Those people were amped up like Ted Nugent. If we had taken that field, there would have been a riot." And I tend to agree with him.
We interviewed one of the black students organizing and he said, "Bullshit. That those fans wouldn't have done anything. The black students were planning on taking the field if the band played "Dixie." When we were interviewing the Arkansas players they said nothing would have happened. That part there is still a lot of debate about.
One of the black students got shot after the pep rally, fortunately he was not seriously injured. So Arkansas succumbed to that pressure and the night before the game at the pep rally the band director announced they would not play the song at the game the next day.
They were warned that the blacks students weren't happy about some things, particularly that the Arkansas band always played "Dixie" after every score. What they were a little more concerned about was the racial unrest. As it turns out, there was a demonstration. The anti-Vietnam sentiment in Fayetteville was not significant. When Nixon came, then that brought Donald Donner – possibly the only Vietnam vet on that Arkansas campus – to lead an anti-Vietnam War demonstration outside the stadium, where Nixon saw it the whole time. He had not won either state in the 1968 election and he was a huge fan of the game, too. Nixon said it wasn't about politics and his people will tell you that, like they told us. And one of the reason we wanted to do this film was to teach kids, my kids' age, what was happening in 1969. Looney: It's one of the last major college game featuring all-white participants, and that makes it, from a historical perspective, very significant. So it was the first time they had taken a college game and said, "Okay, let's arrange television around it and move it to the end of the year when it will be the only game that weekend."įbSH: What other historic impact is there from this game? Texas and Arkansas were originally scheduled to play in October. And this game involved changing the schedule. That Notre Dame game couldn't be seen in certain parts of the country. Looney: First of all they didn't have that kind of production. Notre Dame game that had that kind of big television production. 3.Īnd, lo and behold, that's was exactly what happened.įbSH: Now, prior to 1969 there had been other big games that captured national interest such as the 1966 Michigan State v. Texas and Arkansas have a chance to be undefeated and, worst case, they'll be No. I don't know who, but they will lose to somebody and, besides, even if they don't if we put them at the end of the season whoever we pick to play them will have three or four losses. Especially since Ohio State was the defending champion and they had all their starters back. It was all a dream because it couldn't happen. 2 and we'll get Nixon to come and crown the national champion." And, Beano, by the way, why don't you pick who's gonna be ranked No. Why don't you look over all the schedules – no computers, no nothing – and figure out what game we can pluck out of the middle of the year and put it as the final game of the season. Roone Arledge went to Beano Cook and said "It's the 100th year of college football, we've got to do something special.
THE GAME THE DOCUMENTARY DOWNLOAD LINK TV
The very first one where TV circled around the event. The reason it's important, there's a long laundry list, but first and foremost, is it was the first sporting event arranged for television. If you made all this up, no one would believe it. There's that old saying "fact is stranger than fiction" is really true here. Mike Looney: A story like this only comes around once in a lifetime. Football Study Hall: Why is this game so important and why did you feel the need to make a film about it?
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