Saturday, March 27, 2021
Authors Discuss Local History Implications with Students
Photos of Shelbyville’s Bill Garrett are available on his Indiana Basketball Hall of Fame page.
by KRISTIAAN RAWLINGS
The history of race relations, both local and nationwide, is complex. Progress happens with organization and patience. Those are two of the takeaways Shelbyville Middle School students gleaned from reading “Getting Open”, a book about William Garrett, and by speaking virtually with the authors.
The opportunity to follow up with Shelbyville native Tom Graham and his daughter, Rachel Graham Cody, writers of the 2006 work, made an impact on Emma Claxton, 13. She was particularly impressed with the level of research performed to document the tensions of the time. “Despite the controversy that might come with writing a book such as this one, their explanations made it clear how they pushed through,” Claxton said.
Although students viewed the issue through the lens of the 1947 Shelbyville High School interracial basketball team, they connected the story to the larger picture.
“Really, what we're talking about is American history and understanding the complexity of the civil rights movement, how much effort and planning and strategy was involved,” Cody, a graduate of Swarthmore College and Harvard Divinity School, told the seventh-grade class. “Nothing ever just happens. There’s a bigger story behind it.”
Both were true in Shelbyville when Bill Garrett; his two Black teammates, Emerson Johnson and Marshall Murray; and the entire Golden Bear team took home the state basketball championship.
Over seven decades later, the SMS Honors English Language Arts class read about and discussed former local places of note, such as Booker T. Washington Elementary School. The since-demolished building, off of S. Harrison Street, had been condemned in 1914 but remained in service for local Black students. The Indianapolis Recorder, Indiana’s largest-circulation Black newspaper, in 1930 called it “that old, ugly dilapidated building where our children have to be housed.”
But the outdoor packed-dirt basketball court at Booker T. served as proving grounds for the three Black kids who would eventually break an important barrier on Shelbyville’s starting five.
Graham was growing up on Van Ave. at the time. “I had an unarticulated sense of the poetic justice of this story, and my mother talked about it a lot,” he told students.
Graham was later a student of the Golden Bears’ coach Frank Barnes, whose memorable quotes are included throughout the text. “Barnes had a strong personality,” Graham said. “He was very demanding and turned out very good teams as a result.”
Barnes’ belief in Garrett helped propel the young star to Indiana University, first as a walk-on and then on scholarship. Others, such as Nate Kaufman, were also instrumental in arranging the opportunity.
Garrett played three years for the Hoosiers while breaking the Big Ten coaches’ “gentlemen’s agreement” to not recruit Black players. Cody told students that she took issue with The Indianapolis Star claiming in recent years that Garrett’s recruitment “hardly made waves at the time.”
“Their archives didn’t make it a big deal because to make it a big deal, they would have had to acknowledge that there was this ‘gentleman's agreement’ segregating basketball,” Cody said.
But the story was widely told on the front pages of Black newspapers.
“Questions of where Bill Garrett would go to college were alongside stories of Jackie Robinson, who was breaking into baseball that same summer, 1947, but the mainstream white newspapers never even talked about the fact that the (Indiana) Mr. Basketball, the best player in the state, wasn’t even recruited by any Big 10 or other major schools,” Graham said.
Garrett’s tenure at IU, during which he never played with or against another Black player, included him setting the school’s career scoring record and earning a first-team All-American pick. The year after he graduated, seven Black players were on Big Ten teams.
Cody encouraged students to consider how such major shifts start small. She offered an anecdote from her own participation in Congressman John Lewis’s once-annual pilgrimage in the deep South as an example.
“There is something shocking about how small Selma is, at how the Edmund Pettus Bridge is just a bridge; there aren’t rainbows or sparkles around it,” Cody said. “And the people whose names we know are the tiniest fraction of the people who were involved in the movement.”
Seemingly mundane actions - just doing the right thing - and patience played a role in Garrett’s story, too. In 2017, a historical marker honoring Garrett was placed outside the Old Fieldhouse where he once played. The sign’s reveal, the culmination of a sustained effort by Graham, sportswriter Bob Hammel and others, was attended by numerous Shelbyville residents.
“It probably was the biggest and final gathering ever of everyone associated with Bill Garrett throughout his career,” Graham said.
The Fieldhouse at the time was still named in honor of Ora Wildermuth, the president of the IU board of trustees in the 1940s who had attempted to block desegregation. A year later, his name was removed. Last June, the facility was rechristened the Bill Garrett Fieldhouse.
Graham and Cody explained that connecting Shelbyville history to broader societal issues is just the beginning for young students.
“Knowledge helps fill in the map of who we are and how we got here, but it does not provide explicit directions of where to go,” Cody said. “What it does is make it history, and how we understand ourselves today more complex and honest, which is ultimately freeing and enables us to move forward.”
Her message harmonized with an excerpt from a 1947 Indianapolis Recorder article, republished in the beginning of “Getting Open”.
Well, what happens now to Bill Garrett, Emerson Johnson and Marshall Murray? After the medals and trophies have been stored away, what then? Was it all just moonglow? Was all the celebrating merely a moment of brotherhood in an eternity of intolerance?
Local educators continue to ensure it wasn’t “just moonglow.” Two months after Garrett died of a heart attack in 1974, the Shelbyville school board voted to rename the SHS gymnasium in his honor. Four years ago, his No. 9 jersey was retired.
Now, thanks to the school’s class-set purchase of “Getting Open”, students will ponder the significance of Shelbyville’s own for years to come.
“This is something I’m going to remember because it’s cool meeting the authors of a book about the town I live in,” Sydney Haehl said.
Her classmate, Naomi Garringer, agreed. “The presentation explained lots of concepts I didn’t first consider when reading the book.”
NOTEBOOK
The Strand Theatre is looking for volunteers from 9 a.m. to noon today to remove debris under the stage so that the new floor can be installed. Details here…
As of yesterday, the state reported 4,704 positive coronavirus cases in Shelby County, an increase of 2 from the previous day, out of 18,833 tests, an increase of 4 from the day before. The number of deaths for Shelby County increased by 1, to 94. The State lists 7,302 fully vaccinated people in Shelby County as of yesterday.
HOOSIER NEWS: United Airlines will add seasonal nonstop routes this summer from Indianapolis to Portland, Maine; and to the South Carolina cities of Charleston and Hilton Head, the airline announced Thursday. From May 27 through Labor Day weekend, United will run flights four times a week between Indianapolis International Airport and both Hilton Head Airport and Portland International Jetport. Flights to Charleston International Airport will operate three times a week. (Indianapolis Business Journal)
“This Week in Shelby County" works by George L. Stubbs Sr. are owned by the Shelby County Historical Society (Grover Center) and used with permission.
THIS DAY IN SHELBY COUNTY HISTORY
News around Shelbyville and the surrounding area as reported on or about this date in history. Selections are curated from the Shelby County Public Library Genealogy Department.
20 YEARS AGO: 2001
The Shelbyville Plan Commission passed a formal recommendation on to the Common Council that the new comprehensive plan be adopted. Plan Commission chair David Finkel and Plan Director Tom DeBaun discussed the need for a beltway road that would carry traffic around the west and south sides of the city, connecting North State Road 9 and Interstate 74 and South State Road 9. Finkel said the plan commission had heard for years that something needed to be done about highway traffic flowing through downtown. “We are trying to put in a natural barrier for the town to grow to,” he said.30 YEARS AGO: 1991
Major Hospital administrator Frank Learned announced a tentative deal that would close the Inlow Clinic. Learned said the hospital decided upon a lease deal for Inlow properties after another group, Shelby County Family Medicine, an organization of Drs. William Haehl, James Peters, Thomas Thornberry and Chris Loman, became involved in negotiations.Maurice Leap, president of the Shelby County Commissioners, said a joint city-county jail deal was not yet dead despite earlier statements from other county officials indicating otherwise.
40 YEARS AGO: 1981
Richard Unger was named Morristown Person of 1981. Dave White presented the award to Unger, who had been an active member and officer in the Morristown United Methodist Church and president of the Morristown Lions and Morristown Parent-Teachers Association. Unger had graduated from Morristown High School in 1934. Chamber president Dennis “Buddy” Talbert presented a plaque of appreciation to John Thomas, a county councilman and manager of the Shelby Bank branch on Morristown. Thomas, in turn, presented a certificate of appreciation honoring Lowell Rudicel, longtime Farmers Bank official, for his service to the community. Farmers Bank president Carlos Craven accepted the award on behalf of Rudicel who could not attend because of poor health. In an after-dinner speech, Lt. Gov. John Mutz told Morristown Chamber of Commerce members at the Bluebird Restaurant that the state needed to diversity its economy. “We no longer can depend on the auto plants and equipment for new growth and jobs,” he said. Mutz said he supported President Ronald Reagan’s economic recovery program even if it did cut $260 million in federal funds from the state budget.
50 YEARS AGO: 1971
A 17-year-old Shelbyville truck driver overturned a 27-ton Indiana Ready Mix Co. truck at the road entering Hazelwood Addition. The accident caused the truck to dump wet concrete on the lawn of the Joseph Bernard residence.Flower Power, a floral and decorating service, opened at Blue Ridge Road at CR 350 East.
60 YEARS AGO: 1961
A 55-year-old Shelbyville man pleaded guilty to a charge of operating a bicycle while intoxicated. The man had been arrested on East U.S. 421.70 YEARS AGO: 1951
The local American Legion Post and Legion Auxiliary sponsored an Easter Egg hunt for the boys and girls of the Gordon Children’s Home. Thirty-one dozen colored eggs were hidden about the home grounds. Ronnie Coffey, 8, won special prizes for finding a glass egg and another special prize went to James Means, 8, for finding a bantam egg. Elizabeth Miles and Charles Lane received prizes for finding the most eggs and Danny McNeely and Donna Thornburg received gifts for finding a Legion and Auxiliary egg. Money banks were presented to Harold Kaster and Gladys Woodruff, both 18, as the oldest participants in the yearly egg hunt. The kids were given donuts and coffee after the event.
80 YEARS AGO: 1941
The Shelby County jail residence was destroyed by fire. Thirteen prisoners were escorted to the Franklin jail, although the jail itself was not seriously damaged. The Republican noted that the fire coincided with the twelfth birthday of Rosanna Grinstead, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Everett Grinstead. Rosanna was believed to be the only child ever born in the jail residence. Her birthday and that of her sister, Mary Grinstead, 17, had been celebrated by the family with a steak supper at the family’s home on the Columbus pike. Everett Grinstead had been deputy sheriff and a guest at Sheriff George Nigh’s home at the time of Rosanna’s birth.
90 YEARS AGO: 1931
The Shelbyville school board of education appointed eight enumerators to count local students in effort to claim as much state money as possible. Those chosen were Chloe Schoolcraft, Mabel Kibbey, Mary Sedgwick, Emily Fately, Grace Terhune, Mabel Mann, Mrs. Henry Wendleboe and Carl James. Board members also considered coal bids following a state law ordered that only Indiana coal be used to heat schools.100 YEARS AGO: 1921
Lightning struck the steeple of Blue Ridge M.E. church and damaged the building’s interior. “Ladies of that community have been working very hard and had just had the interior redecorated and now this will have to be done again,” The Republican reported. Telephone wires were also out in the community.INCIDENTS
A vehicle struck and killed a deer on E. State Road 44, Shelbyville.
Thefts were reported in the first block of Maple St., 900 block of Olmsted Court, and at Walmart, Shelbyville.
Burglary was reported in the 6200 block of N. London Road, Fairland.
Jail Book-ins: James P. Clark Jr, 32, failure to appear; Candace Day, 32, domestic battery; Shelly L. Harrison, 52, refusal to identify, criminal trespass; Justin J. Hubbs, 41, criminal trespass, resisting law enforcement; Lisa Israel, 55, house arrest violation escape; Pamela Mick, 58, criminal trespass, resisting law enforcement; Brandi K. Smith, 47, probation violation; Anthony J. Springman, 35, possession of syringe, marijuana, narcotic drug; Susan A. Tucker, 35, house arrest violation; Kelley Vincent, 35, probation violation (two counts); Mark A. Sievers, 46, arson; and Ciara L. Havlin, 24, public intoxication
OBITUARIES
Lois H. Gibson, 96, of Indianapolis passed away, Tuesday, March 23, 2021 at St. Francis. Murphy-Parks Funeral Service is honored to serve the Gibson family. Services will be at The Milner Chapel, located at 2nd Presbyterian Church in Indianapolis, Saturday, May 22 with visitation at noon and Celebration of Life Services at 1 p.m.
Shelley Dawn Robertson, 44, of Indianapolis, formerly of Shelbyville, passed away Wednesday, March 24, 2021 at her home. She was born May 19, 1976, in Shelbyville, the daughter of Larry Robertson and Lisa (Bastin) Lay. Shelley is survived by her father of Shelbyville; mother and step-father, Allen Lay, of Shelbyville; significant other, Matt Daniels of Indianapolis; brother, Matt Robertson and wife, Cassy, of Shelbyville; sister, Holly Robertson and significant other, Wendell Stewart, of Waldron; brother-in-law, Sean Daniels and wife, Starie, of Indianapolis; former sister-in-law, Erin Harmon of Shelbyville; nieces, Tatum Robertson and Leila Stewart; and nephews, Sam Robertson, Brayden Stewart, Joel Stewart, Ethan Lay and Camdyn Lay. She was preceded in death by her maternal grandparents, Robert and Wilma Jean Bastin; and paternal grandparents, Paul and Myrtie Robertson.
Shelley graduated in 1994 from Shelbyville High School, and received her bachelors degree in psychology from Hanover College. While attending high school and college, Shelley enjoyed playing softball. For over 20 years, she was a social worker wrap around facilitator, for Community Health East Gallahue.
Shelley loved sea turtles and was very concerned about their rehabilitation.
She also enjoyed music, sewing and crafting.Visitation will be from 4 to 7 p.m. Monday, March 29, 2021 at Freeman Family Funeral Homes and Crematory, Carmony-Ewing Chapel, 819 S. Harrison St. in Shelbyville. Funeral services will be at 7 p.m. Monday at the funeral home, with Rev. Bill Horner officiating. Inurnment will be at Forest Hill Cemetery in Shelbyville. Memorial contributions may be made to the Clearwater Marine Aquarium, 249 Windward Passage, Clearwater, Florida 33767 or American Lung Association, 115 W. Washington St., Suite No. 1180-South, Indianapolis, Indiana 46204. Online condolences may be shared with Shelley’s family at www.freemanfamilyfuneralhomes.com.
