A LOOK BACK: KAPPA HISTORY
because of an injury, starting in 96 of 99 games and was the longest-tenured Black player during that era. A 1933 ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ among White team owners, barred Blacks from playing in the NFL. Slater was sub- sequently instrumental in assembling All-Star teams of Black players and served as coach of the Chicago Negro All-Stars. He later became a coach of Black semi-professional teams, the Chicago Brown Bombers (1937), the Chicago Comets (1939), and the Chi- cago Panthers (1940). He also served as coach of an exhibition game against the Chicago Bears at Soldier Field in 1938. These efforts paved the way for Blacks to integrate the NFL. He was a 1918 Gamma Chapter initiate and served as its Polemarch in 1921. He was a Life Member of the Chicago (IL) Alumni Chapter and served as its 21st Polemarch (1954). Among his many accolades, he was inducted into the Iowa Sports Hall of Fame, the Col- lege Football Hall of Fame (1951), and a two-time finalist (1970 & 1971) for election into the Pro Football Hall of
Fame. After periodic reconsideration of his induction, January 2020, Slater was finally voted to be enshrined into the 2020 class, during the NFL’s centennial year. Slater’s well-deserved and long past due induction to the Pro Football Hall of Fame, places him in the company of fellow Kappas: Ollie Matson, HOF- 1972 (Gamma Alpha 1950), Bill Willis, HOF-1977 (Zeta 1945), Gale Sayers, HOF-1977 (Mu 1963), Willie Davis, HOF-1981 (Gamma Psi 1954), John H. Johnson, HOF-1987 (Gamma Iota 1954), Lem Barney, HOF-1992 (Delta Delta 1966), Bob Brown, HOF-2004 (Eta 1963), Willie Roaf, HOF-2012 (Little Rock (AK) Alumni 1999) and Aeneas Williams, HOF-2014 (Alpha Sigma 1988). Slater entered the Chapter Invisible August 14, 1966, and is laid to rest at Mt. Glenwood Memorial Gardens in the south suburban Chicago city of Glen- wood, Illinois.
D ue to the discriminatory Indiana University football standout George Taliaferro (Alpha 1948), he had no reason to believe that he would be drafted by the NFL. The native Tennes- sean originally emerged as a high school football phenom at Gary Roosevelt High School in Gary, Indiana, then as a tailback on Indiana University’s football team as a freshman. ‘agreement’ practiced by the white NFL owners to restrict Black players since 1933, Taliaferro was recognized for his remark- able gifts as a running back, quarter- back, kicker and defensive back. He led Indiana University to its only undefeated season and Big Ten championship in 1945 and earned All-American honors
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George Taliaferro at Indiana University.
94 | SUMMER 2020 ♦ THE JOURNAL
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