In 1930, the company organized an all-Black basketball team comprised of its own African American employees known as Cudahy Rex, named after the company’s popular brand of cooking lard. “No other word except ‘flashy’ can describe their two-toned satin sweat jackets,” the Grand Island Herald wrote in 1936. But the Cudahy Rex were no flash in the pan. Its players were former star athletes from the city’s predominantly Black high schools, North High and East High. In addition to competing for an annual plant-wide basketball championship, Cudahy Rex also played throughout the Omaha region and in local Urban League and YMCA open tournaments. During the 1936-37 season, the Rex team was directed by Creighton University trainer Otto Williams, according to the Omaha Evening Bee-News. The existence of the Cudahy Rex team was an important step by the company during this time, since African Americans in Omaha could be arrested, jailed, and fined merely for having “no visible means of support,” then forced to work off their fines laboring for the city. A portion of net proceeds from the sales of our Black Fives assortment will benefit the The Black Fives Foundation, which works to inspire excellence by preserving, teaching, and honoring the pre-NBA history of African Americans in basketball.
