Rod Woodson is one of the greatest defensive backs in NFL history, but before he ever made it to the league, he and his family faced plenty of racially charged hatred growing up in Indiana. Woodson, who was raised by a Black father and a white mother, said that some people didn’t accept his family because they were biracial, including members of his own family.
Recently, Woodson opened up about one particularly terrifying night from his childhood as the Pro Football Hall of Famer said that when he was 11 years old, the Ku Klux Klan tried to burn down his family’s home, and later sent them a letter threatening to do it again.
Growing Up Biracial in Indiana
Woodson was born in 1965 and grew up in Fort Wayne, Indiana. His father was from Gallatin, Tennessee, while his mother was from Fort Wayne. Appearing on OutKick’s The Craig Carton Show, Woodson said that both sides of his family had people who wanted nothing to do with them.
“My dad’s side of the family, some of them didn’t like us cause we’re half white because they had that bias in them. And then you know, my mother family is from the north and then some half of them didn’t like us because we was half black,” Woodson said, on the show.
Woodson said that he didn’t forget about that once he made it to the NFL.
“I remember my dad’s side of the family wanted some tickets to a game and I told my dad, I said, ‘I love you. I’m going to give you tickets. I’ll give them tickets at this time, this one time for you, but they can never ever get tickets from me again.’ Because they didn’t want to be around us when I was a kid, so don’t be around me now,” he said.
Woodson went on to star at Purdue before becoming one of the best defensive backs of his era. He played 17 seasons with the Pittsburgh Steelers, San Francisco 49ers, Baltimore Ravens, and Oakland Raiders, made 11 Pro Bowls, and won a Super Bowl with the Ravens after the 2000 season. He still holds the NFL record with 12 interceptions returned for touchdowns and was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2009.
‘Our House Is on Fire’
Woodson also shared a story of the terrifying night when the KKK set fire to his family’s home.
“We had the KKK try to burn our house down when I was about 11. So, I woke up, it was like 2:00 in the morning. I looked up and we only had a two-bedroom house. So, my mom and dad bedroom was right here, our bed. All three boys stayed in the other side of the other bedroom. I wake up, I look and I see this flickering, these lights outside of the back of our window and I’m like, ‘What the heck?’ And I looked and our house is on fire, like right below our window,” Woodson said.
“And I run in there, tell my dad, I’m like, ‘Dad, our house is on fire.’ And so we all get out of the house, the fire department comes, they do an investigation, and we get a letter a week later from the KKK saying, ‘If you guys don’t get your mixed race butts out of this area, it’s going to happen again,'” he continued.
Woodson said that the family’s dogs started barking and scared off whoever was responsible. By the time they came back, the gasoline they had poured on the house had started to dry, which kept it from going up in flames.
“We were very blessed with that. But we stayed in the same house, you know, for all my childhood until I got to high school and then we moved out a little bit further out,” Woodson said.
Woodson added that his family also received threatening phone calls and letters from members of the Black Panthers because they were half white. But he said his father taught him not to let anyone else define him.
“My dad used to just say, ‘You are who you are. You’re your best of both worlds. Everybody’s going to ask you to choose, right? What are you? You black. Why? What are you? What are you?’ And they still ask that question. What are you? What? I’m like, listen, I am who I am,” Woodson said.
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