Inspiring and Empowering Women: The WNBA Leading the Way into the 21st Century

Atlanta, April 1968. No sound but the clop-clop of two mules along Auburn Avenue at Young Street as they pulled the wagon that carried the casket of Martin Luther King Jr. There I stood, 10 years old, next to my grandfather in a sea of people flooding the four-mile procession. We were dressed in our Sunday’s best while others donned denim overalls, the uniform of the Poor People’s Campaign. On the sidewalk, we stood while others climbed lampposts and utility poles. Hundreds of thousands of people in the capital of the black South and millions more around the world—man, woman, child, black, brown, white, young, old, famous, and ordinary—all mourning their hero. But for us, we were mourning a family friend who, as a child, sat in the pews of Wheat Street Baptist Church, down the street from Ebenezer, and listened to my grandfather preach the words of the gospel and teach how to live them through our deeds. Ideals of “equality,” “justice,” and “freedom” echoed through parable and song from the pulpit and choir. They were lived through voting registration drives, fundraising for affordable housing, and preparations for protests that took place after a Sunday sermon. And as these ideals were litigated in courts of law and the court of public opinion, they were also contested on fields of play across the country. As I held my grandfather’s hand that April day 50 years ago, there walked Bill Russell, Wilt Chamberlain, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Russell and Chamberlain were there after having flown to Atlanta from Philadelphia after playing against each other with shattered spirits in Game 1 of the NBA Eastern Division Finals. They were black and proud, but still black and vilified. Champions who knew the privilege born of talent and fame did not protect them from the hate, slurs, and vengeance like every other black man, woman, and child in America. So, shut up and dribble they did not. Stick to sports they did not. And neither did their contemporaries, people like Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Jim Brown, Wilma Rudolph, and Althea Gibson. Neither has a long line of athletes—men and women—who followed and risked, and continue to risk, their safety, wealth, and freedom to define what it is they are playing for—not just for a trophy or themselves, but for respect and dignity for everyone. Collectively, they have won titles while fighting for voting rights. They broke the stigma of HIV that ravaged a generation to help bring us closer to an AIDS-free one. They speak out against racism, sexism, and homophobia from their heart and personal experiences. From