Taylor Bell Quotations

When it was finally over - all of the traveling, the 350 interviews, countless phone calls - and I received the book in the mail, I realized I had never done anything like it. I look at this book and I looking at three years of my life.

I did not set out to write a controversial book, ... But no matter where I went in the state, I ran into the question of race. The 1940s and most of the 1950s were a time of accepted segregation.

When the change was made in 1972, we were all very skeptical,

Finally, in 1953, Al Willis, the executive director of the IHSA said enough is enough. In 1954 the state tournament was fully integrated.

In 2002, I was in a diner in southern Illinois that didn't allow black people to eat in the restaurant. I was there while a black customer came in, ordered from the counter and left with the food. I checked it out and it is known that the diner is segregated.

I do think there are more classes on the way and I think there will be a loss of identity for a lot of small schools.