COLUMBIA — Marcus Lattimore spoke loudly on the football field.
He’s speaking louder now.
“We’re trying at South Carolina to fight, just like everybody else in America, to fight for equality. These constant reminders that plague South Carolina, of our history, are what holds us back,” Lattimore said on Wednesday. “Being reminded of that every day when a black student passes by the Strom Thurmond Center, I don’t see that as inclusion, I don’t see that as equality, I don’t see that as advancing as a society.”
Lattimore lent his support to a movement started by 2014 USC graduate Heather Armel, an online business consultant in Denver who also does freelance graphic designs. Armel began a petition asking USC president Bob Caslen to rename the Strom Thurmond Wellness & Fitness Center on campus because of Thurmond’s segregationist background.
Armel contacted Lattimore and other USC football alums, they threw their support behind it and Lattimore tweeted a statement on Wednesday afternoon.
“To celebrate well-known segregationist Strom Thurmond’s legacy by keeping his name on our Wellness Center sends a contradicting message to our black students,” he said. “We can no longer be held back by those whose ideals represent division. We must continue to fight for equality.”
His statement was copied into tweets from Alshon Jeffery (Philadelphia Eagles), Mike Davis (Carolina Panthers) and Damiere Byrd (New England Patriots), among others.
“I looked (Thurmond) up and I was reading all of this, and if there’s any time to make a change on this, it would be now,” said Armel, who got the idea from a friend’s social media post. “I’m so lucky that I just randomly messaged Marcus and Alshon, and they said, ‘Yes, we’d be happy to.’”
Lattimore, USC’s career touchdown leader who starred from 2010-12, called Armel the quarterback of the movement. Her petition had received over 13,000 signatures by Wednesday afternoon.
“She’s the one that put the initial thought into all of our heads,” Lattimore said. “Obviously football players have huge names and they’ve done so much for the university, and they gave their bodies to the university. It’s guys like this that have a voice, have a platform, and we’ve all come to this realization, if we’re going to advance, we have to leave the past in the past. We can’t celebrate someone who celebrated division if we want to unite as a society.”
The USC Board of Trustees will meet Friday to discuss renaming Sims dormitory on campus, which is named after a doctor who performed surgery on slaves minus anesthesia. That measure is expected to pass.
A renaming of the Thurmond center is not on the Board’s agenda.
“It has already come up as a concern among members of our community, but it is not up for formal discussion on Friday,” USC spokesman Jeff Stensland said.
Caslen supports renaming of Sims, which will require an exemption to the state’s Heritage Act. Normally a two-thirds vote of the state legislature would be required.
“I believe we are at a point in our nation’s history where action matters more than words alone,” Caslen said in an open letter to USC’s community.
Renaming or removing markers and symbols of slavery and the Civil War has been discussed across the country in the wake of George Floyd’s death while in custody of Minneapolis police. The city of Charleston announced Wednesday that a statue of John C. Calhoun in Marion Square, which has stood for nearly 124 years, will be removed and relocated.
That follows a movement at Clemson University, where the John C. Calhoun Honors College will be renamed. That gained traction when Clemson football alums DeAndre Hopkins (Arizona Cardinals) and Deshaun Watson (Houston Texans) supported the change.
Lattimore, in Portland, Ore., pursuing his independent studies in psychology, took notice. Hopkins, like Lattimore, is from Upstate South Carolina.
“We’re all from the state of South Carolina, so we understand our history. Some of these things prohibit us from progressing as a society because we think it’s OK to have someone’s name who endorses and embraces segregation and slavery,” Lattimore said. “We recognize and appreciate what Bob Caslen has done, but we want to keep this going, keep moving forward. We’re in a time in America that our voice matters, our voice is at the table. If we don’t seize this opportunity, we might not ever have it again.”
Andy Shain contributed to this story.
