12-year-old junior reporter and student athlete Carnegie Johnson chats with hoops superstar Carmelo Anthony, with history from the Black Fives Era!
Episode 3: Carmelo Anthony
MSG Network’s new PSA for Black History Month honors Black Fives Era pioneers and stars Darryl “DMC” McDaniels of Run DMC.
During the 1910s, a Lower East Side basketball coach brought Jewish Americans and African Americans together in the sport for the first time. Who was he? What did he do? Was he Jewish?
One is a media pass to a history-making event. The other was an “errant” pass that may have changed history.
It was an honor to be recognized at Rucker Park for my work with the Black Fives, along with Nate Archibald, Emmette Bryant, Dean Meminger, and Earl Monroe.
This fine clip from ESPN.com honors Nat “Sweetwater” Clifton, one of the first three African Americans to play in the NBA. Clifton played for the New York Rens and the Harlem Globetrotters before signing with the Knicks in 1950.
The Naval Ammunition Depot in Hastings, Nebraska — the Navy’s largest W.W. II inland munitions plant — had an all-black contingent that represented the base in the “Colored Servicemen’s Basketball Championship Tournament of Nebraska” around 1944.
April birthdays related to the Black Fives Era of basketball include Don Barksdale, Bill Yancey, John McLendon, Paul Robeson, and Charles Scottron.
The Rochester Royals won the 1945-46 National Basketball League Championship in their first season with the league. The following year the Royals defended their title, with a new player named William “Dolly” King, the team’s first African American player.
As with any long-lived icon of sports, culture, and history, it is nearly impossible to encapsulate all of the thoughts and remembrances of people into one service, one article, one story, one comment. So, I will continue to share topics relating to John Isaacs from time to time, starting with these.