This story appears in the July 29, 2019, issue of Sports Illustrated. For more great storytelling and in-depth analysis, subscribe to the magazine—and get up to 94% off the cover price. Click here for more.
North Carolina in the summer of 1961 sizzled with heat you could see and feel, like waves off the scalding griddle of a luncheonette, many of which still refused to serve black customers at the counter. This was the summer of the searing in-between—the combustible space between the passing of federal desegregation laws and local compliance.