1. Carlos and tigerbelles
John Carlos –
Coach Temple and the Tigerbelles were frontrunners for women athletics here in the United States,
and possibly even throughout the world for women to be involved in sports…You have to take into
account when Coach Temple and the Tigerbelles originally started they had to basically compete
against themselves because they didn’t have any other women’s programs out there for them. They
evolved to the point where they not only participated in the Olympic Games, but you might say they
dominated women sports in the Olympic Games. If you sit back and take into account what they did-
most nations couldn’t do in the Olympic Games. They won more medals at the Olympic Games as
athletes than most nations won as a country.
Recognition
Women don’t recognition as a whole for anything that they do. Secondly, they didn’t get the recognition
they deserved because they were a bunch of black women doing it. [But] I haven’t seen any expressed
bitterness from any of them. I think more disillusioned but not surprised. I don’t think any of them were
surprised at the end results. Wyomia Tyus is a personal, personal friend of mine-like my sister. It offends
me that she would be the first woman-they hold the Olympics in such high esteem-here’s a women
whom won the 100 meters-back-to-back-she was the first person in the history of the Olympic games to
do this, and for her not to receive the acknowledgement that she’s due…Yet we want to hold FloJo
above Wyomia Tyus. That’s just indicative that the Tigerbelles have never received the respect and the
honor in which they are entitled to. Their situation is somewhat like the blacks that were involved in the
First World War or the Tuskegee Airmen. Look at how long it took before they were recognized and
acknowledged for their contributions in the various wars they were involved in.
On the fairness of comparing the likes of FloJo to Wyomia Tyus
From my perspective, there’s no comparison whatsoever. When I reflect back on track and field I have
one thing in mind…I don’t know if you ever saw the old commercial-Is it real or Memorex? Well, that’s
the way I look at track and field today, in terms of what I know what is real in my era, my day and time
and to take a look at things since that time and saying is it memorex?
Wyomia Tyus is the real deal. Wilma Rudolph is the real deal. All of those girls that came out of
Tennessee State were the real deal.
Wyomia is like my sister. I have a tremendous amount of love and a respect, not just for her, but for her
entire family. We’ve known each other for the better part of 25 years.
Tigerbelles and wyomia looking for respect
They don’t get hung up about a whole bunch of conversations about it, but you just know that they
pretty much understand the situation they’re in. No one’s happy about doing something that was above
the norm and not really fully receive the respect and the accolades you deserve.

2. Description of Tyus
I think she’s a very strong woman. I think she is very a smart woman. She is a kind woman. You couldn’t
ask for a better friend.
As a runner
She was a superb runner. There was no fear for any individual she had to run against.
On the magnitude of Tyus back-to-back 100 meter wins in two straight Olympics
I don’t know if people fully understand the height of that accomplishment. To go to an Olympic Game
and to be a clean athlete, with no drugs whatsoever in your system and then to run against the world
and come out and be successful in the 100 meters, which is supposed to be the premier event of the
Olympics, and to accomplish that feat at such a young age and then to come back and duplicate that
four years later-that’s extraordinary.
On why there is a lack of appreciation for track and field black/white
I think there’s a cultural difference. White folks have the opportunity to get in the pool and get involved
in aquatics. They go into equestrian, the horseback riding. They go into golf. They go into gymnastics. In
all of these sports are economically sound for them to go into. We couldn’t go into those sports because
economically we couldn’t afford to go into those sports. So when you sit back and think about the sports
we did take part in, it doesn’t take any heavy economics to get in the streets and play basketball. It
doesn’t take heavy economics to run track. It doesn’t take a whole bunch economics for you to get a
broomstick and a ball to play baseball. Based on our cultural differences, this is why sports are perceived
the way they are, in terms of blacks being gifted in sports they played every day for recreation-a long
time before they realized it was a sport. It doesn’t cost a tremendous amount of money to have your
kids involved in track and field; basically you need a top, a shirt, some shorts, some sweats and some
running shoes.
Will we see the likes of the Tigerbelles again?
I believe we have glimpses of it. I don’t know whether we will actually ever have another “Speed City”
nor will I see another women’s like the Tigerbelles. First of all, it would be difficult today that they would
have the same family attitude that they had, in terms of them being family. When you say family…that is
something that endures the times. You know, a lot of water has gone under the bridge, and they’re just
as close as a family as they were when they were at kids at the university. I don’t think that these kids
today have that family-orientation attitude that we had back in the 60s.
Mr. and Mrs. Temple
They were like Big Momma and Big Daddy to those girls.

3. Jim Crow
Let’s put it like this:
I don’t care what your ethnic background is all women are into hygiene and cosmetics and grooming and
that type of thing. And so imagine when you go out represent America and they give you a kit to you
know like toiletries, and you look in your bag as a black woman and you don’t have any toiletries in
there that relate to you. You got skin tan lotion. At the same time if your hair was a different texture or a
different type, you needed a different product to do your hair. These things were never taken into
account relative to black women and people of color. They had to do the Magic Man or Magic Lady type
of thing to keep themselves groomed and look respectable and glamorous they would have liked to
have been. They didn’t have these types of tangible things for those black women. They had them for all
the white women in the program, and for white men for that matter. When you look at Jim Crow, Jim
Crow played a large role because Jim Crow was not only outdated in general, Jim Crow was woven into
the system as a whole.
1968-what was it Iike for black athletes at that time during that year?
Black emergence from 1967-69; those three years were critical years relative to black emergence, in
terms of black athletes stepping up to the plate, and saying, “I want to respected as a black man or black
woman. Yes, I am an athlete, but that is just one small part of my life. I think we were starting to excel
along those areas to find who we were as a group of people.“
What was atmosphere like before the Olympics?
To be honest with you, there weren’t any tension. We had our program together, in terms of what we
were attempting to boycott. Once the boycott fell through, everybody was sure what their would be on
the track; so there weren’t any tension. Everybody knew pretty much what their mission was, their task
was during those Games. And everything went along accordingly.
WHAT WAS THE BOYCOTT ALL ABOUT
It was reflective on the treatment of people of color here in the United States, blacks in particular,
people of color here in the United States and around the world. Jim Crow or any other Crow…We were
basically stepping out and said this is something we need to deal with. We can no longer accept this for
being the norm.
On the Silent Gesture-if black athletes were aware of this-
No one had any idea that Mr. Smith and I was going to do that but God.
The aftermath: did Wyomia tyus or any other of the Tigerbelles reach out to you guys?
I think Wyomia and all the rest of the girls on the team were concerned about our well-being, concerned
about all the hostility towards us. To be honest with you, relative to that time and that incident, the

4. women didn’t the respect nor were they allowed to have the involvement that they needed to have in
that particular situation.
Overshadowing Wyomia
It overshadowed the Olympics. It overshadowed any aspect of the Olympic competition because it was
higher, it was deeper, and it was more than athletics.
HOSTILITY AFTER SILENT GESTURE OF CARLOS AND SMITH
“I don’t think there was any hostility towards Americans. I think what it was, I think they tried to create
some sort of divide among the black athletes. It was a pro boycott or pro demonstration versus those
who were anti-boycott and anti-demonstration.
On the proposal of boycott
I would never condone another Olympic boycott ever in my life, not for principle, but merely because
I feel that the boycott stricken, wounded and scarred so many athletes. I don’t think they’ve ever
recovered from those who were involved in the 1968 potential boycott. I don’t think anyone really
fully recovered from the boycott of 1980 in Moscow. I don’t think any athlete fully recovered from any
boycott or any attempted boycott, because part of your life is being taken away and a scar like that
doesn’t heal. So I would never advocate for any athlete to boycott or any country to boycott.
Do you have any regrets?
I have no regrets whatsoever. No regrets. If I die and come back I’ll have no regrets. In 1968, I didn’t
march in the opening ceremony. Mr. Smith didn’t march in the opening ceremony.
WHAT DID BLACK ATHLETES AND BLACK AMERICA FEEL IN RELECTION OF THE FREEDOM SALUTE
“The biggest snowball, so to speak were the one oppressed, were relieved, were honored and were
excited about what we had done on that victory stand, because that, in essence, was a sedative for the
pain they had to endure for the duration of time since slavery days. It was a sedative for them to say,
“Thank God, somebody got up and let the world know how we felt as black people and how we felt as
people of color for the injustices that’s been done to us. You know, it’s one thing to talk about your
history and feel for your history, it’s another thing and you sit back and you see all these year gone by
and we’ve haven’t had one President of the United States step and say, “I, as president of this nation I
would like to extend a sincere apology for what has happened in our ancestry past. That’s the way
healing starts. We’re still having atrocities taking place. We talk about going to the moon, we talk about
leaving earth and this and that an we’re still dealing civil rights and human rights issues?
Wilma Rudolph
She’s like a hallmark athlete for Tennessee State University.

5. When I started my career, I started my career because of Edith McGuire. When I was a young guy I
would watch the track meets on television. I was just attracted to her. I started my career in track and
field hoping I could get a chance to talk to her. It was an infatuation about her I might say. Then when I
got into track and field, when I was rising up, she had retired. My first serious and true involvement in
track and field to make me focused was the Tigerbelles.
I met her long after I fished my career in sports.
Sum up the Tigerbelles
If you have a daughter and you had to mold her after individuals that would be great in the world of
athletics, even greater as human being, then you should go find the history on the Tigerbelles. They
would be heroes of any young girl regardless of their ethnic background because they endured, they
succeeded and they championed all the causes.