Julius Campbell, the real-life T.C. Williams football standout famously portrayed in "Remember The Titans," died Friday of organ failure at 65.
Campbell, portrayed by Wood Harris in the 2000 film, was instrumental in building a camaraderie among the T.C. Williams Titans in 1971, when Alexandria, Va. integrated its three high schools – Francis C. Hammond and George Washington being the others – into one.
The film was predicated on the team overcoming a real-life racial divide – T.C. Williams was composed of a 4:1 white-black ratio – to come together against long odds to win the state championship.
There's no Hollywood fabling here; T.C. Williams did win the Virginia AAA state championship with a perfect 13-0 record in 1971.
Fans of the film will remember Campbell for the kinship he built with white linebacker Gerry Bertier (Ryan Hurst), their "left side, strong side" breakthrough serving as a watershed moment in the film, allowing the rest of the Titans to recognize that camaraderie was possible despite their differences.
That too, was not far off from reality.
Herman Boone, head coach of that '71 championship team (portrayed by Denzel Washington in the film), told The Washington Post Campbell was "very, very instrumental on that team at simply getting kids to just talk to one another, kids who never talked to kids from another race their entire lives."
"By doing so," he said, "they learned many things about each other that were not passed down to them and for that, the world owes Julius a debt of gratitude."
Campbell's leadership became evident on a trip to Gettysburg, where the Titans held training camp ahead of their first season together.
"Julius took it upon himself to lead the team and rebuild race relations," Boone told The Post. "He talked to members of the team even up at Gettysburg about how we could come together. It was Julius who came up with the saying that our team is a team of one group of people with 'one vision.' And in order to win we must have 'one heartbeat.'"
In lieu of flowers, Campbell's family has requested donations to the '71 Original Titans Scholarship Fund.
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