DISCLOSURE

I earlier described my lifelong close relationship with both BC and with its Jesuit community. I am also the nephew of the late Rev. Maurice V Dullea SJ, BC '17. During Fr. Dullea's student years, he commuted daily from South Boston to the campus in Chestnut Hill. He was a 6'2", 170-lb tackle on the BC football team, lettering in all four years. He was team captain in 1916. During the final game of his playing career, against arch rival Holy Cross, he made a key play late in the game which resulted in BC's first win over the Crusaders in many years. He entered the Jesuit seminary immediately after graduation.


From 1930 until sometime in 1940, Fr. Dullea served the College of the Holy Cross as founder and director of its intramural sports program. He was BC Faculty Moderator of Athletics from 1940 until 1943, and again from 1946 until 1957. From 1946 until 1957, Fr. Dullea was Chairman of the Boston College Athletic Board. He was named to the BC Varsity Club Hall of Fame in 1978, and a plaque containing his likeness can be viewed on a wall at Conte Forum. After 1957, Fr. Dullea served on the Theology Faculty at BC until he retired from active service.

I do not know where he stood during the 1940 BC football season on the matter of holding Lou Montgomery out of football games with southern teams, or with Lou's becoming a non-participant in the Sugar Bowl of Jan. 1, 1941.

I do not know specifically who was responsible for BC's developing and carrying out the racially exclusionary policies and practices which resulted in the blacklisting of Lou Montgomery from so many of the Eagles' biggest football games of that era. BC's presidents at the time were Rev William I McGarry SJ from 1937 until 1939, and Rev William I Murphy SJ from 1939 until 1945. There was no title of Athletic Director at that time, but that job belonged to John P. Curley, whose was known as the Graduate Manager of Athletics. I believe the Faculty Moderator of Athletics from 1933 to 1939 was Rev Francis V Sullivan SJ, who was then replaced in 1940 by my uncle, Fr. Dullea.

For what it's worth, I don't know whose signatures appear on the various contracts for games with southern schools. If these contracts even still exist, they were not made available to me by any of the Be Library, Public Affairs, or Athletic Department officials with whom I was in contact during my research . I do wish to point out here that it never was my intention in developing this story to either point accusatory fingers at, or, conversely, to try and protect, any of the specific individuals involved.