Public Affairs Director Jon Michaels (since 1977) talks to Bruce Danielson, a local business consultant, citizen activist and history researcher.. We talked about the South Dakota African History Museum in the Sioux Falls Pavilion. The main topic was about Cleveland Abbot.

from the website of the South Dakota Hall of Fame:

Legacy Cleveland "Cleve" Abbott
Hall of Fame Inductee

Induction Year
2018
Home Town
Watertown, SD
Birth
December 19, 1894
Yankton, SD
Death
April 15, 1955
Yankton-Born Cleveland Abbott Played a Pioneering Role in American Sport
South Dakota African American Firsts
The Cleveland Abbott Story
Cleveland “Cleve” Abbott lived, believed and taught these words he spoke in 1924: “To learn self-control is another great philosophy of the adage, ‘Him whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad,’ the success of any team and the prowess of any player depend upon the ability to keep cool under fire and the control of temper.”
Imagine being a black child in the early 1900’s. What chance would you likely have to create changes now taken for granted in the world of international sports. Cleve Abbott was raised in a time of real and perceived cultural disadvantages able to stop many. A strong South Dakota character, combined with natural abilities, took him to the world stage, making it better place for all of us.
Cleve Abbott was a true South Dakotan to his core. A man of few words who instead used challenges to prove principled action creates success. He took his athletic prowess and South Dakota public education to create his own path to excellence.
Cleve’s parents, Albert B. Abbott and Mollie Brown, were married in 1890 in Alabama and by the time Cleve was born December 19, 1894, they were living in Yankton, SD. The family grew to seven children by the time the move was made to Watertown, where Cleve’s mother died in 1909. Young Cleve was raised at a time when most sons would have followed their father to become a stone mason. He instead combined sports and education to build citizens of character and strength for a stronger nation.
He trained his mind like he trained his body. Cleve was among the first black South Dakotans to graduate from a public high school and college while excelling in sports. He graduated from Watertown High School and South Dakota State, earning a combined total of 30 varsity letters covering football, basketball (team captain), baseball, track and tennis. Considering the social and legal tenor of the day, these accolades would have been life highlights but Cleve was just getting started.
Cleve’s college academic record combined with athletic ability was brought to the attention of Booker T. Washington, founder of the historically black college in Alabama, the Tuskegee Institute. While searching for a man of color to combine integrity, scholarship and athleticism to transform the stature and place in American society for his students he had a 1913 chance encounter with South Dakota State president Ellwood Perisho, Abbott received a graduation job offer. Cleve accepted the challenge to build an athletic program at Tuskegee when his dairy science degree was earned.
In 1916, Cleve showed up for work at the Tuskegee Institute as an agricultural instructor and coach. Soon WWI interrupted his career reporting for active military duty, to become a respected Army intelligence officer and leader of men in France.
At the conclusion of the war, he continued his education in Kansas and then Harvard. He joined the faculty at Kansas Vocational School in Topeka, Kansas, serving as coach and Commandant of Cadets.
Abbott was asked to return to Alabama in 1923 to be the eighth head football coach for the Tuskegee Institute Golden Tigers, for 32 seasons until 1954. His accumulated record still ranks first at the school in total wins, fifth in winning percentage (.661) amounting to 202 wins, 97 losses and 27 ties including six undefeated seasons, topped by six college football national championships. The stadium he personally helped build was renamed in his honor.
According to his wife Jessie, Cleve’s responsibilities as Director of the Department of Physical Education and Athletics allowed them to create model programs designed not only for black men and women to excel but all students in America. The efforts to help women, brought to the world stage the first black woman to earn a 1948 Olympic Gold Medal, Alice Coachman.
Cleveland and Jessie did not experience the challenges of southern segregation growing up. Like most early immigrant South Dakotans, they showed a prairie toughness able to persevere with an acceptance of challenges to create success. Efforts to bring out the excellence in everyone was based on their ability to be involved in all aspects of community. Tuskegee was a platform to create opportunities showcasing talents previously ignored because of skin color.
A preeminent athletic program for all students was built. For young women students, a chance no one else gave, to compete. When there were no competitors for his men and women, events were created or they went to northern events to compete based on their ability and not race. Creating the Tuskegee Relays brought the world stage to them in Alabama.
Cleve became the first person of color to be a member of the U.S. Olympic Committee in 1946. There is a long list of excellence awards given during his life and his early death in 1955 has not stopped them:
National Football Hall of Fame 1948
South Dakota Sports Hall of Fame 1968
South Dakota State University Hall of Fame 1968
NACDA All-Time Hall of Fame 1971
Tuskegee University Hall of Fame 1975
Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Hall of Fame 1992
Alabama Sports Hall of Fame 1995
USA Track and Field Hall of Fame 1996
Watertown Sports Hall of Fame 2002
American Football Coaches Association Trailblazer Award 2005
USA Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches Association 2010
Black College Football Hall of Fame Class of 2012
Cleveland Leigh Abbott US Army Reserve Center, Tuskegee, AL
Cleve Abbott’s induction into the South Dakota Hall of Fame in 2018 is an honor he would humbly have accepted as a means to highlight his students and their achievements, not him.
Booker T. Washington’s search for a principled person to build a structured athletic program for students succeeded. Cleveland Abbott was the principled student, teacher and coach who brought South Dakota values to a national and worldwide stage. To students he was The Duke of Dakota.
South Dakota Hall of Fame acknowledges the excellence and opportunities Cleveland Abbott achieved. Cleve opened opportunities not only for his students but all of mankind.