THE REAL HOOSIERS: Crispus Attucks High School, Oscar Robertson and the Hidden History of Hoops
For decades, a Catch-22 rule by the Indiana State Athletic Association prevented segregated schools, including Catholic ones, from competing in its storied high school basketball tournament. (Never mind that Crispus Attucks High in Indianapolis was segregated because the school board had mandated construction of a school for African Americans.) The discriminatory policy ended in the 1940s. But it wasn’t until 1955 that an all-Black high school made the final game.
In fact, two of them did. On the Monday before Super Saturday at Butler Fieldhouse on March 19, 1955, the day when the four remaining teams would play for the state championship, a meeting was convened at the office of Indianapolis mayor Alex M. Clark. The principal of Attucks, Dr. Russell Lane, was there, along with at least one representative from the police department, the fire chief and a couple of downtown businessmen (all white). It appears that the school superintendent, Dr. Herman L. Shibler, attended, but if not, he was certainly monitoring the proceedings.
The stated purpose of the meeting was to discuss celebration plans if Attucks won the state title, which now seemed, in the minds of most prognosticators, a fait accompli. The tenor of the discussion, as well as some of the specifics, remains unclear—which is a shame because that meeting serves as a fascinating backdrop to what would be the most glorious weekend in the three-decade life of Crispus Attucks High.
Consider the multitude of factors that were in play during that landmark week in March 1955:
Attucks was set to be not only the first Black state championship team but also the first team from Indianapolis to win it all.Its opponent in the final was expected to be another all-Black team, Roosevelt High from Gary. That meant 10 African Americans on the court for 32 minutes in an arena where Black players were still few and far between. The NBA barely had 10 African Americans in its nine-team league.Wafting around all of this was the memory of the previous year’s state championship celebration—dare we call it ?—after beloved Milan, the inspiration for the film three decades later, won it all. The police department had all but adopted the Milan team, giving it an escort around Monument Circle and stopping local traffic to honor a team from 80 miles outside Indianapolis.Amid the anticipation of victory, there floated a sense of unease in some segments of the white community, which had never engaged in wholesale racially integrated celebration. Indianapolis was still a deeply segregated town, and the city was not far from the days when Attucks victories produced stories about how the locals were down on crazed Indiana Avenue.
It’s impossible to determine if any journalists sat in on the meeting in the mayor’s office, but all the Indy newspapers reported on it. A story in the took a downcast tone, bearing the headline ATTUCKS VICTORY PLANS LEAVE OUT FIRE TRUCK, and said that the championship might “lack one of the traditional thrills” that was a “time-honored salute to [Indiana High School Athletic Association] kings since basketballs had laces.”
But reporting on the same meeting, the related that fire chief Joseph Hancock promised Attucks “a gleaming fire truck” for the celebration. The said that Attucks could have “the shiniest fire truck in town” if it won, and the , contradicting its earlier story, even laid out specifics: Lane, Shibler and Clark would ride in the mayor’s Cadillac, followed by the coaches and players on a city fire truck, in turn followed by buses for Attucks students.
In other words, it was to be a citywide party, likely the first time a group of African Americans would be recognized by the masses.
But years later, Lane had a different take on what transpired. Ted Green, who wrote and directed a 2016 documentary about Attucks, found an audiotape of Lane talking about the meeting and included it in his documentary. Here’s what Lane said:
Narrator Green then paraphrases what Lane said he was told: The parade could include one lap around Monument Circle but would then have to move to the west side of town, to Northwestern Park deep in the Black neighborhood. The message was clear: Arguably the grandest moment in Indianapolis sports history would be diminished because it was achieved by African Americans.
Lane spent much of the week reminding the Attucks team and the students that they needed to behave themselves. But how much reminding did they need? In recent years no team had comported itself as well as Attucks. Earlier in the season, Forest Witsman, the coach of bitter intracity rival Howe, had made this comment: “My kids would rather play Attucks than any team I know. They’re gentlemen.”
Whatever happened in the mayor’s office was of little concern to Oscar Robertson and his teammates. No doubt they understood the larger significance of being the first all-Black team on such a big stage, but it’s doubtful they dug into the parade details and celebration specifics. They were kids. They wanted to win, collect the trophy and kiss the girls.
The had teased this moment a year earlier when Attucks and Roosevelt were advancing in the postseason. “It looks like the folks better hurry up and abolish segregated schools for sure,” the paper wrote, “if they don’t want to be looking at an all-tan final game of these go-rounds.” Attucks reached the state semis while Roosevelt lost in the regionals in 1954. But, as was predicted, the go-round of ’55 was here, and the recognized the moment. In the days preceding the state championship foursome at Butler, the weekly ran a story about a man named Fred K. Dale of Pendleton, Ind., a small town about 30 miles northeast of Indianapolis. Dale told the that an Attucks victory “should do much to remove the last traces” of Jim Crow laws. “The old tale of Negro inferiority will be dealt a severe blow by an Attucks victory this week. The double-barreled attack, with Gary Roosevelt in the North, should convince even the hardest headed that the days of segregation and second-rate living are gone forever. In case you have forgotten, I am a white man. Not all of us are KKK supporters.”
