Word: gaither
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...orders were issued in dead seriousness; yet no one lifted an eyebrow. For Coach Alonzo Smith ("Jake"') Gaither, 56. has been handing down such edicts ever since he showed up in Tallahassee in 1937 and began turning Florida A. & M. University into the nation's top all-Negro football school. "I've had my ups and downs," says husky Jake Gaither. "But they've been mostly ups. We've won 122 and lost 20. Bud Wilkinson at Oklahoma and I have the best records of any football coaches in the country, and I forget...
...Just a Game." Following Gaither's example, many small Negro colleges have beefed up their football teams in the past decade, now play a game both solid and spectacular. Because" they meet no white teams, it is impossible to tell just how good the Negro clubs really are. "We have to wait until our players reach pro ball," says Gaither. "In pro ball I'll match my boys against anybody...
...Seven of Gaither's graduates have turned pro, including the Chicago Bears' elusive Willie Galimore. Many pro scouts are now finding stars hidden away on other Negro teams that seldom make headlines. Maryland's Morgan State produced the New York Giants' all-N.F.L. Tackle Roosevelt Brown, and North Carolina A. & T.'s J. D. Smith is "now a standout halfback for the San Francisco '49ers. Says one N.F.L. scout: "My God, we'd be crazy not to watch those Negro colleges. They've got the talent...
...Gaither encourages his boys to turn pro, not so much for the money as for another sort of reward: "There is no place in the life of my people for mediocre performance. This has to be the dominating factor in our life. For a Negro boy, there is not just a game of football. He can't afford to let his people down...
...When I started here." Gaither recalls, "Florida was the dishrag of the nation as far as Negro football players went." Today. Florida has some of the best Negro football anywhere-and the state's 84 football-playing Negro high schools are staffed by nearly 100 Gaither-trained head and assistant coaches...