![]() The city, populated predominantly by African-Americans and Hispanics, is home to Glades Central High School, an academic underachiever whose football team has sent more than 30 players to the NFL since 1985. and defined by the fertile black silt that helped build a sugarcane-farming empire. among the poorest communities in the U.S. For the coach, good intentions must battle a town’s obsession to win above all else.īeyond the Friday night lights, this book is an engrossing portrait of a community mired in a shameful past and uncertain future, but with the fierce will to survive, win, and escape to a better life.ĭrawing comparisons to the 1990 bestseller Friday Night Lights, this football narrative chronicles the evolution of high school football in Belle Glade, Fla. Without football, Jonteria and the rest must make it on brains and fortitude alone. For boys like Mario, being a Raider is a one-shot window for escape and a college education. Muck City tells the story of quarterback Mario Rowley, whose dream is to win a championship for his deceased parents and quiet the ghosts that haunt him head coach Jessie Hester, the town’s first NFL star, who returns home to “win kids, not championships” and Jonteria Willliams, who must build her dream of becoming a doctor in one of the poorest high schools in the nation. The industry that gave rise to the town and its team also spawned the chronic poverty, teeming migrant ghettos, and violence that cripples futures before they can ever begin. Belle Glade’s high school team, the Glades Central Raiders, has sent an extraordinary number of players to the National Football League – 27 since 1985, with five of those drafted in the first round. Many of these were children who honed their skills along the field rows and started one of the most legendary football programs in America. The loamy black “muck” that surrounds Belle Glade, Florida once built an empire for Big Sugar and provided much of the nation's vegetables, often on the backs of roving, destitute migrants. ![]() When the people move out to seek a better life, these traditions fade.In a town deep in the Florida Everglades, where high school football is the only escape, a haunted quarterback, a returning hero, and a scholar struggle against terrible odds. the economy sort of falls apart, these schools are no longer these titans anymore. where there's more of a future for their kids. There are no jobs, the gang violence has gotten out of control and so people are getting sick of this. is I think a lot of the kids' parents are moving out. "It's interesting this year because the Raiders for the first time in their history started the season 0-4. Belle Glade is full of these grid-iron kings who were never able to get out. At the same time, it is such a pressure-cooker environment and often it is so often prioritized above all else. It opens a door to a lot of these guys that they otherwise wouldn't have. "Football has sent more kids to college in the Glade than anything else. On Belle Glade's relationship with football ![]() Once there was no jobs anymore, football became the only kind of life raft away from this place that kept sinking back in time. " has been ingrained in them from the time they were born their dads, their uncles, their cousins - they all played football. Right now I think the official unemployment is about 20 percent." Once the machines came in we saw just chronic underemployment and unemployment in the Glades. They cut the cane year after year until the mid-'90s, when machines could do it. ![]() And the result was this loamy, black soil we called 'the muck.' In the '60s, the sugar industry came and would hire, instead of local labor, they started bringing in people from the Caribbean. "It was started, as a lot of towns in south Florida, with the draining of the Everglades. He talked with Weekend Edition host Scott Simon about the town's story - a story that's more than just about football. The school is proud of that record, but it may have come at a cost.īryan Mealer spent a year in the town of Belle Glade, Fla., and his new book, Muck City: Winning and Losing in Football's Forgotten Town, spotlights the stories of players, their families, their coach and a town that struggles to win a spot on the field, and life. Over the past generation, Belle Glade Central High School has sent 30 players onto the NFL. Belle Glade, on the shore of Lake Okeechobee, is surrounded by black soil, also known as the "muck" that's renowned for growing sweet corn, vegetables and sugar cane. There are five graduates from Belle Glade, Fla., in the NFL right now. It's almost certain that during this NFL season, you'll see a player from a place that's called Muck City. His work has appeared in Best American Travel Writing and was chosen for an Overseas Press Club Award citation. Crown Archetype Bryan Mealer is the author of The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind.
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