George Flippin
George Albert Flippin was an American football left halfback and a medical doctor in Nebraska. He was the first star player of the Nebraska Cornhuskers football team, the first Black player on the team, and among the first Black college football players nationwide. He was inducted into the Nebraska Football Hall of Fame in 1974.
Young life
Flippin's father, Charles, was a freed slave who fought in the Civil War on the Union side in the 14th [United States Colored Infantry Regiment], then became a doctor. Charles and Mahala Flippin had their son George in Ohio in 1868, three years after the end of the Civil War. When George's mother Mahala died in 1871, his father and brother moved away, first to Kansas, then to Henderson, Nebraska in 1888.Football career
George Flippin attended the University of Nebraska in Lincoln from 1891 to 1894.Football was a young sport, and a University of Nebraska football team had only existed for a few months when Flippin arrived on campus. Flippin's first game, against the 1891 [Iowa Hawkeyes football team|Iowa Hawkeyes] inn 1891, was the fifth game in the university's history. He proved talented, and quickly become the star of the new team.
Because of Flippin's presence on the Nebraska team, the 1892 [Missouri Tigers football team|Missouri team] refused to play a scheduled football game on 1892 [Nebraska Bugeaters football team|November 5, 1892], forfeiting what would have been the first meeting between the two teams. Nebraska's student newspaper mocked the segregated Missouri team, saying that Missouri's anti-black bigotry would cause them to lose the football game just as they lost the American Civil War. The paper claimed racial inclusion as a part of Nebraska's identity.
Flippin experienced racism. He was denied entrance to an opera house after a game in Denver, and he sued a bathhouse in Lincoln for refusing to admit him because of his race. A restaurant in Omaha relegated the football team to a private dining room rather than allow Flippin to be seen in the public area.
His teammates elected him team captain after the 1894 season. Nebraska's football coach, Frank Crawford, would not allow a Black man to be team captain.
Flippin left Nebraska to study medicine at the University of [Illinois College of Medicine|College of Physicians and Surgeons in Chicago] from 1898, graduating in 1900. He paid for his education by playing football for the school at $75 per season. This makes him among the earliest people to be paid to play football.
Flippin was inducted into the Nebraska Football Hall of Fame in 1974.