During a break in the first quarter of Monday night’s demolition at the hands of the San Francisco 49ers, the Washington Redskins honored four representatives from the Navajo Code Talkers Association – President Peter MacDonald Sr., Vice President Roy Hawthorne and members George James Sr. and George Boyd Willie Sr. The four men were outfitted in both their military hats and Redskins jackets in what some see as Washington paying lip service to the increasing criticism surrounding the team’s name.

In World War II, the Navajo language was vital to the security of Allied radio transmissions, as Axis counterintelligence was unable to translate the codes built upon the Native American Languages. There were approximately 400-500 Native Americans in the United States Marine Corps whose primary job was the transmission of secret tactical messages. Code talkers transmitted these messages over military telephone or radio communications nets. Though initially developed by Choctaw members serving in World War I, The name code talkers is strongly associated with bilingual Navajo speakers specially recruited during World War II.

Recognized at a first quarter commercial break, the Navajo code talkers stood in the endzone nearest the Washington Redskins’ locker room, accompanied by family members. As the team played a video tribute to the code talkers, the honorees received a round of applause from stadium attendees.

The Redskins have weathered a monsoon’s worth of controversy over their name, which NBC announcer Bob Costas referred to as “An insult, a slur” during a Sunday Night Football broadcast earlier this season. Redskins owner Daniel Snyder has steadfastly refused to change the name (even amidst objection by the Native American community), penning an open letter to “Redskins Nation” detailing why the name deserves to stay.