O-Line Coach Edwin Harrison's grandfather was a "trailblazer"
09/27/2024 03:33 PM
Sports Illustrated was in its second month when a notable first took place.
On Sept. 27, 1954 — 70 years ago today — the featured photo was a close-up of Calvin Jones.
The University of Iowa Hawkeyes' star lineman was the first Black athlete — and the first college football player — to appear on the magazine's cover.
That image, from just the seventh edition of SI, is framed and mounted on the wall of Edwin Harrison's man cave in Houston, where the Saskatchewan Roughriders' offensive line coach resides during the off-season.
"It's a constant reminder of the legacy that was left for me," he said after the Roughriders practised at Mosaic Stadium on Thursday.
"Maybe one day I can look back and my children, my grandchildren, will be proud of what I was able to do."
Thirty-nine-year-old Edwin Harrison II is himself a proud grandchild, even though he never got to meet his paternal grandfather.
Jones was among five Canadian professional football players who died in a plane crash near Chilliwack, B.C., on Dec. 9, 1956.
Jones (of the Winnipeg Blue Bombers) and Roughriders players Mel Becket, Mario DeMarco, Gordon Sturtridge and Ray Syrnyk were returning from Vancouver, where the second annual Shrine East-West All-Star Football Game had been played the previous day.
After encountering bad weather and experiencing engine trouble, a four-North Star aircraft — Trans-Canada Air Lines Flight 810 — slammed into Mount Slesse.
The crash claimed the lives of 59 passengers and three crew members. It was then the worst commercial aviation disaster in Canadian history.
Harrison is unavoidably reminded of it virtually every day.
The names and retired numbers of Becket (40), DeMarco (55), Syrnyk (56) and Sturtridge (73) are prominently displayed on the east side of Mosaic Stadium, to the left of Ron Lancaster (23), George Reed (34), Dave Ridgway (36) and Roger Aldag (44).
Harrison doesn't find it eerie or discomforting to look at the upper level of the east grandstand. Instead, he views time spent at the venue with a spirit of appreciation and respect.
"The best thing I can say is that God did it," he said. "God has truly been remarkable in my life and in my family's life.
"I'm blessed that I get to come to work at this remarkable facility and I get to see those names every day. It's a constant reminder not only to try to strive to be the best coach I can be, but the best person I can be.
"Just maybe, along the way, I might be able to coach somebody who has their name up there one day, which would be pretty awesome."
In Iowa City, Iowa, tribute is paid to Jones, who in 1955 became the first Black player to win the Outland Trophy as the top interior lineman in U.S. college football.
His number (62) is one of only two that have been retired by the Hawkeyes, for whom he starred from 1953 to 1955. He was the first two-time consensus All-American in the school's history.
While still an active collegiate player, Jones was selected by the Detroit Lions in the ninth round (98th overall) of an NFL Draft that was held on Nov. 28, 1955.
The 6-foot-0, 230-pounder opted to join the Blue Bombers, who announced the high-profile signing on Jan. 21, 1956.
"Back in the '50s, Black players were not nearly paid the same wage that their white counterparts were getting in the NFL," Harrison said.
"The biggest thing was the amount of pay. He was paid a fair wage in a good league up north."
With the 1956 Blue Bombers, Jones played in all 16 regular-season games and both playoff contests.
He paid three visits to Taylor Field, the last of which was on Nov. 3, 1956 for the opener of a two-game, total-points Western Interprovincial Football Union semi-final.
Saskatchewan won Game 1, 42-7, effectively cementing a berth in the WIFL final against Edmonton. The finale was played on Nov. 5 in Winnipeg, where the Blue Bombers prevailed (19-8) but were nonetheless eliminated.
Winnipeg's first touchdown was on a reception by Bud Grant, a future head coach of the Blue Bombers and Minnesota Vikings.
Barely a month later, Grant would play an integral role in the story of Jones and the tragic or fortuitous fates of his teammates.
On a soggy Saturday afternoon at Empire Stadium in Vancouver, the West All-Stars blanked the East 35-0.
It was, however, a more gruelling game than the score indicated — a contrast to the no-contact, effort-optional All-Star games that now predominate across the sporting landscape.
In the victors' dressing room, an exhausted Jones sat back, sipped on a beer, and — as quoted by Denny Boyd of the Victoria Times Colonist — said: "It's always rough when you play it tough."
Jones was among six Blue Bombers representatives in the game. Grant, George Druxman, Bob McNamara, Gord Rowland and Buddy Tinsley also made the flight from Winnipeg to Vancouver for the game.
(The Roughriders were represented by Becket, Sturtridge, Ken Carpenter, Larry Isbell, Harry Lampman, Martin Ruby, Frank Tripucka, Reg Whitehouse and John Wozniak. DeMarco and Syrnyk went along to watch, as did Sturtridge's wife, Mildred. The Sturtridges had three young children.)
En route to Vancouver, Grant had looked at his return ticket and noted that the delegation was not scheduled to begin its multi-stop journey back to the Manitoba capital until Sunday night.
"That meant we would be left in Vancouver all day Sunday with a day to kill, just waiting around for our return flight to Winnipeg," Grant wrote in his autobiography, I Did It My Way. "It didn't sound like a lot of fun to me.
"After we landed, I happened to walk by the ticket counter, so I inquired about getting an earlier flight back to Winnipeg. I was told there was a morning flight but it was full.
"I asked to be put on a waiting list. They put me on it but cautioned me there was little chance I'd make it.
"In any event, I left my name and hotel phone number. In fact, I asked them to put my teammates' names on the waiting list, too.
"And with that, I didn't give it a second thought."
Fast forward to the morning of the game. Shortly before Grant left his hotel room and headed to the team bus, the phone rang.
"Mr. Grant," an airline representative said, "there is space on the airplane to return earlier on Sunday to Winnipeg if you still want to make the change."
Grant was also told there was room for all six Blue Bombers players.
"I told her that was fine and headed out the door, eager to give my teammates the good news," he wrote.
"The next day, we all had to meet around 6 a.m. to return to the airport for the early flight. All of us showed up on time, except for Cal Jones. The rest of us were on the bus, ready to go.
"I went back into the hotel and called his room. 'I'm still in bed, Bud,' he told me. 'I've overslept and I'm not packed or anything. It's been a long night.'
"I told him that we could take another few minutes and I would come up to his room and help him get ready. He said, 'Well, OK, I'll get ready and be right there. You don't need to come up.'
"A few minutes passed, and still no Cal. I called again. 'Bud, I'm back in bed. I have a headache. Just tell them I'm going to stay. Put me back on the first flight.'
"I said I would but told him to check later to be sure he could still get on it. I booked him on the evening flight and we left for the airport."
The five Winnipeg players who took the early flight were back home by noon.
The 23-year-old Jones boarded the ill-fated Sunday night flight, which was to make stops in Calgary, Regina, Winnipeg, Toronto and, finally, Montreal.
"By the time I woke up on Monday morning, the news was everywhere," Grant wrote. "The evening flight from Vancouver to Winnipeg had disappeared."
Despite an intensive search, the wreckage of the plane was not found until the following May. The discovery was made by a mountaineer.
Because the crash had occurred in December, the snow made it difficult to spot the debris from the air and access it from the ground.
The passengers were buried on the mountain, where a cairn now honours the victims of the accident.
The B.C. government declared the area a heritage site in 1995, when Harrison was in elementary school.
As he got older, he became increasingly curious about his grandfather and learned so much more about him.
"He was cut down early in his life, but I think he left a lot," Harrison reflected. "He left a memory and he left an example for a lot of men to follow — especially in this league, in the game of football, and really at the offensive line position.
"He really took playing the offensive line to a whole other level. He set the bar high for all linemen who followed him.
"There's a long-standing tradition of good offensive linemen coming out of the University of Iowa and playing professional football for a number of years.
"I think he really was a trailblazer in that sense."
Harrison emulated Jones by becoming an accomplished offensive lineman in his own right.
He excelled at the University of Colorado, earning All-Big 12 honourable-mention laurels in 2007, before spending parts of the next two seasons on the Kansas City Chiefs' practice roster.
In 2010, Harrison signed with Calgary and went on to become the Stampeders' rookie of the year while wearing his late grandfather's No. 62. That was the first of Harrison's six seasons on the Stampeders' roster.
Comfortably into that tenure, he devoted part of a bye week to hiking up Mount Slesse and visiting the crash site.
By that time, Harrison and his wife (Kishanda) had founded a charitable organization (62s Blocking for the Blind) to help blind and visually impaired people maintain or improve their physical fitness.
"In 2012, the CFL did Engraved on a Nation (an eight-part documentary series) to celebrate 100 years of the Grey Cup," Harrison recalled of The Crash, which was directed/written by Paul Cowan and produced by Dugald Maudsley.
"They literally filmed myself and my family for about half a year, just chronicling my grandfather's life, our life, the transition of me marrying my wife and us dedicating our non-profit to my grandfather down in the States.
"It was just an amazing experience, being able to hike up Mount Slesse and going to the crash site. It really was breathtaking to get up there to the site and really see where the plane had crashed.
"The memorial that they have not only for my grandfather, but for all the passengers who were involved in the crash, was really remarkable.
"The camera crew, the CFL and TSN really did an outstanding job with the full production. It was more than myself and my family could ask for."
Harrison remained with the Stampeders through the 2016 season before going into coaching.
After spending three years as the assistant head coach and offensive line coach at Marshall High School in suburban Houston, he returned to the CFL with the Toronto Argonauts.
He was the Argos' running backs and run game co-ordinator when they won the 109th Grey Cup Game, played at Mosaic Stadium, on Nov. 20, 2022. Corey Mace, now the Roughriders' first-year head coach, was then Toronto's defensive co-ordinator.
Harrison spent a second season in Toronto before being hired by Mace and officially named to the Roughriders' coaching staff in mid-January.
"We are very grateful for the CFL," Harrison said. "We are very grateful for the Saskatchewan Roughriders. We are very grateful for the Calgary Stampeders. We've been very grateful for the Toronto Argonauts.
"These organizations and this league have allowed my family, in one way or another, to provide for our family. When you give a man an opportunity to take care of his family, we can't say 'thank you' enough."
