Sunday, November 30, 1969

I caught the 9:45 a.m. plane for Las Vegas where the Presidents of the WAC Conference were to meet at noon and the following day. After arriving in Las Vegas I spent the balance of the morning looking over papers in preparation for the afternoon meeting of the Presidents. We had a full afternoon meeting from about 1:30 p.m. until about 6:00 p.m. during the course of which it was apparent that a number of the Presidents did not think that the BYU intended to do anything substantial (at least sufficient to meet their needs) with respect to recruiting Negro athletes. Their problem was that every time they played the BYU they had some kind of disturbance and they were greatly concerned that when we start playing basketball in January that they would have real trouble on their campus because of the very strong feeling of their students and facult[y] with respect to the fact that in the Mormon Church the Negro cannot hold the Priesthood. I found out the next day that some of the Presidents themselves had somewhat the same feeling. I have made elsewhere a memorandum of this meeting and will not repeat it here.

While some of the other Presidents decided to have a night off and go to some of the night clubs, I spent the evening preparing a rather careful statement for the meeting the next day for the Presidents.

ELW.