Ordinary people probably don't pay particular attention to uniform designs in pictures. As a school historian, I keep my laser focus on small things when working with vintage images.
When I scrolled through TikTok, the attached picture in an advertisement caught my hawk eyes. The picture features a track team from Sheffield High School in either Alabama or Tennessee. I don't know anything about the team, but I see a common design on the track uniform shirt that CSDR used to have.
The track uniform shirt shows the first letter of the school name. At close range, the letters “S” and “C” have tiny wings on both sides. Why wings? The concept of wings goes back two thousand years to when Greece's empire covered a part of Europe and Asia. They came up with tiny wings on sandals to symbolize speed. See picture of a foot with the wing.
CSDR Athletic Director William “Bill” Thornton (1922-2016) adopted the design of wings to attach to the letter “C” on the track uniform for a new sports program track and field established in the Spring of 1955.
Teams continued to wear the original track uniforms with wings from 1955 to 1975. I remember wearing that uniform in 1973 and 1974.
As a museum curator, I am happy that the school museum has the uniforms on the old bleachers.
Kevin Struxness, ‘76, MA
Editor, CSDR Old Times
10 October 2024
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