Roberta Vincent, Special to The Times
Editor’s Note: As our nation celebrates Black History Month, this series in The Norwich Times will review the accomplishments of some of the exceptional athletes from Norwich who attended NFA and were inducted into the NFA/Norwich Sports Hall of Fame. This is the second in our series.
Every small city has its share of great athletes, but Norwich has a truly exceptional history. Here are short profiles of a few of these local athletes, all of whom are in the NFA/Norwich Sports Hall of Fame.
Robert E. “Bobo” Alves, Class of 1962
While the Mashantucket Pequot and Mohegan tribes have been administering the COVID-19 vaccine to tribal members and now, on a limited basis, to some of their casino employees the Eastern Pequot Tribe has been struggling to get its elderly members vaccinated.
The Easterns’ chairwoman, Katherine Sebastian Dring, believes it’s another consequence of her tribe’s lack of federal recognition, a status the Mashantuckets and Mohegans have long enjoyed.
“Here we are, a state-recognized tribe with a reservation established in 1683, scientists have said we need to get vaccinated and we have not been acknowledged as an at-risk population,” Sebastian Dring said Friday. “As Native Americans, we are at risk. That’s a scientific fact.”