Club Book Episode 84 Wil Haygood

African American historian Wil Haygood made waves in 2008 with the publication of a feature in The Washington Post titled “A Butler Well Served by This Election.” It profiled the life and service of Eugene Allen, a White House butler who worked under eight presidents over the course of 34 years. It is the inspiration behind the Lee Daniels movie of the same name, starring Oprah Winfrey and Forrest Whitaker. In 2013, as a tie-in to the Hollywood film, Haygood fleshed out Allen’s story into a New York Times bestselling biography, The Butler: A Witness to History. Haygood has also penned biographers of African American luminaries including musician Sammy Davis Jr., boxer Sugar Ray Robinson, and Supreme Court justice Thurgood Marshall. Haygood’s new book, Tigerland, tells the remarkable untold story of baseball and basketball teams at a poor, black, segregated high school in Ohio. The Tigers both won high-profile state championships (and made national headlines) in 1968-1969 against the backdrop of escalating racial tensions.

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