City of Shelbyville formally dedicates Bill Garrett mural

Shelbyville Mayor Scott Furgeson welcomed a group of community officials and citizens to City Hall Thursday to a ceremony celebrating the dedication of the recently completed Bill Garrett mural on the outside wall of Cagney’s Pizza King on East Broadway.

The mayor stated the mural honors an individual with tremendous achievements and someone who stands as a special representative of Shelbyville.

“This is a great project that will serve as a constant reminder of how special Shelbyville is and of the high expectations and standards that Bill Garrett set,” said Furgeson. “This mural can serve as an example of the higher goals Shelbyville people should always strive for.”

The project, sponsored by The City of Shelbyville, The Blue River Community Foundation, Duke Energy and Mainstreet Shelbyville, is part of the foundation’s “Pride in Place” program that is supported with funding from the Lilly Endowment.

“Bill Garrett quickly rose to the top of the list when we surveyed the community about prominent Shelbyville figures to honor,” said foundation executive director Jennifer Jones. “We got the idea of a large mural after seeing the 60-foot one of Reggie Miller in downtown Indianapolis.”

Jones reached out to artist Pam Bliss, who produced the Miller art, and she agreed to complete the project for Shelbyville.

“After that Cagney’s owner and current mayor Scott Furgeson gave permission for us to use his building,” said Jones.

Garrett is possibly Shelbyville’s most profound success story. He was a remarkable all-around athlete who led Shelbyville to the Indiana high school state basketball championship in 1947.

He was named Indiana’s Mr Basketball and went on to Indiana University where he became the first black player in the Big Ten Conference. Garrett excelled at IU where he earned All-Big Ten and All-American honors. He served in the United States Army during the Korean conflict.

Garrett later became a teacher and coach at Indianapolis Crispus Attucks High School and coached the Tigers to the 1959 Indiana state basketball championship. He became the school’s athletic director and later an assistant dean at IUPUI.

Garrett died of a sudden heart attack at the age of 45 in August of 1974.

Shelbyville High School named the school’s gymnasium in his honor in 1975 and retired his Golden Bear uniform No. 9 in 2017.

Bliss, an IU alumna, stated that the wall was easy to work on and she completed the Garrett art in quick fashion. She further professed that she derives satisfaction from providing this kind of artwork to small communities because it offers them an opportunity to enjoy a sense of pride in their history.

“I feel very fortunate that I have found my niche and that I get to go to communities to commemorate and educate through my art,” said Bliss. “Some younger members of communities often are not aware of what their community has been part of.”

Blue River Community Foundation board and arts committee member, Lee Marks, lauded the project for serving as a direct connection between sports and the arts.

Shelbyville Central Schools Superintendent Matt Vance stated: “Bill Garrett’s legacy of courage, resilience and perseverance lives on through every student who walks the hallways of Shelbyville High School and every player who takes to the court in Garrett Gymnasium.”

Former Shelbyville and Indiana University player Gary Long (photo, at podium) spoke about the thrill of watching Garrett and his state champion teammates.

“That team and Bill Garrett were all people around town talked about back then,” said Long. “I still remember them on that fire truck coming back to Shelbyville after winning the state. That inspired my love for Shelbyville basketball and made me want to be a player.”

Bill Garrett’s middle daughter, Judy Garrett Shelton, one of Bill’s four children, currently resides in Texas. She expressed her gratitude to the Shelbyville community for all the honors bestowed on her father.

“This gives me such a glowing feeling,” said Shelton. “I just appreciate Shelbyville, from the bottom of my heart. My oldest daughter is named Shelby after Shelbyville. I’ll never forget this.”

Bill Garrett’s son, Billy Garrett (photo, left with his sister Judy Garrett Shelton), spoke eloquently about how Shelbyville’s history of acknowledging and honoring his dad continually clarifies his perspective of who Bill Garrett was and what he accomplished.

“My father died when I was so young,” Billy said. “Everything that happens here, things like this help me to know him more; to understand who he was. Shelbyville is my home. I always feel welcome here. I am forever indebted to Shelbyville for all you have done for our family.”

Billy Garrett was a fine athlete in his own right. He played four years of football at Illinois State. His son, Billy L. Garrett Jr., set several basketball records at DePaul University and played a season with the New York Knicks.

Billy Garrett currently works as an assistant basketball coach at Bethune-Cookman University.

James Garrett III, great nephew of Bill Garrett, served as master of ceremonies for Thursday’s event. He is the son of former Shelbyville City Councilman and Shelbyville basketball player James Garrett Jr., who was also on hand for the ceremony.

Tom Graham, a 1961 Shelbyville High School graduate, Golden Bear basketball player and author of the book “Getting Open: The Unknown Story of Bill Garrett and the Integration of College Basketball,” cited Garrett as the “Jackie Robinson of College Basketball.”

“Before Bill Garrett went to IU, major college basketball was almost exclusively white,” said Graham. “In 1952, the year following Bill’s graduation, there were seven black players on Big Ten Teams. He opened the door. Bill Garrett was the right person, at the right time in the right place.”

Jones concluded the event by announcing that Indiana University had created the “William L. Garrett Community Fund” at the Blue River Community Foundation that will be utilized to address quality of life programs for Shelby County.

Following the program, the participants traveled to the Garrett mural at Cagney’s for commemorative photos.

Bill Garrett, Shelbyville’s favorite son, is therefore memorialized with his image forever visible to Shelbyville travelers moving east on Broadway. And, in a twist of poetic irony he is now back in the place where it all started; roughly six blocks from his childhood home on Howard Street, which was just down the street from the site of the former Booker T. Washington School where he developed his remarkable basketball skills, and about a mile from Paul Cross Gymnasium where he led his Golden Bear teammates to immortality.

Thomas Wolfe’s novel declares that “You Can’t Go Home Again.”

But, in a very real sense, Bill Garrett has.

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