![]() ![]() The “(New York team organization) was a circus of ineptitude,” Barnes wrote. After Baltimore released Barnes, the newly-formed Titans of New York immediately signed him because the team had first option on any player released within the league.īarnes loathed being on the Titans. But when Clark’s Jarticle appeared, it referred to him as “Ernie Barnes,” which changed his name and life forever.īarnes was the last cut of the Colts’ training camp. Until then Barnes was always known by his birth name, Ernest Barnes. Clark, sportswriter for the Baltimore News-Post newspaper. Shortly after his 22nd birthday, while at the Colts training camp, Barnes was interviewed by N.P. ![]() In 1999 Barnes was bestowed The University Award, the highest honor by The University of North Carolina Board of Governors.ĭuring the 1960 NFL draft, held in November 1959, Barnes was drafted in the 10th round by the then-World Champion Baltimore Colts. In 1990 Barnes was awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Fine Arts by North Carolina Central University. Barnes played the football positions of tackle and center at NCC.Īt age 18, on a college art class field trip to the newly-desegregated North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh, Barnes inquired where he could find “paintings by Negro artists.” The docent responded, “Your people don’t express themselves that way.” 23 years later in 1979 Barnes returned to the museum for a solo exhibition.and North Carolina Governor James Hunt attended. At North Carolina College he majored in art on a full athletic scholarship. His mother promised him a car if he lived at home, so he attended the all-Black North Carolina College at Durham (formerly North Carolina College for Negroes, now North Carolina Central University) located across the street from his high school. Segregation prevented him from considering nearby Duke or the University of North Carolina. In 1956 he graduated from Hillside High in Durham with 26 athletic scholarship offers. By his senior year at Hillside High School, Barnes became the captain of the football team and state champion in the shot put.īarnes only attended racially segregated schools. That encounter would begin Barnes’ discipline and dedication that would permeate his life. Tucker shared his own experience of how bodybuilding improved his strength and outlook on life. Tucker was intrigued with Barnes’ drawings so he asked the aspiring artist about his grades and goals. He was discovered hiding there by the masonry teacher Tommy Tucker, who was also the weightlifting coach and a former athlete. One day Ernest was drawing in his notebook in a quiet area of the school. He continually sought refuge in his sketchbooks, finding the less-traveled parts of campus away from the other students. A self-described chubby and unathletic child, Barnes was taunted and bullied by classmates. When he entered junior high, he could appreciate, as well as decode, many of the cherished masterpieces within the walls of mainstream museums – although it would be many more years before he was allowed entrance because of segregation. By the time Barnes entered the first grade, he was familiar with the works of such masters as Toulouse-Lautrec, Delacroix, Rubens, and Michelangelo. Fuller encouraged him to peruse art books and listen to classical music. On days when Fannie Geer Barnes allowed her son “June” (Barnes’ nickname to family and childhood friends) to accompany her to work, Mr. His mother, Fannie Mae Geer (1905 – 2004) oversaw the household staff for a prominent Durham attorney and Board of Education member, Frank L. (1899 – 1966) worked as a shipping clerk for Liggett Myers Tobacco Company in Durham. He lived with his parents and younger brother in what was then-called The Bottom, a community near the Hayti District of the city. was born Friday morning, Jin Durham, North Carolina during the height of Jim Crow.
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