INTERCOLLEGIATE FOOTBALL RESEARCHERS ASSOCIATION ™ The College Football Historian ™ Expanding the knowledge and information on college football’s unique past—today! ISSN: 1526-233x [February 2011 Vol. 4 No. 1] circa: Jan. 2008 Tex Noel, Editor ([email protected]) (Website) http://www.secsportsfan.com/college-football-association.html All content is protected by copyright© by the author. With this issue of The College Football Historian, we are kicking-off our 4th season of presenting remembering historical College Football…We have nearly 300 subscirbers—in 5 countries…Thank you! Collie J. His missives ran in the Pittsburgh Courier and other black newspapers By Michael Hurd and put Grambling on the college football map and on the minds of Call it hyperbole if you want, but fans and pro football scouts around Collie J. Nicholson created the the country. And along with the image of black college football from Tigers came the rest of black college the backwoods Northern Louisiana football. outpost known as Grambling, a community founded by former Collie, who during World War II was slaves and a place you reached only the first-ever black combat if you were going somewhere else. correspondent for the U.S. Marine However, on his battered black Corps, refined and popularized the Remington typewriter, Collie banged Black College Football Classic game out news stories, feature stories, concept, booking the G-Men for and games stories, all in his colorful games in Yankee Stadium, the Los Runyanesque style announcing the latest Grambling gridiron triumph The College Football Historian- 2- or pro prospect. Angeles Coliseum, the Houston Astrodome and other big city arenas with Grambling and Eddie State, Florida A&M, and Southern Robinson, the team’s charismatic University – had full-time SIDs. head coach, as the main attraction. Most black colleges didn’t Collie also founded the Bayou emphasize the position, relying on Classic, the annual cat fight members of the athletic committee between rivals Grambling and or English department to double as Southern University. publicists, writing press releases and sending them out to local In 1976, Collie learned enough newspapers. A lot of black colleges Japanese to negotiate a contract for didn’t begin hiring full time SIDs Grambling and Morgan State to play until the 1960s, and they continue in the first regular season NCAA to under-value the importance of the game played outside of the U.S. job. Grambling was here, they were “Collie was fortunate to have the there, they were everywhere and backing of the president and the Nicholson was the traffic director athletic director (football coach and messenger, letting the world Eddie Robinson), something which know there was such a thing as an most of his collective successors institution of higher learning that around historically black colleges catered specifically to black people today don't have,” said Alvin Hollins, and that those schools had some Florida A&M’s long-time sports pretty good athletic teams. information director, and a member On Feb. 19th, Collie will be of the school’s Sports Hall of Fame. enshrined with the second class of “He was probably one of the best the Black College Football Hall of and most effective combinations of Fame publicist and promoter/marketer (http://www.blackcollegefootballhof. this country has ever seen. org). Here is an excerpt from his Sadly, most of my contemporaries biography, “Collie J., Grambling’s don't even know who Collie is. Plus, Man With the Golden Pen” (St. he did what few of us only dream of Johann Press, 2007, today: get a small black college team http://www.stjohannpress.com), on TV, get them to barnstorm to written by Michael Hurd. major markets in the U.S. and (Collie) Nicholson defined the The College Football Historian- 3 position of sports information director at black colleges and began overseas and make them nearly a his job at a time when only three household name. other black colleges – Tennessee “In this day and age, HBCU athletic treated them right and they got directors don't value public relations what they expected out of me and and we are left with trying to work the best that we could afford.” miracles every day. Collie was in He put the program on the map and every way the ultimate PR guy.” only Robinson was more responsible Collie’s genius was evident though for sending Grambling players to the the position of sports information pros. The coach nurtured them on director is, by design, not front and the field, Collie J. tutored them off of center. it in how to deal with the media, and his ability to get publicity was a “People don’t see that position, major aid to the players in getting sometimes coaches don’t see that noticed by pro scouts and signed to position,” Keith Prince, of the contracts, some of which Collie Monroe (La.) News Star, said. “They helped negotiate. think news stories just happen. He’s gotten much more attention for Collie was instrumental in Tank what he did now that it’s all over. Younger signing with the Los Like so many great men, people Angeles Rams in 1949, becoming don’t realize what is being achieved. the first black college player to make It’s really just an issue of the way an NFL roster. James Harris would people perceive things. They were become only the second black looking at what he did, but their quarterback to start a game – the focus was on Grambling, which was first to start for an entire season, in exactly what he wanted. It was the NFL in 1969 after being drafted never about him. It’s true in that in the eighth round by the Buffalo profession, you’re out there to serve Bills. Nicholson’s media and NFL your university, your athletic teams blitz played a big role in Harris and coaches and the less you’re in getting noticed by the league. Collie the public eye, the better. That’s not followed that in 1977 when he the focus. Nobody other than people developed the Heisman Trophy in the media realized what he was campaign for quarterback Doug doing.” Williams, who finished fourth in the balloting in addition to becoming the Collie would not have had it any first player from a black college to other way. be named to the Associated Press “The people I met doing business at The College Football Historian- 4- Grambling are people I could always go back to and oLok them in the All-America first team and the first face and know they felt that I black quarterback drafted in the first round by an NFL team (Tampa assistant sports information director Bay in 1978). Mary Jo Haverbeck in 2001. The award is given to a CoSIDA member “For all of us, most of us had never who has broken down barriers, been out of the “boot” (Louisiana), worked to mentor others, and has so we were in awe,” Harris recalled. encouraged the active participation “We’d never seen tall buildings and of women and minorities in sports things like that. We didn’t have a lot information. The award from of money so we did a lot of bus CoSIDA was among dozens of riding, but flew to New York and for honors Nicholson received, a lot of guys it was their first plane including: recognition from the ride. That’s the era we were in, but National Association for Equal people read about us all over the Opportunity in Higher Education country. If they had then the TV and (NAFEO) as an outstanding black stuff they have now, this media college graduate; induction to the playground, Grambling would have SWAC Hall of Fame in 2002; Jet been one of the biggest things in Magazine’s 1976 Black College sports. Sports Information Director of the “There can’t be anybody better than Year; and the Distinguished Service Nick in terms of work ethic, Award in Sports Journalism by the contacts, and he had creativity and Louisiana Sports Writers visions far beyond what we could Association. see. He had imagination. We only Collie J.’s football and basketball dreamed of some of the things that media guides won 13 national Nick was getting done. We had awards, combined, from the NAIA, probably the greatest coach that NCAA, and CoSIDA. The colorful ever lived. He really built character cartoons featured the Grambling and was a strong factor in all of his tiger mascot and were drawn by an player’s lives. We had that. We had artist Collie worked with for several a small school like Grambling sitting years, but never met. Phil Neel was on the best coach to ever live and as a cartoonist for the Birmingham fine a PR man as anybody ever had.” Post-Herald for over 30 years, but The College Sports information also freelanced as the artist for Directors Association recognized media guide and game program that in 2002 when the group made covers for Auburn University, Nicholson the second recipient of its The College Football Historian- 5- prestigious Trailblazer Award, an honor they had bestowed the year featuring their tiger mascot, “Aubie.” before to former Penn State Neel did similar work for Southern University, with its Jaguar, and concept, though Collie gave Neel a Clemson’s tiger mascot, as well as free hand to create. Neel sent a Grambling. small draft of a color sketch for Collie’s okay, then mailed the final “I don’t know what I would have design to Grambling. done without tigers and jaguars,” Neel quipped.