would deny that you were a great coach. What you did in reviving UT football beginning in 1957 was most impressive, that is for sure. Three national championships!

I also know that you are accustomed to high praise these days, but what I have to say may not be too flattering, so be prepared.

I was not previously aware of the circumstances of Gautt’s arrival on the OU football team: Some black doctors and lawyers basically paid for his freshman year and “presented” him to Bud Wilkinson. Your old coach was put in a hard position, wasn’t he? If he refused, he was a racist, and if he agreed, he risked angering many of his white supporters. We know that he did in fact agree, and some of those supporters were not at all pleased (except maybe when they saw Gautt play!). At any rate, OU integrated its freshman team in 1956 and its varsity in 1957. Gautt was not only a two-time all-Big Eight player but an academic all-American, despite coming from a segregated high school. He later had a nice pro career and went on to get a Ph.D., as you know.

If OU could integrate so early, why not UT?? Yes, I realize there had been some black players in the Big Eight before, at places like Nebraska, Colorado and Iowa State. Perhaps that eased the decision for Wilkinson, but still, Oklahoma was a “southern” state in every sense of the word. Why did we not have a black player in orange and white until 1970? Why this 13-year gap? You are the only person who can truly answer the question. The supposed rule prohibiting black students from intercollegiate competition (changed by the Board of Regents in November 1963) could have been ignored if you had chosen to do so. But especially after that, you had no excuse. You had led the Longhorns to the national championship, you were national coach of the year, you were the athletic director (you were your own boss), and you had tenure as a faculty member—unheard of at the time. On top of all that, OU was begging you to come back home.

Seems to me that you were holding all the cards. It was the right time for you to act, but what did you do? You sat and waited and let others deal with the problems that inevitably come with major cultural changes, which is just what integrating the UT football team would have meant. You saw Prentice Gautt playing for the Sooners, so why not find a Gautt of your own? It’s not like there weren’t plenty of them in Texas. I am talking about young men who could have excelled athletically and academically. Bubba Smith, Mel Farr and Jerry LeVias have told me that you said they could come to Austin and “try out.” Smith, Farr and Levias!!! I am putting the question to you directly, Coach: Why did you not have the courage and wisdom to go out and get them and others, too? It was going to happen eventually, and you had the choice of being early or late on this crucial issue. Who were you afraid of offending? In one of our interviews, you told me that you didn’t call all the shots at UT, but (as mentioned earlier) you were in such a strong position, you could have insisted that this was the right thing to do for a variety of reasons, and you were leading the way. But no.

Year after year passed, and the Horns remained all white, as was pointed out to you more than once. It’s true that your 30-game winning streak was mostly accomplished without a single black player—and Julius Whittier didn’t play much in 1970. I realize you had a bit of bad luck with Mike Williams and Leon O’Neal. And yet there had been some walk-on freshmen like E. A. Curry, Talmadge Blewitt and Robinson Parsons in 1967. Why didn’t you do everything in your power to encourage those guys to stick with it, and somehow get them on the varsity in 1968? Instead, they fell by the wayside and integration of UT football was further delayed, permanently affecting your reputation among black Texans.

But let’s go back to 1962. Yes, 1962. Back when, if there was not a gentleman’s agreement (not to recruit black players or allow walk-ons) among SWC football coaches, it sure appeared that way. When Hayden Fry was interviewed by SMU about becoming the Mustangs’ coach, he told the president and the AD that he would accept the job only if he were allowed to integrate. Now that is courage! He was risking his first and possibly last chance to become a head coach because he wanted to do what was right. Fry is honest enough to say that he also wanted to win football games. As you know, he was hired, and he slowly, carefully laid the groundwork for recruiting Jerry LeVias of Beaumont. LeVias signed that historic scholarship on May 22, 1965.

LeVias and Fry suffered all kinds of pressure and abuse for courageously going forward. Let the record show that you did not have the kind of wisdom—and again, courage—to do the same. You let others take the slings and arrows.

Yes, you won a lot of games at UT, but you could have won more if you had integrated earlier, maybe right on the heels of your mentor, Bud Wilkinson. If not him, then when you heard Fry was going to do it, you should have gone right along. Instead, you waited and made excuses and ignored the fact that the Horns needed some black boys to go with the white ones. What a huge failure on your part! And it continues to tarnish your legacy, even though the media seems to think your first name is “legendary.” When I was researching my first book, I heard this quote from several black people: “Darrell Royal said he would never have one on his team.” I always responded that I didn’t think you said those words, but I could see why they imagined you had. After all, the fact is, you didn’t have one on the varsity until 1970.

You could have been there with Wilkinson, Fry, Bill Yeoman of Houston and John Bridgers of Baylor, all of whom had the guts to act. But who are you lumped with? Guys like Frank Broyles, Bear Bryant, Charlie McClendon and Vince Dooley, who waited until the very end. Their reputations on the matter of racial integration are set, as is yours, and it is not very flattering. This is one of the reasons I did not favor renaming Memorial Stadium in your honor—not just the fact that it was originally named for Texans who had died in World War I and then World War II, and your name there greatly dilutes their sacrifice—but your glaring lack of wisdom and courage when it came to recruiting black football players. You were such a towering figure in the 1960s, and you were coach at what was undoubtedly the top school in the Southwest Conference. As such, you had an obligation to boldly lead, but you meekly followed.

I hope you don’t feel that I have been unduly harsh in this assessment, but almost 50 years have passed since Prentice Gautt integrated OU football and 40 years since LeVias did the same at SMU. The facts are fairly clear. I just think it’s a shame you didn’t get out in front of this crucial issue. Perhaps you disagree entirely with what I have said or can refute it. If so, I welcome your feedback.

Sincerely,

Richard Pennington
1407 Drake Ave.
Austin, TX 78704
448-3640
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