Johnny Bright’s name is synonymous with greatness in two places where he excelled: on football fields and in classrooms. A fullback for the dominant Edmonton Eskimos of the 1950s, who won three straight Grey Cup championships, the American came to Canada early that decade – eschewing the National Football League’s Philadelphia Eagles, who drafted him fifth overall – from tiny Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa, where he starred for the NCAA Division I Bulldogs. Bright was a favourite to win the 1951 Heisman Trophy as U.S. college football’s top player when he was targeted in a racially motivated attack during a game. The “Johnny Bright Incident” occurred during Drake’s Oct. 20 game against Oklahoma A&M, when defensive tackle Wilbanks Smith, a white man, knocked Bright, who was Black, unconscious three times. One of the blows broke Bright’s jaw and forced him from the game. He subsequently missed the rest of the regular season. The incident drew widespread attention across the U.S. and earned the photographer who captured the attack in a series of photos a Pulitzer Prize. It also led to significant changes in the college game, including the introduction of mandatory face masks and mouthpieces for players, rule changes as well as bringing more attention to issues surrounding integration in U.S. society. When both Oklahoma A&M and the athletic conference to which both schools competed in failed to take disciplinary action in the attack, Drake removed its teams from competition in it. While most of them returned to the Missouri Valley Conference in 1956, its football team didn’t go back to it until 1971. Although Bright’s name already adorns Drake’s football field and one of its colleges, the university’s president said it’s important to further honour him by marking the 75th anniversary of the incident and keeping the memory of his remarkable accomplishments on and off the gridiron alive. Marty Martin said Bright’s “courage, resilience and character that he showed in the moment and the years thereafter” is worthy of being remembered today. “He was an outstanding athlete who was a strong student who combined those two to have phenomenal success (not just) as a football player in the Canadian Football League but also a wonderful career as an educator,” Martin told CTV News Edmonton on Friday, less than an hour after the university unveiled a seven-foot bronze statue of Bright outside one of the stadium gates. “That’s what we want from our alums, that they go out and have the kind of positive impact that he had. We need to celebrate those who have reached a level that the rest of us can find inspiration in and give us that optimism and energy we need to go out and be our best selves.” Bre Bright-Wortham, Bright’s granddaughter, said at Friday’s unveiling that the family is “humbled that Drake continues to exude the values they exhibited 75 years ago in support of my grandfather.” “At a time when most schools were ignoring the educational desires and athletic talents of Black Americans, Drake, Des Moines and the state of Iowa embraced my grandfather,” Bright-Wortham said Friday morning at the dedication of the statue and plaques at the gate telling Bright’s story. “Drake, a storied institution, exemplified the values instilled upon its founding, and left the conference in protest after the safety of an athlete was compromised.” When he wasn’t starring alongside the likes of Jackie Parker, Normie Kwong and Rollie Miles for the Eskimos, now known as the Elks, Bright worked as an educator in the Edmonton public school system, and coached high school football and basketball squads as well as the junior football Wildcats. He earned an education degree at Drake and put it to work as a city teacher starting in 1957. He later served as a junior high school principal until 1983, when he died unexpectedly of a heart attack during knee surgery at age 53. Bright’s name can be found across Edmonton, including on a local school, a west-end athletic park next to two high schools and a scholarship for Grade 12 student athletes. He is also one of 41 team greats on the Elks’ Wall of Honour at Commonwealth Stadium. When Bright retired as a player in 1964 after 12 seasons, first with the Calgary Stampeders and then with the Eskimos following a mid-season trade in 1954, he was the CFL’s all-time leading rusher. He’s a member of the Canadian Football Hall of Fame, the U.S. College Football Hall of Fame and the Alberta Sports Hall of Fame. “He’s very well remembered,” Martin said. “In my remarks for the unveiling of the statue, I said, ‘You stand on the shoulders of giants that came before you.’ “Johnny Bright was one of those.”
