Better than the Best: Black Athletes Speak, 1920-2007

Don Benning: Wrestling

59 Don Benning, Ed.D. wrestling June 3–4, 1994 Omaha, Nebraska In 1963, Dr. Don Benning broke two color lines simultaneously when he was hired as head wrestling coach and assistant professor at Omaha University,1 becoming the first African American head wrestling coach at a predominantly white university, and the first African American full-time faculty member at Omaha University. In addition to these positions , Benning also served as assistant football coach and athletic counselor . In 1969 he became the first African American coach to be a member of the U.S. Olympic Wrestling Committee. He led the Omaha University wrestling team to a National Championship in 1970. That same year, he was awarded Wrestling Coach of the Year by the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics. In 1971, while still coaching, Benning became the first African American in the state to receive a doctoral degree from the College of Education at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. After his years of coaching and teaching at Omaha University, Benning went on to become assistant principal at Central High School (1971–1976), director of the Department of Human Community Relations Services (1976–1979), consultant for the U.S. Navy (1979), and assistant superintendant of the Omaha Public School District (1979–1997). Don Benning’s other distinctions include a Sports Illustrated Award of Merit (1969), a Nebraska High School Athletic Director of the Year Award (1974), induction into the University of Nebraska at Omaha Hall of Fame (1982), a Viking of Distinction Award (1986), and induction into the Nebraska High School Hall of Fame—Sports (2000). Don Benning retired from his position as assistant 60 don benning, ed.d. superintendent in 1997, and is now coordinator of urban education and part-time senior lecturer of educational administration at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. Childhood I was born in Omaha, Nebraska, on October 10, 1936. My parents’ names were Erdie and Mary Benning. They were married for fifty-three years. Both of my parents were middle-aged when I was born. My father was forty-nine and my mother was forty-eight. I knew my parents as middleaged and elderly individuals, but the way they carried themselves never did fall into the stereotypical category of invalids or the deteriorating elderly. I was the youngest of five children. My oldest brother, William Philip, was twenty-three or twenty-four years older than me. The next oldest was Earl; then my sister Francis, and finally my sister Phyllis, who was four years older than me. Earl played sports in high school, but neither of my sisters played sports. I was the first in my family to play any sport extensively. None of the others in my family went to college. At that time there were open discrimination and segregation laws on the books, even here in the northern cities. The circumstances in which I was raised were somewhat unusual. I wasn’t raised in the black community. I was raised in a very poor segment of the white community in northeastern Omaha, which was nearly as bad as what you would find in white Appalachia. I never did get the straight story of how my family ended up there. We had very limited resources at that time in 1936. It was during the wpa (Works Progress Administration) and the Depression. One thing I remember about my dad was that he always was working at something, even if it was hauling garbage. He ended up retiring from the Union Pacific Railroad as a chair car porter. Even though I had a two-parent family, we were very poor. If it were today, I would say we would certainly have qualified for welfare. When I was in elementary school the Brown v. Topeka Board of Education decision wasn’t in place. That came in 1954. I went to Sherman Elementary School in the 1940s, which was a predominantly white school. At that time it was K–8. The Bennings were pretty much the only blacks that attended. It was a situation where I definitely was the minority. It was interesting because it taught me a few important survival skills early on in life: that I still had to deal with prejudice, racism, and discrimination. I don benning, ed.d. 61 had to learn how to take care of myself. You learn how to survive or perish in those situations. You either become submissive...