Blue White Illustrated

only be proven by watching game film. What is true is that heavily favored Pitt was set to go to the Orange Bowl until Penn State's 17-0 upset. 'Something special was going on' Arnelle went on to be honored by Penn State for his leadership and schol- arship. He graduated with a bachelor of arts degree, majoring in political sci- ence with a minor in European history. He spent two years in the Air Force and some time playing pro basketball for the Fort Wayne Pistons and Harlem Globetrotters, but decided to get on with his life's work as a lawyer. His in- terest in that profession dated back his encounter as a 9- or 10-year-old with a soon-to-be-famous attorney. While working at the New Rochelle city courthouse, Arnelle's father heard about a lawyer who had been impressing local judges with his arguments. Hugh got permission to sit in back of the room and listen, and one day he took his youngest son with him. "My father was very impressed with this lawyer arguing cases," Jesse said. "The three judges were almost deferential to this lawyer, and my father wanted me to know something special was going on. When it was over, my dad introduced him to me. It turned out to be Thurgood Mar- shall." Marshall was already arguing civil rights cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He would continue to be the country's leading civil rights attorney, climaxing in 1954 with the milestone re- jection of the "separate but equal" argu- ment, a ruling that integrated the nation's public schools. In 1961, Presi- dent Kennedy appointed him to the U.S. Court of Appeals Second Circuit. Four year later, President Johnson made Mar- shall the first African American to serve as U.S. solicitor general, and in August of 1967 the Senate confirmed Marshall's appointment as the first African Ameri- can Supreme Court justice. In 1962, Arnelle earned his law degree from the Dickinson School of Law in Carlisle, which is now part of Penn State's law school. He spent the next few years in government service, mostly in Washington, D.C, but his du- ties also included Peace Corps assign- ments in Turkey and India. After working on Sen. Robert Kennedy's ill- fated 1968 presidential campaign, he moved to the Bay Area, working as a trial lawyer at the San Francisco Federal Public Defenders Office before setting up his own firm specializing in civil and criminal law. In 1984, Arnelle and William Hastie formed the first African American law firm to focus on corpo- rate defense litigation. That led to his participation on various company boards in the business world, such as R.J. Reynolds, Waste Management, Textron and Wells Fargo Bank, helping to make him wealthy far beyond his imagination at New Rochelle High School. A distinguished alumnus Decades earlier, Arnelle caused a major uproar at Penn State that old- timers still remember with mixed emo- tions. It was on Saturday, May 18, 1968, six weeks and two days after the assas- sination of Martin Luther King. Arnelle was the guest of honor at the State Col- lege Quarterback Club's annual football team banquet at the Hetzel Union Building, and he was about to shock his unsuspecting audience. When he started to speak, he talked about his "love affair" and respect for his alma mater. Then, with his emphatic bari- tone voice, he gave a speech about racism at Penn State that a reporter de- scribed as "eloquent" and "distin- guished." "There has never been a Black Ameri- can on the faculty, with tenure, holding the rank of a full professor of anything," Arnelle said. "There has never been a Black dean of a Penn State faculty; there has never been a Black vice president of the university in any capacity; there is no known Black Penn State graduate ap- pointed, assigned or consulted at the policy-making level of the university. … During the early 1950s, the university's undergraduate student enrollment was between 9,000 and 12,000. The per- centage that Black students comprised of that total was 1 percent. Today, the university with 42,000 undergraduate students is among the top 16 universities in enrollment, but Black student enroll- ment represents still only 1 percent of the total." When Arnelle finished after several more minutes, Ridge Riley, president of the Penn State Alumni Association, rose and presented Arnelle with the first alumni player award, an award that con- tinues to this day at the annual football banquet. Ron Kolb, sports editor of The Daily Collegian, wrote about the ban- quet in the newspaper's May 21 edition. Holding a mini statue of the Nittany Lion shrine, Riley said, "We are proud of your achievements and your dedication to the great problems of our time." Then Kolb wrote, "Arnelle went to the podium, and after the applause died down, he said he was deeply honored with appreciation. 'But I decline to take it with me now,' he said. 'I will come back for it when freedom is here, when I can accept it with gratitude, affection and extreme humility.' "Football coach Joe Paterno then arose, thanked Arnelle and praised this athlete whom he had helped to recruit, and for whose ideas he had so much re- spect. However, this act he rejected. 'I resent you not accepting the award,' Pa- terno said, 'because it comes from friends. I hope Penn State does all those things you said, and I'm sure they will. I love the University and I hope to be here until I die. But I hope you will accept this award.'" A year later, Arnelle was elected to the university's board of trustees. Eventu- ally, he formally accepted the State Col- lege Quarterback Award and received the Distinguished Alumni Award from Penn State. He and Paterno remained good friends for decades. Arnelle wasn't perfect. Like all of us, he had his flaws and made his share of mistakes. Yet, until the day he died, no one loved Penn State more than H. Jesse Arnelle. ■

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