Separate Games: African American Sport behind the Walls of Segregation eds by David K. Wiggins and Ryan A. Swanson (review)

The history of sports often focuses on individuals. This is especially true when discussing matters of race. The names of Jesse Owens, Jackie Robinson, and Wilma Rudolph figure prominently in stories told about the African American athletic experience. Separate Games: African American Sport behind the Walls of Segregation offers a different perspective while exploring a period of sport history unfamiliar to many fans and students. Organized into three categories—teams, events, and organizations—David K. Wiggins and Ryan A. Swanson have compiled an impressive collection that demonstrates the broad range of sporting endeavors African Americans organized and competed in before the fall of the color line. The book includes essays on auto racing, bowling, golf, and tennis alongside more familiar sports such as basketball, baseball, football, and track and field. Moreover, high school, college, amateur, and professional male and female athletes, organizers, and administrators populate the volume's stories.

The first four chapters offer insight into the organization, structure, and reception of black teams. They show that in spite of their haphazard barnstorming nature, black teams such as the Cuban Giants, Harlem Renaissance Big Five, and the Philadelphia Tribune Newsgirls, were remarkably popular, economically successful, and influential. The Renaissance Big Five in particular served as an important Harlem institution and as leaders during the early years of professional basketball. It found more economic success on the road, seizing on its regional appeal and expanding the Renaissance into the northeast and Midwest. Tennessee State's "Tigerbelles" track-and-field team benefited from better organization and demonstrated its influence in different ways, particularly through the members that went on to join the U.S. Olympic team.

Events became community institutions that reflected local histories and conflicts as well as the regional and national importance of sports to African American life. The next four chapters on the Gold and Glory Sweepstakes, the East West Classic, the Turkey Day Classic, and the National Interscholastic High School Basketball Tournament demonstrate that major sporting events often functioned as social events imbued with meaning beyond the playing field. They were shaped by community leaders and reflected black pride, serving as more than an alternative to segregated white events. Indeed, the Turkey Day Classic reflected the histories of Montgomery, Alabama State University, and the Tuskegee Institute as well as their differing views on sport and respectability. The Gold and Glory Sweepstakes stemmed from a different kind of local history, rooted in exclusionary auto racing practices and a vibrant, entrepreneurial black community in Indianapolis.

The final four chapters explore organizations like the Colored Intercollegiate Athletic Association, American Tennis Association, United Golfers Association, and the National Negro Bowling Association. Challenging the color line, providing economic opportunity, and fostering fellowship among African Americans counted among the goals of each organization. The authors outline how each group formed communities by developing tournaments, venues, and athletes. This is particularly clear in the National Negro Bowling Association, which valued women and children as an integral part of creating a family-friendly sporting culture open to athletes of all race, gender, age, and ability.

Community is at the heart of many of the essays, grounding teams, events, and organizations in particular places and linking them to broader efforts by African Americans to achieve social, political, and economic equality. Relying largely on newspaper coverage and editorials from the black press, each chapter balances the aspirations of leaders, athletes, and communities with the daily realties of living behind the walls of segregation. Some essays offer more analysis and new insights than others, but overall the book is cohesive and accessible. Separate Games makes an important contribution to our understanding of African American life and the history of sports.