Flashpoint: How a Little-Known Sporting Event Fueled America’s Anti-Apartheid Movement

History professor Catsam (Freedom’s Main Line) provides illuminating historical context for recent intersections of sports and political activism in this well-crafted study of the 1981 U.S. tour of South Africa’s national rugby team. The Springboks, who, Catsam writes, “embodied their home country’s white supremacist apartheid policies,” arrived in the U.S. during Ronald Reagan’s first year as president. His administration had adopted a policy of constructive engagement with the apartheid regime, a shift from the approach of Reagan’s predecessor, Jimmy Carter. In fact, the invitation from the United States of America Rugby Football Union to the Springboks was sent on the very day of Reagan’s inauguration. But the prior leg of the team’s tour, in New Zealand, was marked by major protests, and concerns about a repetition in the U.S. led to cancelling matches scheduled for Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York City, whose match was shifted to Albany, despite efforts to cancel it on public safety grounds that made it all the way to the Supreme Court. Through extensive research and interviews—including with members of the team—Catsam assiduously captures how the uproar around the team’s tour primed “the pump of an American anti-Apartheid movement,” ultimately playing a part in the evolution of American policy. This account of an obscure yet impactful moment in history will fascinate sports fans. (Sept.)