Holloway
Stay tuned next, when we'll talk to a North Carolina living legend, Dr. John McLendon, who is co-founder of the CIAA Basketball Tournament, and studied under the founder of basketball, Dr. James Naismith. Next on Black Issues Forum. [Music]

Holloway
Hello, I'm Jay Holloway, and welcome to another episode of Black Issues Forum. Today, we look at Part II of the CIAA Tournament, and we talk to the co-founder of the tournament, Dr. John McLendon, better known to many as, Coach Mac. One of the co-founders of the CIAA Tournament, and many of the Black college coaches look to him as the senior Black college coach in America. We talked to Coach McLendon about several issues, about the tournament, about race relations, economics, business, and education. Here's what he had to say.

Jay Holloway
You've seen African Americans go through segregation and integration, and how do you think that has affected our educational growth, and the education of Blacks in general.

John McLendon
Well, the fact that we have so many people that went through that system, and in some areas, are still going through it, who have been immanently successful, almost makes it look like it's beneficial, however, lack of facilities, and lack of diversified course content, may be limiting for the future. The people that we have produced over the last 100 years or so, it's phenomenal that they have done so, and yet the system out of which they come has been labeled as inferior. How ver, just because those people succeeded through these difficulties, doesn't mean that that's the way to go. They should have had an easier time of it, or at least a time of it where they could have more choices, instead of just what they had to do, or no choice in what they had to do. I look at the educational systems, especially in historically Black colleges and universities, and they're still trying to meet the needs of the student. I think the significant thing is that those schools, despite their andicaps, did meet the needs of the students. But I don't think, as they are constructive now, unless they are helped along significantly, that we ought to use the past practices as a measure of what we need to do for the future. We need to add on to opportunities for young people. We need to add on to numbers, we need to have more people going to college, to the colleges and universities, we need to have more graduates. This is actually not a Black and White problem, it's a national problem. We are n ot ranking the best of anything in the world, although the propaganda is that we are. That is not the case. We need to rise higher as a nation, and you know how that is, that's just a well-known fact. Unless we all go up together, we all go down together. Make sure that you have the future, after athletics, well in hand, before you get involved. You can use athletics, the same way you use athletic scholarships. An athletic scholarship is just a means to get your education, and you should use opportunities in professional sports, as just a means to secure your future, but the future you want to secure is already established through your educational participation and graduation, degree and so forth, before. That's what I would tell them, that's how I'd follow it. The other thing is, don't adopt the habits and ideas and attitudes of athletes before you become one, and after you become one, stay how you've developed yourself. It is a bleak future, in terms of developing manhood and womanhood, if you're a professional athlete because you're thrown into a separate world.

Jay Holloway
Coach McLendon has been around for a long time. He started coaching in 1938, so he's seen race relations in America go through a lot of changes. He was the coach and the organizer of the first inter-racial basketball game between Blacks and Whites, in 1944, when North Carolina College, now known as North Carolina Central, played Duke University in a confidential basketball game for the first time ever. We also asked Coach McLendon, as a scholar and as an athletic coach, about race relations, and his views, in America today.

John McLendon
Well, I think we're at a time where people note the discrepancies in government and other social relationships with a little more sensitivity than in the past. Some things you might have passed over, now they become a little more important. That's because the big things have been put aside, or put down, and now the little things are the things you notice. I think that's part of it. The other thing is that I just can't go along with the fact that things aren't improved. Not because I'm operating within a sphere of peace, and tranquility for that matter, it's because people, regardless of those who are highlighted against this idea, regardless of the fact that many people say it's a negative reaction, and you're going down, I think the majority of people, if they were the ones who were speaking would say, it's improved. A quick example, I was talking to a group of students, and telling them about some of my days at the university that I attended and they just looked at me with disbelief, because they can't believe, they can't think of how, they're thinking in terms of how it is now, they can't take this scene and put it back because they don't know how to do, so therefore they just don't believe it. "I can't believe they would do that," when I told them, for instance that in Kansas when I was coming up that you could not allow a Black man to teach White people's children. It was a state law, and it was not reversed though. And it does sound crazy to you, and to me although I've been through it So, I think, when I say that, and the students and people look at me with disbelief, that's a sign of the improvement in race relations. We've come farther than where we were, because you can't believe where you've been. I would suggest that it's time for us to go interracial. It was the Colored Intercollegiate Athletic Association in 1945, and the first conference in the United States to go interracial was the Gulf Coast Conference, and they included Dillard, and Xavier, and Southern University of New Orleans, and they've been interracial for about ten years and have gone a great job in race relations through that athletic relationship, and I think that that should be one of our next goals. I'm not speaking for the CIAA, because I'm not in a speaking position, I'm speaking here as one of the surviving founders, and where the CIAA might go, and I do think that there are schools in Virginia and North Carolina that would be happy to be a part of CIAA, but we have to extend them an invitation. Now that may not be a popular idea, but I think it's a good idea, needless to say.

Jay Holloway
There continues to be an economic disparity between Blacks and Whites in American and in North Carolina, especially between wealth and income. We asked Coach McLendon about his view in economics and business.

John McLendon
I think that anytime you have an opportunity, you always have the people who have the intelligence, the foresight to apply it in the business world. We have many business experts. We've had to be business experts of a small degree just to survive. On the other hand, I think that the future should have us included in businesses where we have not been, where we haven't done very much, because it's just not known, maybe not known how to get into it. For instance, the biggest bu iness in the United States, outside of automobiles, is sports, is sports equipment, and I've gone to several shows and the first thing I do is get the exhibition books to see where the exhibition of various sports will be, the companies that have this kind of product, and so forth, and in this biggest, biggest business, we don't even have one percent of people an ownership role. So, many of us just wear shoes, and athletic apparel, and all that, everybody does it. Where does it come from? Doesn't come f rom us. So, here's an uncharted field that I think we should get interested in.

Jay Holloway
What about all the moneys that the professional athletes have made? Have you talked to them, or are there any plans for those athletes...

John McLendon
Some of them have ventured into areas where they haven't been because they need the capital to do it, but it's not making a dent. What we're talking about for our students who go to school, the high school right down the street here, for them to have in their minds, let's go into the sporting goods business, let's go into the manufacturing business, let's go into this because this is a big business, and we don't have a piece of it. It's almost like auto racing. Right today, there's only one Black auto racer on the scene and it's one of the biggest sports there is from a spectator point of view. Felix - they call him - Well, his last name is Jiles - Nighthawk. Felix "Nighthawk" Jiles. And he just qualified in the Baha 1000 last year but he hasn't qualified at anything this year. I'm just saying - everybody doesn't want to go out and be a race driver. Walter Payton drove an automobile and he likes driving it around like Paul Ne wman, but we're not into that. Here's a giant field. And all sports have gone up in the millions. Well, we need to explore other areas where all we need to do is know about, know how to get into it, then apply the talent that we have. We'll be successful. We're always successful.

Jay Holloway
Coach McLendon is more than just an athletic coach; he's a scholar. As a Ph.D. he continues to lecture around the country at America's universities and colleges. We asked Coach McLendon about education and how meaningful that is to today's youth.

John McLendon
First, it's just necessary for survival now. It has always been necessary for improvement and advancement. But I think it's necessary for survival. I don't see how you can face the 21st century like everybody is planning to do without being well fortified in educational - in the educational aspects of society. I don't know how anyone could consider doing without it. They might not know exactly what aspect of it to go into but they're going to have to have an educational bac kground and a degree is usually required in order to do anything.

Jay Holloway
We had a chance to talk with Coach John McLendon at the CIAA Basketball Tournament about a wide variety of issues. And here's what he had to say.

John McLendon
I'm busy. I advise people, "Don't retire!" Because that's the time to start work. Everybody says, "I'll bet you're retired. I know you have time for this." I'm teaching at Cleveland State University. Cleveland State University was the first predominantly White school in the United States to hire a Black coach. And I've ended up for the third time in Cleveland. I teach the history of sports and the role of minorities in their development. My class is - came about when a oung lady came to interview me. She said, "I understand you are sometimes referred to as the Jackie Robinson of basketball." And I said, "That's a little too heavy! It sounds great but I don't know about that." And she said, "Well tell me something before we get started. Who was Jackie Robinson?" She was a 19-year-old Black girl, a senior at Cleveland State University, who had come from a little town in Pennsylvania. I immediately went to - I told her to go to the library at once and never ask that question again. And I told her all I knew about Jackie Robinson and some things I didn't know about him so she'd know who he was. And I sent her to the library but I went to the head of the history department. And it turns out that the head of Black Studies at Cleveland State was Howard Mims, Dr. Howard Mims, who was from Hampton. And he came into Hampton as I was leaving. I coached at Hampton two years, two very fine years. And I call it a two-year vacation. Okay? He said, "Oh, we should have that course! Could you teach it?" I said, "I'll have my syllabus on your desk Monday." So since that time I teach the history of sports but I teach the sport. Let's just say auto racing. I teach auto racing. That's an "A." It starts out with auto racing and we go all the way through track & field, tennis, boxing, all the sports that we've been a part of in this country. But they have to learn the sport so they'll know why and what it takes to be a hero in that sport. Then they have to recreate the climate out of which the hero came. They have to recreate in the class the political climate, the economic climate, the racial climate. They have to do that as part of studying Wendell Scott, who was the first Black to be winner of the NASCAR Nationals. He came from Danville, Virginia. And I make them study and then I send them to all the museums they can go to. We have our own selection of people who are heroes, not necessarily recognized. But that's what I like about teaching this class. It's a revelation to the students. They have never been taught anything like this. They haven't even been taught about the sport. I had a young judge - I call everybody young these days, but - Judge Connelly. She's a well-known judge in the area. And she appeared in my class and I asked her what she was doing in there. And she said, "You can't talk to anybody for five minutes unless they bring up sports. And I just want to know more about them. And also I want to know more about what our people are doing in it. What have the done and what were they doing before they got in there? I'd like to more about it." She became an "A" student, of course. All of my classes, they have to build their own sports guide that includes all of the things they learned in class. But I have a research list of about 100 books. They have to read 10 books and they have to have 20 articles of their own selection. And then they have to go to athletic contests. Some of them have never been to a baseball game. Can you believe it? And some haven't been to a basketball game. Some of them haven't been - none in the class but one had ever been to an auto race. And you know that's big in this country? So Wendell Scott was number one. It so happens that his son is a coach in the Virginia area, down near Tidewater. And I met him in a tournament. So I have more stuff on Wendell Scott than Wendell Scott's family because he sent me everything his father said or did. His father used to drive through the hills of Virginia trying to escape revenue officers. That's how he got his early training. That's no secret so I'm not telling on him. But I tell my class - So all of them - I have a whole document on - that they have to absorb. And I have a blockbuster quiz at the end of the thing but it's an open book. Because I'm not interested in testing just to see what kind of grades you make. I want them to retain the knowledge. Anyway, it's fun to me. I teach it two days a week. I'm the only class in the University that has two hours - two days a week, two hours each day. And I look forward to it because history is being added all the time.

Jay Holloway
Finally, we talked with Coach McLendon about health care. As a man who's in his 80's, that's something he can speak on very well. And here's what he had to say.

John McLendon
Well, our health care system is not very good. Since I'm now in a situation where I know instead of what I read about, I can tell you it's deficient. There's not enough care and not enough concern either. And even in the tax structure there's no reason why people when they reach a certain age can't make more money that is not taxable. Some of the things that you have to address yourself to makes it look like the government doesn't care about its older people at all. Now my wife has a - her mother, she's going to her 90's. Although she can apply for daily meals or Meals on Wheels and such, she still has to pay the same taxes as a person that's 35 years old and has the same income. It always seems interesting to me why we tax the pension of older people, why you would tax the Social Security. People have worked hard all their lives to put in there for the future and then if you make over so much money they tax it. I'm in taxes heavily. So it looks like we don't want the elderly to survive or the older generation to survive unless - Well, we don't want them to survive well. We just want them to be carried along. It almost causes you to lose your dignity, to have to work out the latter days of your life here in a poor system of taxation and health care. It's impossible for you to get sick without bankrupting yourself. If it's for any extended length of time you will, even with those supplements that you add onto your health care programs, you're in bad shape. You just have to hope and pray and be careful that you don't have a serious illness or accident.

Jay Holloway
What about prevention? You seem to handle and you've taken good care of yourself in your life. And a lot it is just preventing those sicknesses.

John McLendon
Well, of course you are flooded all the time with ways to keep yourself healthy. And most of it is about diet. And that includes liquid diet. Along with practices of improper eating and also eating the wrong type of foods. Usually the ones that are the most wrong are the most tasty. You just have to make some disciplinary moves in your life that will keep you from letting the diet destroy you. I think that's one essential thing. And, of course, regular exercise. When you get to a certain point it doesn't have to be strenuous. It just has to be regular and then you try to be careful. Accidents take off as many people as does disease. But on the other hand that's something that you can't entirely control because other people cause accidents in which you are involved. But I think diet and some of the things that people that do most are some of the things you shouldn't do at all. I have always been, because of my profession, one who is against, let's say, smoking and drinking. And if I'm against smoking it's automatic I'm against drugs. So I wouldn't take any such material into my system at all, not under any circumstance. Not just because I've been an athlete, because I've coached athletes or taught them. But it's just a matter of it's stupid. It's just a case of plain stupidity. And you don't practice stupidity with knowledge. If you are involved in something it's because you are ignorant. That means you don't know any better. I don't mean it in its harshest terms. So I think people just need to take a checkup on their habits. And diet is one of the things you have to check up on. That's a hard thing. It sounds so easy to say don't eat foods that are not proper. But if you go from here to the corner you just pass up a lot of good food that you want to be a part of or you want it to be a part of you. But at the same time you have to limit those opportunities.

Holloway
Well there you have it. A discussion with a living legend, Coach Mac - Dr. John McLendon, a living legend in his own time, who got his start in 1938 right here in North Carolina. He's the co-founder of the CIAA Basketball Tournament and studied under the founder of basketball, Dr. James Naismith. He also coached the first known collegiate basketball game between Blacks and Whites. That was between North Carolina College, now known as NCCU, North Carolina Central, and Duke Uni versity. Coach Mac, Dr. John McLendon. Thank you so much for watching Black Issues Forum again. Please call us at (919) 549-7167 or send e-mail to bif@unctv.org. We'd love to hear from you and hear your comments. And also visit us on the World Wide Web. That's at wwwunctv.org/bif. I'm Jay Holloway. You have a blessed evening and a peaceful one. Good night!

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