COLUMBIA, Missouri -- Call out the instigator, because there’s something in the air
We’ve got to together sooner or later, because the revolution’s here
And you know it’s right
Released in May 1969, Thunder Clap Newman’s “Something in the Air” hit the charts nine months after UCLA basketball star Lew Alcindor and other prominent college athletes chose not to participate in the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City.
Tommie Williams and John Carlos won gold and bronze medals, respectively, in the 200 meters then donned black gloves and raised the “Black Power” fist on the medal stand as the Star Spangled Banner played. The players who skipped the Games were ripped by the predominantly white sports media. Williams and Carlos were stripped of their medals and ordered out of the Olympic Village.
There indeed was something in the air in October 1968.
Forty-seven years later, about 30 black football players at the University of Missouri told this nation and those that run collegiate athletics that “the revolution’s here.”
On Saturday, November 7, these gallant, young black heroes informed their coaches and the world that they would not practice or play until Timothy Wolfe, the university system president, resigned or was removed from office and graduate student Jonathan Butler ended his 10-day hunger strike.
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