Limited integration of athletics programs at area schools followed the enrollment of the first black students. Sports integration mirrored the progress of school integration generally in the Shoals, with limited desegregation of football and basketball programs as early as 1965, and substantive integration of teams and coaching staff following the court-ordered closure of the area’s all-black high schools in 1968 and 1969.

Often, the process of integration could be lonely during the “freedom of choice” era in the Shoals. Students such as Deshler High School’s Porter Thomas were the singular black students to join varsity teams at their respective schools. Still, integration continued. In 1968 and 1969 with the court-ordered closing of the area’s segregated black high schools, and the resulting merger of their athletics programs with those of the previously all-white high schools led to an era of substantive and permanent athletic integration in the Shoals.

The closure of the Shoals’ all-black high schools also initiated the gradual process of coaching integration, which marked the culmination of athletic integration in the area. When Trenholm and Sheffield’s Sterling High School closed in 1968, their respective head coaches, Charles Mahorney and Milton Franklin, accepted assistant coaching positions at formerly all-white schools. Harvest Mitchell likewise accepted demotion to an assistant coaching position when, in 1969, the all-black Burrell-Slater closed its doors. What was different, in Mitchell’s case, was that he was initially passed over for the promotion, then sued the Florence City school system and secured the job through a federal court order.

¹Associated Press, “School Integration Climbs,” Florence Times, September 7, 1966.

Adapted from Corrigan, Brian. “Integration of Athletics in the Shoals,” May 1, 2017, University of North Alabama.