Because history is an evolving thing, we should always be mindful of its elasticity, of the idea that one day’s absolute is the next day’s possible, and vice versa. As time passes, one era's standards and mores can often be found lacking by later generations.
That may be the case at the University of Maryland, where the decisions of the 1950’s are running smack into the sensibilities of the 21st century. We learned last week that the student government association at College Park has endorsed a movement to rename Byrd Stadium, the home of the school’s football and lacrosse teams. The stadium, which opened in September 1950, bears the name of H.C. “Curley” Byrd, the former president of the university from 1936 to 1954.
Byrd played a number of sports at Maryland and was football coach before becoming president. At first blush, naming the stadium after Byrd seems a natural. That is, until you consider the plight of men like Wilmeth Sidat-Singh, a former two-sport star from Syracuse University. Sidat-Singh, who was thought to be Hindu, was actually African-American. Because of that, he was barred from playing in a football game in Baltimore against Maryland in 1937, because, at that time, Black students were barred from attending school at College Park and Maryland athletes were banned from playing against Black athletes from other schools.
We told you about that case a year and a half ago here on Sports at Large. Maryland officials paid tribute to Wilmeth Sidat-Singh and his memory 76 years after the fact in a game between the Terps and Syracuse at Byrd Stadium in November 2013. The date of the original game fell during the tenure of Curley Byrd as school president and the exclusion of Black students was a policy that Byrd enforced.
That rule stayed in effect until 1951. However, even after that policy was changed, Byrd continued to bar Black athletes from playing for the school until his retirement. That edict stayed in effect until 1962. After what seemed to be a long period of quiet, college campuses have recently perked as a sense of social conscience seems to have awakened among students of the 21st century.
Just last month, a group of Maryland students challenged school President Wallace Loh’s decision not to permanently expel a fraternity student who fired off an e-mail with racial slurs. It should come as no surprise that an amalgam of those same groups, young people of goodwill from all ethnic backgrounds, is seeking to have Curley Byrd’s name taken off one of the campus’ most visible buildings.
And their cause is certainly just, under 2015 rules. And if this was a choice to name such a facility after Byrd today, I’d sign the petition and march right along with them. But, as a Black man and a Maryland graduate who has spent many a fall Saturday afternoon in the Byrd Stadium seats and press box, I am conflicted.
Future generations must know about the racism of Curley Byrd’s time. I just don’t know if taking his name off the stadium would tell the complete story.