Black 14: The Rise, Fall and Rebirth of Wyoming Football

Got Ryan Thornburn's book, "Black 14: The Rise, Fall, and Rebirth of Wyoming Football", and read the entire book in about two hours. It's not a long book, only 151 pages of widely spaced text including index. But despite its short length, Ryan does a very good job of covering the basic story of the Black 14 incident and its effect on the Wyoming football program. A lot of what he wrote I was familiar with, but I did learn a few things about the incident I didn't know.For one, how spineless the UW administration and the governor where in letting Coach Lloyd Eaton dictate how the situation was going to be handled. I came away from the book thinking that if the athletic director, president, or governor had some ca hones, and not let Eaton run over them, the situation could have been handled in a way that wouldn't have destroyed a then top-ten football program.Ryan also does a good job of chronicling the painful climb out of obscurity to the successful tenure of AD-Head Coach Paul Roach. It's the Roach years that many of our younger fans on this board remember as Wyoming's glory years and rightfully so. But as Ryan so poignantly points out, Wyoming football of the 50's to the mid 60's was damn good and on the verge of becoming a national powerhouse. But for the stubborn shortsightedness of the head coach, all was lost. And it's this fact that makes the story of Lloyd Eaton so tragic. Eaton's inability to adapt to the changing times of the '60s was his and Wyoming football's downfall.Each of the lives of the Black 14 are detailed in the book and how the event shaped the rest of their lives. Ryan covers all of the surviving members and shows how each man dealt with the situation and what they did with their lives. Ryan covers 12 of the 14. Two were not interviewed, one having passed away, Jim Issac, and Ivie Moore, whereabouts unknown.Thornburn brings us full circle to the present time. I was shocked to read his quotes from Wyoming new head coach Dave Christensen in the book. It means that he was working on this manuscript as late as this spring to be able to include "DC".And though I was a bit disappointed at the brevity of the book (I guess I can't get enough of Wyoming football history), Thornburn covers his subject well and does justice to the most pivotal event in Wyoming football. An event which I believe we're still trying to overcome. As long as a live I'll never get over what might have been had cooler heads prevailed.On the 40th anniversary year of the Black 14 incident, thank you Ryan Thornburn for a great read! I'd recommend it to anyone who loves Wyoming football or college football for that matter.

This is a decent summary of the infamous "Black 14" incident and makes interesting reading for Wyoming football fans. Most interesting were interviews with some of the key individuals involved.I do believe this book, and other reviewers here, are too hard on Lloyd Eaton. Eaton had two rules which were no demonstrations and no factions. The players violated both those rules by putting on those armbands and walking into Eaton's office. They were already demonstrating, and already forming a faction. This was, as we would say now, a very "in your face" flaunting of team rules. And this was after Eaton had already told Joe Williams no, you are not going to do this. Eaton blew his top, and I can understand given the circumstances. People often say regrettable things when they are mad. But the players broke team rules and it is not surprising there were consequences for doing that. The author could also have mentioned that the same week of this incident several white players had asked to participate in an anti-Vietnam-war protest, and he had refused them too.More attention should have been given to Willie Black and BSA's involvement. There seems to have been quite a bit of manipulation of the players, with dire consequences for their potential NFL careers, with little or no consequences to the BSA leadership. Perhaps they should have been more interested in the players' welfare and less interested in provoking a conflict?The near universally accepted assertion that the players' "civil rights" were violated also seems questionable. The players were offered academic scholarships to play football at Wyoming, under the rules Eaton had prescribed. When you accept compensation with the agreement that you will live up to your end the the bargain, even if you might not like some of those terms, you do not have a constitutional right to renig on those terms. You are totally free to renig on those terms, but then your employer, or coach in this case, has a right to abrogate the agreement.Eaton also had it right when he told Joe Williams, if you have a beef with how the BYU players treated you last year, take it out on the field. The whole idea of wearing armbands seems kind of silly, and to do so over a religious belief seems even sillier.Criticism of Eaton seems on firmer ground if he did, as has been asserted, tell a player he couldn't marry his white, pregnant girlfriend. That was a matter that was none of Eaton's business, and if it lead to bringing fatherless child into the world, deplorable. Eaton should have worried less about doners in Casper and more about the welfare of his player, his player's girlfriend and their unborn child. If this story went down as presented in the book, that is, as Eaton's side has never been told.On a more "sports" level, it is an open question as to what the fate of this team would have been without the decimation in personnel. The Cowboys roared out to 6-0, but this was done in an era when they played all their home games in September/October. They had a reputation, particularly under Eaton, of being less than stellar road warriors. This team had had only one road game in their undefeated start, and that was a narrow victory over a so-so Air Force team. How they would have fared in the 4-game road stretch at the end of the season will never be known, but game 10 was against formidable Houston (a "Power 5" type school in today's parlance) at the Astrodome. Winning that game would have been a tall order for even the full-strength Cowboys. Would they indeed have gone back to the Sugar Bowl? Unfortunately we'll never know.

Accurate summarization of an important, less publicized series of events.

I purchased this for a gift for my grandfather who was a VP for student affairs at Wyoming during this period. Nice for him to be able to read this and tell me all the stories that went along with those times at the college

Being a Wyoming grad from that era, I found the book very interesting. If you are a football fan but not from Wyoming, you too will find this intriguing. Who would ever believe that the University of Wyoming in a small high plains Wyoming town had a top ten NCAA football program? Well, in the 1960s it was. So what happened? Fascinating history, even if you aren't a Cowboy Joe fan. I wonder would the program would be like today if the Black 14 incident hadn't happened.

I was blown away by the retelling of this forgotten story. Very timely with the election of Obama to look back at our history of social progress as we go forward into the future.