Status in Racial Disputes
Griffith Stadium was located in the Shaw Neighborhood of Washington, D.C., a historically black area since the Civil War. The neighborhood was home to many black working-class people, but also a class of young, professional African American "elite" such as Langston Hughes. Duke Ellington worked at Griffith selling hot dogs during his childhood.
Griffith Stadium was not officially segregated, although an unofficial policy early after the 1920s expansion was that blacks sat in the right field pavilion. Calvin Griffith, nephew of Clark Griffith, claimed that the segregated seats were a result of "colored preachers ... asking Mr. Griffith to put aside a section for the black people."
Shorty after the end of World War I, after a report that several white women had been raped by a black man, a large group of whites seeking revenge marched toward the Shaw neighborhood. However, a conflict was avoided after these men came upon "a group of two thousand armed black men," who had been prepared and gotten their weapons at Griffith Stadium, chosen as a meeting place because of its landmark status in the community.
Senators management, seemingly uneasy about racial matters, were latecomers to integrating their team, hiring their first black player in late summer of 1954. The segregationist policy of the Redskins was more overt and controversial. In October 1957, a group of blacks picketed multiple times in front of Griffith Stadium, protesting the lack of black players on the Redskins. It would be five more years before the Redskins finally began employing black players, the last NFL team to erase the color line.
Read more about this topic: Griffith Stadium
Famous quotes containing the words status and/or racial:
“What is clear is that Christianity directed increased attention to childhood. For the first time in history it seemed important to decide what the moral status of children was. In the midst of this sometimes excessive concern, a new sympathy for children was promoted. Sometimes this meant criticizing adults. . . . So far as parents were put on the defensive in this way, the beginning of the Christian era marks a revolution in the child’s status.”
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“Rarely do American parents deliberately teach their children to hate members of another racial, religious, or nationality group. Many parents, however, communicate the prevailing racial attitudes to their children in subtle and sometimes unconscious ways.”
—Kenneth MacKenzie Clark (20th century)