Wilmeth Sidat-Singh

{{Short description|American soldier, basketball player, and football player}}

{{Infobox military person

|name=Wilmeth Sidat-Singh

|image=LIEUT. WILMETH SIDAT-SINGH - FIGHTER PILOT, ATHLETE - NARA - 535676.jpg

|caption=Poster from Office for Emergency Management, Office of War Information News Bureau, 1943

|birth_date={{birth-date|February 13, 1918}}

|death_date = {{death date and age|1943|5|9|1918|2|13}}

|birth_place=Washington, DC

|death_place=Lake Huron

|nickname= The Syracuse Walking Dream

|allegiance=United States

|branch=United States Army Air Forces
United States Air Force

|serviceyears= 1943

|rank=

|unit=

|commands=

|battles=

|awards=

|relations=

|laterwork=

}}

Wilmeth Sidat-Singh (February 13, 1918*[https://news.google.com/newspapers?nid=2211&dat=19430710&id=3ugmAAAAIBAJ&sjid=FAMGAAAAIBAJ&pg=2095,4206384 "On the Sport Front," article by Harold Jackson published in The Afro American on July 10, 1943], p. 19, "[Sidat-Singh] was born on February 13..." – May 9, 1943) was a U.S. Army Air Corps officer with the Tuskegee Airmen, and an American basketball and football player who was subject to segregation in college and professional sports in the 1930s.

Early life

His parents were both African-American. After the death of his father, Elias Webb (a pharmacist), his mother, Pauline, married Samuel Sidat-Singh, a medical student from India who adopted Wilmeth, giving him his family name. After his graduation from Howard University, Dr. Sidat-Singh moved the family to Harlem and set up a family medical practice.

Wilmeth showed great talent as an athlete and became a basketball star, leading DeWitt Clinton High School to the New York Public High School Athletic League championship in 1934.

Basketball, Football, Law Enforcement Career

Sidat-Singh received an offer of a basketball scholarship from Syracuse University and enrolled in 1935. Former lacrosse coach Roy Simmons Sr. saw him playing an intramural football game and asked him to join the football team. Sidat-Singh starred for Syracuse, playing a position equivalent to modern-day quarterback and starring for the basketball team as well.{{cite news |last1=Vasudevan |first1=Anish |title='AS EVER, SINGH': Wilmeth Sidat-Singh was Syracuse's 1st Black star athlete |url=https://dailyorange.com/2022/10/wilmeth-sidat-singh-was-syracuse-first-black-star-athlete/ |access-date=25 October 2022 |work=The Daily Orange |date=23 October 2022}}

Syracuse University and nearby Cornell University were among the first collegiate football teams to include African-American players as starting backfield players. A 1938 news report in the Baltimore Sun reports on one such game where Sidat-Singh led Syracuse to victory over Cornell.{{cite news |last1=Rice |first1=Grantland |title=Syracuse tops Cornell team in last period |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/29095704/the-baltimore-sun/ |access-date=26 May 2020 |work=The Baltimore Sun |date=16 October 1938 |pages=24}} In that era, when games were played in Southern segregation states, African-American players from Northern schools were banned from the field. Because of his light complexion and name, Sidat-Singh was sometimes assumed to be a "Hindu" (as people from India were often called by Americans during this time). However. shortly before a game against the University of Maryland, a black sportswriter, Sam Lacy, wrote an article in the Baltimore Afro-American, revealing Sidat-Singh's true racial identity. Wilmeth Sidat-Singh was held out of the game and Syracuse lost that game 0-13. In a rematch the following year at Syracuse, Sidat-Singh led the Orange to a lopsided victory (53-0) over Maryland.{{cite press release |editor= Mike Morrison|author= |title= 2017 Football Media Guide |url=https://cuse.com/documents/2017/7/12/2017_Football_Media_Guide.pdf |location= Syracuse, NY 13244|publisher=Syracuse University Athletics |date=July 7, 2017|access-date=2020-05-26}}

With unofficial bans on black players enacted in both the National Basketball League (NBL) and National Football League (NFL) Sidat-Singh played briefly for a professional barnstorming basketball team in Syracuse and then joined the Metropolitan Police Department of the District of Columbia.

Military Career, Tuskegee Airmen, Death

After U.S. entry into World War II, he applied and was accepted as a member of the Tuskegee Airmen, the only African-American unit in the U.S. Army Air Force, and won his wings as a pilot.

Sidat-Singh died in 1943 during a training mission when the engine of his airplane failed. "He died on a training flight when his stricken plane went down in Saginaw Bay, his parachute tangled in the fuselage." He drowned in Lake Huron.{{cite news |last1=Waters |first1=Mike |title=Remembering the former SU players who died in the military |url=https://www.syracuse.com/orangebasketball/2020/05/memorial-day-remembering-the-former-syracuse-basketball-players-who-died-in-military-service.html |access-date=26 May 2020 |work=syracuse.com |date=25 May 2020 |language=en}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/for-years-no-one-knew-what-this-plaque-in-the-wilson-building-signified/2016/05/27/7aaf971c-241b-11e6-8690-f14ca9de2972_story.html|title=For years no one knew what this plaque in the Wilson Building signified|newspaper=Washington Post|access-date=2016-05-28}}

Legacy

In 2005, Syracuse University honored Wilmeth Sidat-Singh by retiring his number and hanging his basketball jersey (#19) in the rafters of the Carrier Dome.{{Cite web|url= http://www.orangehoops.org/WSidahSingh.htm|title= #19 Wilmeth Sidat-Singh|author= Orange Hoops|publisher= Orange Hoops|access-date= 2011-06-30}}

On Saturday, Nov. 9, 2013, the University of Maryland publicly apologized to surviving relatives from the Webb family at a ceremony during a football game with Syracuse University.{{Cite web|url= http://www.umdsbs.com/sports/301-amending-a-wrong|title= Amending a Wrong|author= Rhiannon Walker|publisher= SBS Stories Beneath the Shell News|access-date= 2013-12-14}}{{cite news |last1=Barker |first1=Jeff |title=Maryland football trying to do right by Sidat-Singh, 76 years later |url=https://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/bs-sp-terps-wilmeth-sidat-singh-1109-20131108-story.html |access-date=26 May 2020 |work=Baltimore Sun |date=November 8, 2013 |location=College Park, MD |language=en}}

Family

Two of Sidat-Singh's paternal aunts, educators Helen Webb Harris and Ethel Webb Terrell, were founding members of the Wake-Robin Golf Club, the oldest registered African American women's golf club in the United States, in 1937.{{Cite web |last=Lawrence Corbett |first=Merlisa |date=February 25, 2022 |title=Oldest Black Women's Golf Club in the Nation Plays the Long Game |url=https://www.aarp.org/home-family/friends-family/info-2022/wake-robin.html |access-date=January 16, 2025 |website=AARP.org}}{{Cite web |date=2020 |title=About Us: History |url=https://wake-robingolf.org/about-us |access-date=January 16, 2025 |website=Wake-RobinGolf.org}}

Fraternity Membership

Wilmeth Sidat-Singh was a member of Omega Psi Phi fraternity initiated into Kappa chapter on May 2, 1938.{{cite web |author= |title=Third District History and Archives Monday Pearl 3/4/19 – Oh Nellie! |url=https://3rddistrictques.org/third-district-history-and-archives-monday-pearl-3-4-19-oh-nellie/ |publisher= THIRD DISTRICT OF OMEGA PSI PHI FRATERNITY |date=March 4, 2019 |access-date=26 May 2020}} The original initiation document has a poem written about Sidat.{{cite magazine |last1=Rice |first1=Grantland |last2=Martin |first2= John S. |editor= Theodore R. Fortson |date=December 1938 |title=Saga of Sidat-Singh |url=https://drive.google.com/file/d/1bhxbFGvwCyNP5Qs1TkT9ipCF0kXMWAJt/view|magazine=Omega Bulletin |location=Detroit, MI |access-date= 26 May 2020}}