ABSTRACT
AMID THE MOUNTAINS OUTSIDE Charleston, West Virginia, in the mid–1940s, North Carolina College basketball coach John B. McLendon Jr. found himself facing an angry young white man and a potentially explosive situation. McLendon and his team had boarded the bus after a game with West Virginia State and discovered only one seat remaining open. Under the protocols of segregation, white riders had filled the front of the bus, and black riders had gone to the back. The lone empty place sat right on the dividing line, next to a young white woman with a baby in her arms. After a quick conference the team concluded that center Henry Thomas needed the most rest and should sit down. Thomas asked the woman if he could sit next to her, and she said she did not mind. The bus driver, however, had a different view. “I can see him now,” McLendon recounted. “He looked up in the mirror, and he saw Henry Thomas sitting beside this girl. So he came back. And on the way back, I said to the players—they were all lined up, hanging on—I said, ‘Don't forget, now, I'll do the talking.’” 1
