Louisiana Voice

Shawn Wilson as president of Grambling State University? That’s the skinny we’re picking up from the Rumor Mill, a fine-tuned source perfected by the late John Hays, publisher of the now-defunct Morning Paper of Ruston.

Ralph Waldo Emerson Jones, one of five members of Southern University’s 1925 graduating class, was hired by mistake that same year by Louisiana Negro Normal and Industrial Institute founder Charles P. Adams. Eleven years later, he would be elevated to president of what would later become Grambling State University. He remained in that position for 41 years.

Jones played the white legislators in Baton Rouge like a fiddle in order to build Grambling from little more than an afterthought backwater glorified high school to a real college. He employed his special brand of humor in order to get the school’s name changed to its present identity.

“We won our conference in football last year and as much as we respect our friends at Louisiana Normal, in Natchitoches (known today as Northwestern State University), we’d prefer to get our congratulatory mail instead of it going to them first,” he began in his petition to lawmakers. “Besides, during football season, by the time our cheerleaders could yell, ‘Louisiana Negro Normal and Industrial Institute, hold that line,’ the other team done scored.” When they finished laughing, the name change to Grambling was approved.

But while Jones was amusing the white politicians in Baton Rouge, he always got the last laugh as he quietly built the school into turning out alumni like New York Times columnist Charles Blow, Grammy Award-winner Erykah Badu, actress Natalie Desselle-Reid, former Oregon legislator Margaret Carter, Ohio politician Alicia Reece, former U.S. Attorney Stephanie Finley, Missouri politician Raychel Proudie, retired LSU professor Alma Dawson, major league baseball players Ralph Garr and Tommie Agee, and NBA legend Willis Reed.

Eddie Robinson was another example of Grambling’s reputation of stability, having served as the school’s head football coach for an unprecedented 56 years, from 1941-1997, with only a two-year break during World War II to interrupt his tenure. More than 200 of his former players would go on to NFL careers.

Grambling’s Tank Younger became the first player from a historically black college to play in the NFL when he signed with the Los Angeles Rams in 1948. Dozens more would follow and at one point, in the early 1970s, Grambling had more active players in the NFL than any other school in the U.S. – including such powerhouses as Alabama, LSU, Oklahoma, Notre Dame, Ohio State, USC, and Michigan. Former GSU quarterback Doug Williams was the first black quarterback to win a Super Bowl in 1989 and was the first quarterback ever to throw four touchdown passes in a single quarter in a Super Bowl on his way to being named the game’s MVP.

Ruston Daily Leader sports editor, the late O.K. “Buddy” Davis helped put Grambling and Robinson become national household words and Howard Cosell featured the schools legendary football program in Jerry Izenberg’s ABC-TV special titled “Hundred Yards to Glory” in 1967.

Since the retirements of Jones (1977) and Robinson (1997), the offices of both head football coach and school president have had to install revolving doors to accommodate the arrivals and departures of both positions. There have been, for example, eight different presidents of the school since Jones retired – an average stay of only 5.75 years.

The latest, Rick Gallot, president of the school since 2016, has been named to head the University of Louisiana System, leaving the president’s office vacant once again. His seven years there, set him apart as one of the longest-tenured GSU presidents since Jones retired. It may have helped that he was a native of Grambling and that his father, Richard Gallot, Sr., was a respected Grambling businessman and former mayor of the town of Grambling. His mother was also a professor at GSU for more than 35 years and was a member of the UL System Board of Supervisors from 2005-11.

But fear not, LouisianaVoice has learned from usually reliable sources that Department of Transportation and Development Secretary and unsuccessful gubernatorial candidate Shawn Wilson will succeed Gallot as Grambling 11th president and the school’s 9th since 1977.

Here’s hoping when they do, they’ll spell his first name correctly, something that I failed to do before being corrected by a couple of sharp-eyed readers.