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BREAKING BARRIERS
W&J REMEMBERS LEGENDARY ATHLETE WHO CHANGED THE GAME FOR AFRICAN-AMERICANS IN COLLEGIATE SPORTS
As the Presidents kicked off their 120th football season in September, Washington & Jefferson College paused to honor the memory of a player who advanced the role of African-Americans in collegiate sports. Charles “Pruner” West ’24 led the Presidents to their only Rose Bowl appearance in 1922 against the University of California Golden Bears, becoming the first African-American quarterback to play in the nation’s oldest bowl game. According to his daughter, Linda West Nickens, West had been a halfback at the time, but was asked to play quarterback when the starter was injured. “It was kind of a ‘fill-in’ thing, but my father rose to the occasion,” she said. West, who also excelled at track and field, rose to the occasion at a number of athletic events during his W&J career. He earned the title of a two-time national collegiate pentathlon champion—a feat no W&J athlete had accomplished before—and was named to the 1924 Olympic team, though he did not participate due to an injury. In recognition of West’s contributions, Dana Brooks, dean and professor of physical education at West Virginia University, presented W&J with a poster of West during a dedication ceremony Sept. 1 at the U. Grant Miller Library. Brooks, who first read about West when teaching a course on African-Americans in sports, was impressed with the student-athlete’s accomplishments on and off the field. Referring to the bigotry that West endured in the pre-Civil Rights era, Brooks said the aspiring physician always remained “humble, successful and talented.” The ceremony was attended by members of West’s family, including Nickens and her children, Michael West Nickens and Crystal Nickens. “How fitting that you should choose to further spread my father’s story at a time when the country is honoring, Martin Luther King, Jr., with a statue on the Washington, D.C., Mall,” said Nickens, who proudly called her father a “pioneer.” “He confronted racial barriers not only in football, but also in the medical field.” At W&J, West is best known for his involvement in a legendary 1923 match against the Washington & Lee Generals. It was the tradition of the Southern school, at the time, to request that Northern teams bench their African-American players. When Bob “Mother” Murphy, W&J’s athletic director, approached his star player about their opponent’s demands, West voiced his frustration. “They left it up to me and asked how I felt about it,” West later wrote. “I told them, well, there’s no way I can stop you from playing without me, but if you do, I’ll never play another game for W&J.” This prompted Murphy to tell the Generals, “W&J does not play without Pruner West.”As a result, the Presidents paid the Generals a portion of the proceeds that would have come from ticket sales and dropped out of the game.
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WINTER 2012 MAGAZINE