Bobby Mitchell: Remembering proud graduate of Langston High
EDITOR’S NOTE: Pro Football Hall of Famer Bobby Mitchell, a Hot Springs native, died Sunday at the age of 84. The following are excerpts from “The Remarkable Bobby Mitchell” by historian Don Duren, originally published in the 2011 edition of The Record, the annual publication of the Garland County Historical Society. A complete version of the article is available at hotsr.com.
Bobby Mitchell won fame as a professional football player who played for the Cleveland Browns and the Washington Redskins. In 1983, the professional football committee selected him as a member of the National Football League Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Long before his professional career began, however, Mitchell was a star in his hometown. Mitchell, born in Hot Springs, was a standout athlete at Langston High School in Hot Springs, graduating in the class of 1954.
Although Hot Springs newspapers The Sentinel-Record and The New Era would refer to the Langston four-sport standout by his given name, Cornelius Mitchell, his family called him “Neal.”
Neal (Robert Cornelius Mitchell) was born in Hot Springs, Ark., on June 6, 1935, to Albert and Avis Mitchell. His father was a minister, and his mother was a homemaker. A bi-vocational pastor, his father worked during the week at one of the bath houses owned by the National Park Service on “Million Dollar Bathhouse Row” in downtown Hot Springs.
A middle child in a family of eight children, Mitchell attended Goldstein Elementary School and played baseball, basketball, and football with neighborhood friends. He recalled, “My older brother didn’t want me around, and my younger brother was too young. It’s maybe why I turned to sports.” People soon noticed his speed, ability, agility and versatility.
Growing up in Hot Springs, Mitchell met and became friends with several professional players who visited the Spa City during their offseason. Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcombe, and Monte Irvin were among the major league baseball players who stayed at one of the of the
few black-owned hotels in the city (probably the National Baptist Hotel). Mitchell noted, “For black players, Hot Springs was like their spring training since they weren’t welcome in Florida. We were very fortunate because we got a chance to play baseball and basketball with all these great people.” He also said, “We got to know these guys personally. It was a great situation for all of the young kids. To grow up in an area like that was a great advantage for someone like me.” When he graduated from Langston in 1954, Bobby wore a suit purchased for him by Campanella.
By the time Mitchell graduated from high school, he was a star. Local newspapers called him “Mr. Touchdown.” His childhood friend and high school and college teammate Charles Butler once said, “Nobody could catch him. He was a threat to break loose on anything. He was hard to get your hands on because he had the instincts to shift his feet. A lot of times we would have plays where they were supposed to go through the tackles, but he bounced outside, and he was so quick that he could pull it off.”
Little Rock Dunbar graduate Sidney Williams, who attended the University of Wisconsin and became the first black quarterback to start in the Big Ten Conference, remembered playing against Mitchell: “He was a guy who got out of seemingly impossible situations.”
In 1952, (Mitchell’s) junior year in high school, he scored 23 touchdowns. An injury sidelined Mitchell in the third quarter of the last game of 1952, as Langston lost the state championship to Jones High School of North Little Rock. Mitchell, however, received the first of many honors as he was chosen to the All-State squad.
Langston, with a student enrollment of only around 300 from the seventh to 12th grades, was a small school compared to most of the schools they played. But the senior-packed 1953 version of the Langston High Bulldogs was very talented. In an early season game, Langston triumphed over a much larger school, the Bossier City Bears of Louisiana, 48-7 as Mitchell rambled for three TDs. Cornelius “Mr. Touchdown” Mitchell scored three touchdowns against Little Rock’s Dunbar High School, as Langston rolled to a 37-7 triumph.
An injury slowed Mitchell for a few games, but he came back with a vengeance against Washington High of El Dorado. El Dorado player Prince Holiday recalls, “We were shaking hands with him before the game and he said, ‘You better enjoy this because it will be the last time you touch me tonight.’” The Langston Bulldogs trounced the Oil Town team 48-2 as Mitchell romped for three more six pointers.
Fort Smith’s Lincoln High School was Langston’s next target. If the Bulldogs won their last game of the season, they would be state champions. “Langston Batters Ft. Smith To Win State Championship” was the headline in The Sentinel-Record on Nov. 28, 1953.
In front of 1,200 fans at Rix Stadium in Hot Springs, Langston smothered Fort Smith 61-6 to cop the Negro Big-Eight state football crown. Langston finished the season with a record of 9-2. The two losses were at the hands of large, out-of-state, all boy schools — Melrose High of Memphis and Manual Training School in Muskogee, Oklahoma. Mitchell garnered All-State honors for the second year.
A year earlier, his good friend and high school teammate Charles Butler had received a football scholarship to the University of Illinois, thanks to Hot Springs Attorney Henry Britt. An Illini graduate, Britt had asked an Illinois coach to visit Butler and Mitchell at the Spa City during Butler’s senior year (which was Mitchell’s junior year). Britt knew the two Hot Springs players were good college prospects, and the Illini coach was duly impressed with their abilities. Butler urged Mitchell to accept Illinois’ scholarship offer. Butler had a big influence on Mitchell’s decision, but his mother had a bigger influence. Fortunately, his mother and his friend were of one mind. She voted for Illinois, so Mitchell chose to head to Champaign where Butler, his former high school teammate, played.
In Illinois, Mitchell encountered racial discrimination to a degree that he had not known before. He has stated that racial discrimination was seldom a big ordeal in Hot Springs, that blacks had rights in Hot Springs that others outside Hot Springs didn’t enjoy.
“I rave about Hot Springs,” he said in a 2011 interview. “I tell people, ‘Everybody lived the same.’ I don’t even remember riding on the back of the bus. Maybe I did. But Hot Springs was different from most of Arkansas. People came there from all over the country for the baths. But I knew that 20 miles from Hot Springs I’d be hurt.”
In 1977, Mitchell was selected to the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame and in 1997, Mitchell was inducted into the new Arkansas Walk of Fame in Hot Springs. During a visit home for the ceremony, he toured Langston Intermediate School, which named a gymnasium in his honor. He said, “I’m proud to say that I’m a graduate of Langston High School.”
When asked about growing up in Hot Springs during segregation, he said: “I don’t remember ever having a sad day in this town, as far as relationships are concerned. I had as many friends uptown as I had on the boulevard (his neighborhood). We all came together. That’s why people from Hot Springs, no matter where they are, always talk about Hot Springs and are not afraid to say they’re from Hot Springs. I’m proud, proud to say I’m from Hot Springs, Ark. This city means a lot to me.”
His hometown is proud as well, proud of the outstanding athlete and fine man who grew up in Hot Springs, Ark.