Crowds of people poured onto Long Field in Evanston Sunday morning to support or take part in the 27th annual Ricky Byrdsong Memorial Race Against Hate.
The event featured a 10K, 5K and youth fun run on a course primarily along Sheridan Road.
The principal sponsors this year were YWCA Evanston/North Shore and, for the first time, the Harley Clarke Development Company, a subsidiary of Celadon Partners, a Chicago development firm.
The race commemorates popular Northwestern University basketball coach Ricky Byrdsong, who was gunned down in 1999 by a white supremacist.
Cherese Ledet, President/CEO of the YWCA, said the race has staying power because “Ricky was murdered because of a senseless act of hate. We are still going through that cycle.” She added that people who are members of historically marginalized groups in the U.S. once again feel they may be targeted for violence.
“We will not fall to the fear and to the hate. We will overcome that by coming together in love,” she added. A lot of the race’s participants, she said, are young first-timers who may not know Byrdsong’s story, but, because of the event, they have an opportunity to learn about it and join in the pushback against hate.
Byrdsong’s widow, Sherialyn Byrdsong, said the event “is so relevant. Acts of hate have escalated and have almost become commonplace in our nation today. We need a reminder that we have to do something in response to all of the acts of hate.”
Mayor Daniel Biss participated in the 5K run, which he said was “plenty” for him. He said the event was important in that it reinforces Evanston’s values and “what our community wants to be” in terms of rejection of hate and violence, as well as community support.
Several area running groups participated in this year’s race. The Evanston Running Club, which was established in 1973 and has participated in the event since its inception, was represented again this year and is a sponsor. Amy Gingold, the club’s president, estimated that about 50 of her members were racing this year.
She said her members enjoy the race, but, they also feel the event promotes an important cause, hence the financial support the club has offered as a sponsor over the years.
Some runners said they felt an urgency in supporting the cause behind the race. Beth Caldwell, a longtime participant, said it was easy to support an event “that’s so aligned with your personal core values,” adding that she felt it was necessary to push the pendulum away from the current “national landscape.”
Caldwell, an administrator at Chiaravalle Montessori School in Evanston, said it is a challenge for people who grew up decades ago to teach today’s young people about the dangers of a reemerging negative social climate that seemingly was in retreat until recently.
But she said high profile local events, such as the race and the opening of the Obama Center in Chicago, “is a little swing” in a positive direction.