Major national, literary, and regional media outlets have featured Black Fives founder Claude Johnson, the Black Fives Foundation, the Black Fives brand, and his book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era (Abrams, 2022). We are grateful to these outlets and their insightful writers for helping bring this history to wider audiences.
Major National Media
The New York Times
“He has spent the past 16 years filling in the gaps, starting with amateur basketball clubs organized in the early years of the 20th century.”
The New York Times
“A lot of things we didn’t know about my dad came through Claude. You can’t ask for anything better. What he’s done makes me say, ‘Boy, you went deep.’”
The New York Times
“It sort of feels like a death in the family.”
The Athletic
“How did we miss this? How did we miss an entire chunk of history? We didn’t miss it, Johnson explains. We just didn’t look.”
National Media
SLAM
“Historian Claude Johnson has spent more than two decades researching and honoring the history of some of the game’s more revolutionary pioneers.”
Literary Recognition
Literary Hub
“I aimed to leave no stone unturned, to go down every side street to tell these stories before they were lost.”
Museum of African American History
“This book, ladies and gentlemen, is monumental.”
Andscape
“Maybe we’re on a basketball train, but if you look out this window and it’s a scenic ride, you’re going to see Black history going by.”
Regional / Local Media
The Baltimore Banner
“His new book, ‘The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era,’ delves with a unique precision and narrative force into the history of the pioneering African-Americans who helped to popularize the sport in urban communities nearly five decades prior to the integration of the NBA.”
The New York Daily News
“(Claude) is a force of nature. Nobody knows more or has done more to capture this story. He has rescued these men from historical oblivion.”
WESA 90.5 FM
“What I was trying to do here was unearth some more things that Pittsburghers could be proud of.”
Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
“One of the reasons I wrote this book is to give voice to the voiceless.”
Essays / Commentary
Andscape
“That’s when I dove into researching, preserving and teaching the pre-NBA history of African-Americans in basketball, an effort that today has become a nonprofit, The Black Fives Foundation.”
DETAILS
Long Before the Brooklyn Nets, There Were the Black Fives
Outlet: The New York Times
Author: James Barron
Date: February 1, 2013
Section: City Room – City Sports
URL
Opening Paragraph
In 1996, the National Basketball Association published an encyclopedic history — 800 pages about the players and the teams. Claude Johnson, who was the league’s director of international licensing at the time, leafed through it and found only two and a half pages devoted to the all-black teams that had predated the N.B.A.
Only two teams were mentioned. There must have been others, he thought.
Selected Pull Quotes
On the motivation behind the research
“Claude Johnson, who was the league’s director of international licensing at the time, leafed through it and found only two and a half pages devoted to the all-black teams that had predated the N.B.A.”
On the scope of Johnson’s long-term research
“He has spent the past 16 years filling in the gaps, starting with amateur basketball clubs organized in the early years of the 20th century.”
On the historical importance of the Black Fives
“Like the Negro League stars in baseball, the Black Fives were talented players who helped to shape the game before the integration of the N.B.A. in 1950.”
On Johnson’s determination to recover forgotten teams
“But they were following a path set by the earlier club teams that Mr. Johnson is determined to lift out of obscurity, among them the Smart Set in Brooklyn and the Alpha Physical Culture Club in Harlem.”
On Johnson’s personal commitment to writing and documenting the history
“For years, I was that guy saying, ‘I’m going to write a book,’ ” he said. “There’s a difference between saying ‘I’m going to write a book’ and writing a book.”
On the research process behind reconstructing the history
“Amassing the material took the detective work of a historian — sorting through tidbits of information, reading and cross-referencing articles from old newspapers, interviewing descendants of players.”
On the archival research methods
“You know how you can be a stalker of a person who lived back then?” he asked. “I was looking at all the possible records. Census records. The city directory. The World War I records.”
On discovering early Black basketball teams
“Eventually, I found myself in the Schomburg basement,” he said, referring to the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture on Malcolm X Boulevard in Harlem.
Summary
This New York Times City Room feature recounts how historian Claude Johnson began researching early African-American basketball teams after discovering that an official 800-page N.B.A. history devoted only a few pages to the all-Black teams that existed before the league’s formation. Johnson spent more than a decade reconstructing the history of these forgotten teams, conducting archival research in libraries and historical collections, examining census records and newspapers, and interviewing descendants of players. His work helped document teams such as the Smart Set Athletic Club and the Alpha Physical Culture Club and brought new attention to the Black Fives era, whose players helped shape the sport before the N.B.A. integrated in 1950.
Remembering the ‘Black Fives’ of Pro Basketball
Outlet: The New York Times
Author: Richard Sandomir
Date: March 19, 2014
Opening Paragraph
ROSENA DISERY, a teenager at the New York African Free School in 1820, surely knew nothing about basketball when she stitched a silk-on-wool sampler with words from the poem “Self-Love and Truth Incompatible.”
But she deserves a critical assist for the New-York Historical Society’s decision to mount an exhibition through July 20 about the “Black Fives” amateur and professional basketball teams that played in New York City and around the country from 1904 to 1950.
Selected Pull Quotes
About the historic scope of Claude Johnson’s work
“Mr. Johnson’s mission is akin to the work that has been done to preserve the history of baseball’s Negro leagues. But his task might be harder.”
About Claude Johnson’s relationship with Black Fives Era descendants
““He was like my dad’s son,” said Karen Isaacs, whose father, John, played for the Rens. “He and my dad had a beautiful friendship.”
About the impact of Johnson’s work
“Mr. Johnson’s mission is akin to the work that has been done to preserve the history of baseball’s Negro leagues. But his task might be harder.”
About Johnson’s partnership with the New-York Historical Society
“The stories converged. We invited Claude to the unveiling of the sampler and we chatted about his work on the Black Fives, and I thought it sounded like a fantastic potential exhibition.”
About Johnson’s long-term dedication to the subject
“Mr. Johnson, founder and executive director of the Black Fives Foundation and guest curator of the exhibition, has since the mid-1990s been fascinated with the Black Fives — dozens of church, club, industrial, newspaper and community-sponsored teams…”
About the scale of Johnson’s archival work
“Inspired by a book about black athletes by Arthur Ashe, Mr. Johnson has acquired hundreds of artifacts from the Black Fives era.”
About the depth of Johnson’s historical recovery
“But now, because of Mr. Johnson’s work, some of the history behind Dolly King’s playing days — which included two seasons in the N.B.L. — is coming back to his only child.”
Recognition of Johnson’s research depth
“I’m more than surprised by the depth of his research,” said Mr. King. “I’ve told Claude that anything I can do to help get these guys recognition, count me in.”
Recognition from the family of a Black Fives player
“A lot of things we didn’t know about my dad came through Claude. You can’t ask for anything better. What he’s done makes me say, ‘Boy, you went deep.’”
A Piece of Harlem History Turns to Dust
Outlet: The New York Times
Author: Kia Gregory
Date: April 10, 2015
URL: https://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/nyregion/a-piece-of-harlem-history-turns-to-dust.html
Opening Paragraph
The Renaissance Theater and Casino in Harlem, where Duke Ellington performed, Joe Louis slugged opponents and the Black Fives basketball team called the Harlem Rens dominated games, is now mostly in piles of brick, metal and dust.
Selected Pull Quotes
On Claude Johnson and the Black Fives Foundation
“It sort of feels like a death in the family,” said Claude Johnson, founder and executive director of the Black Fives Foundation, a group devoted to the history of black basketball players and teams before the game was integrated.
On Johnson’s personal reaction to the demolition
“I am just going there out of sorrow because I felt like you pay your last respects,” Mr. Johnson said.
On the emotional impact of the demolition
“There’s really no dignity there in a way,” he said, referring to the backhoe’s work. “Just the end.”
Summary
This New York Times article reports on the demolition of the historic Renaissance Theater and Casino in Harlem, widely known as the “Renny,” a cultural landmark that once hosted legendary performers and served as the home court of the Harlem Renaissance basketball team, the Rens. The piece describes the unsuccessful preservation efforts and the emotional response from historians and community members as the building was torn down. Claude Johnson, founder and executive director of the Black Fives Foundation, is quoted reflecting on the loss of the historic site and its importance to the history of Black basketball and Harlem culture.
The Black Fives, the Big East and the part of basketball history being brought to light
Outlet: The Athletic
Author: Dana O’Neil
Date: Feb. 9, 2022 (updated Feb. 10, 2022)
Opening Paragraph
“Claude Johnson likes to say that history itself doesn’t change. It’s what we do with it that changes the arc of our understanding of our past.”
“He shared this at the start of a lengthy and educational conversation, one that I began with a question that only just dawned on me, but a query he’s been asked so many times he has the ready-made response: How did we miss this? How did we miss an entire chunk of history?”
Pull Quotes
On uncovering overlooked history
“How did we miss this? How did we miss an entire chunk of history? We didn’t miss it, Johnson explains. We just didn’t look. ”
On the importance of rediscovering Black Fives history
“What we want, really, is for people to just pause and contemplate it all for a second. Ask the question, ‘Am I sure of what I know?’ and really understand that you really don’t know what you don’t know.”
On the scale of the historical discovery
“It’s almost like finding a whole new set of baseball cards that you never knew existed from the 1920s, and they’re all Honus Wagners.”
On Johnson’s decades-long work
“All of this unspooled on the microfilms as Johnson first followed a curiosity and then discovered a life’s passion.”
On the impact of his research
“It’s an oversight Johnson has spent the last two decades trying to rectify.”
On the purpose of his work
“Just make people think,” he says. “Be aware of what’s in your grandfather’s trunk. Don’t toss it. Ask questions. Check it out.”
Summary
This article by Dana O’Neil in The Athletic explores how the largely forgotten history of the Black Fives era of basketball is being rediscovered and shared with a new generation. It focuses on the decades-long work of Claude Johnson, founder of the Black Fives Foundation, whose research uncovered a vast and overlooked chapter of basketball history involving African American teams and players before the NBA integrated. The piece also highlights a partnership with the Big East Conference, which used Black History Month to educate players and fans about these teams through special warm-up jerseys and programming. The story frames Johnson’s work as a sustained effort to correct historical oversight and encourage people to rethink what they assume they know about the origins of the modern game.
“Without Them, There Wouldn’t Have Been an NBA”: The People and Places Keeping the Memory of the Black Fives Era Alive
Outlet: The Athletic
Author: Moke Hamilton
Date: February 27, 2019
Opening Paragraph
NEW YORK — As the frigid February breeze blew, it was as unpleasant as it was damp outside. The gray Adidas sweatsuit 64-year-old Robert Stovall wore more or less matched the color of the sky.
Pull Quotes
“It only had two pages, three pages of material on these prior African-American basketball teams that existed,” Johnson recalled to The Athletic. “I knew that there was more.”
“He listed a dozen or more of those early teams, and I couldn’t figure out how he knew about those teams,” Johnson said. “And so I embarked on research … I just began that journey of trying to document and learn about this parallel history. Dozens of teams, going all the way back to 1904.”
“I was sitting there and I’m like ‘Am I in trouble?’ It’s like getting called to the principal’s office,” Johnson joked.
“It turns out he was just reaching out in a wonderful way and I was pleasantly surprised.”
“Slowly, through the players’ union and Adam Silver’s office, there’s more and more understanding that somehow, the road was paved by these early pioneers,” Johnson said. “The Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame also has recognized that.”
“One lecture and one presentation at a time, that’s among the things the Black Fives Foundation will ensure nobody overlooks again.”
Summary
This Athletic feature follows the efforts to preserve and share the history of the Black Fives Era, the period before the NBA integrated when all-Black professional basketball teams flourished across the United States. The story traces the cultural importance of Harlem’s Renaissance Ballroom, home of the famed New York Rens, and the broader historical landscape in which early African American basketball teams developed.
Central to the article is the work of Claude Johnson, whose research into early Black basketball began in the 1990s after discovering how little documentation existed in official NBA histories. Johnson spent decades uncovering archival records, artifacts, and stories of teams that had largely been forgotten despite their major contributions to the sport. Through the Black Fives Foundation, exhibitions, presentations, and collaborations with NBA organizations such as the Oklahoma City Thunder and Brooklyn Nets, Johnson has helped bring renewed attention to the pioneers who shaped basketball long before integration.
Uncovering the ‘Negro Leagues’ of Basketball
Outlet: The Wall Street Journal
Author: Sophia Hollander
Date: February 11, 2013
URL: https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304914904579437600097903692
Opening Paragraph
“Claude Johnson never intended to dedicate his life to the history of basketball’s early segregated leagues.
At first, he says, his interest in the African-American teams of the early 1900s focused simply on selling their retro jerseys. But over the last decade, his vision broadened as he began amassing artifacts from dozens of all-black teams—known as ‘Black Fives’—that competed before the National Basketball Association integrated in 1950. His quest to chronicle their all-but-hidden history will reach a milestone on Friday when ‘The Black Fives,’ the first major exhibition on the topic, opens at the New-York Historical Society.”
Pull Quotes
“It’s been such a struggle,” said Mr. Johnson, who guest-curated the exhibit and is founder and executive director of the Black Fives Foundation.
“You don’t want a black team to show up when nobody was expecting a black team,” Mr. Johnson said. “That was a risky undertaking.”
“That…caused the public to realize that black basketball talent was here to stay and it was first rate,” Mr. Johnson said.
“There’s a better karma now,” he said. He dreams the NBA will really embrace this and players and college teams will pause to take in the exhibit: “We’re all part of this bigger picture.”
Summary
This Wall Street Journal feature by Sophia Hollander examines the efforts of Claude Johnson to uncover and document the largely forgotten history of early African American basketball teams known as the “Black Fives.” The article focuses on the opening of the first major museum exhibition on the subject at the New-York Historical Society, built from more than 150 artifacts collected by Johnson, including jerseys, contracts, photographs, and newspaper clippings. Through years of research and collecting, Johnson reconstructed the story of dozens of Black teams that played before the NBA integrated in 1950. The article portrays Johnson as the central figure bringing this overlooked chapter of sports history to public attention through scholarship, artifacts, exhibitions, and the work of the Black Fives Foundation.
New book on the “Black Fives” restores the buried history of basketball
Outlet: Andscape
Author: Jesse Washington
Date: May 24, 2022
URL:
https://andscape.com/features/new-book-on-the-black-fives-restores-the-buried-history-of-basketball/
Opening Paragraph
It all started with an enticing name: the Smart Set Athletic Club.
In 1998, Claude Johnson was working for the NBA’s marketing department when he picked up the book A Hard Road to Glory: A History of the African-American Athlete by tennis legend Arthur Ashe. One of the Black basketball teams Ashe mentioned was the Smart Set Athletic Club, founded in Brooklyn, New York, in 1904 as the first independent, formally organized Black basketball team. Johnson wanted to know more about this team and its era.
Pull Quotes
“A severance package allowed Johnson to make Black Fives his full-time job, although he wouldn’t draw a salary for years.”
“He kept on collecting artifacts, visiting libraries for historical research, giving talks at schools and doing the occasional apparel collab with Nike or the ’47 Brand.”
“The Black Fives is a detailed and compelling look into a world that most sports fans know little, if anything, about.”
“What surprises me still is you see the size of this book and it’s just the tip of the iceberg.”
“Our mission with the foundation is to research, preserve, showcase, teach and honor.”
“I don’t like the idea of a person of his stature just lying there in a gravesite that isn’t marked.”
“Maybe we’re on a basketball train, but if you look out this window and it’s a scenic ride, you’re going to see Black history going by.”
“So why not know the history? Not just play and watch the game, but know the history.”
“I hope people go on this journey and realize that not only was Madden buried in an unmarked grave, but this whole history in effect was buried, too.”
Summary
The Andscape article profiles Claude Johnson and his decades-long effort to uncover and preserve the forgotten history of early Black basketball teams known as the Black Fives. Inspired by Arthur Ashe’s book A Hard Road to Glory, Johnson began researching the Smart Set Athletic Club, the first formally organized Black basketball team founded in Brooklyn in 1904. What began as curiosity evolved into a lifelong mission.
Johnson built the Black Fives brand, collected artifacts, conducted archival research, and ultimately founded the Black Fives Foundation to preserve the era’s history. His work culminated in the publication of The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era, which documents the pioneers of Black basketball before integration into the modern professional game.
The article emphasizes Johnson’s persistence through years without salary, his commitment to honoring overlooked figures such as Will Anthony Madden, and his broader goal of reconnecting modern basketball fans with the deeper social and cultural history of the sport.
‘The Black Fives’ Tells the Monumental History of the Black Pioneers Who Revolutionized the Game
Outlet: SLAM
Author: SLAM Staff
Date: May 26, 2022
URL:
https://www.slamonline.com/books/read-the-black-fives-book-excerpt/
Opening Paragraph
“Historian Claude Johnson has spent more than two decades researching and honoring the history of some of the game’s more revolutionary pioneers. Following the racial integration of professional leagues in the 1950s, dozens of African American teams, which were often called ‘fives,’ were founded. In his new book, THE BLACK FIVES: THE EPIC STORY OF BASKETBALL’S FORGOTTEN ERA, Johnson rewrites our own history of the game today.”
Pull Quotes
“Historian Claude Johnson has spent more than two decades researching and honoring the history of some of the game’s more revolutionary pioneers.”
“In his new book, THE BLACK FIVES: THE EPIC STORY OF BASKETBALL’S FORGOTTEN ERA, Johnson rewrites our own history of the game today.”
“From the visionaries to the managers and all of those who helped blaze a trail while battling discrimination, the Black Fives helped strengthen and uplift their communities during Jim Crow.”
Summary
This SLAM feature presents an excerpt from Claude Johnson’s book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era and highlights the historical importance of early African American basketball teams before the integration of professional leagues. The article introduces Johnson as a historian who spent more than two decades researching the pioneers of the Black Fives era and reconstructing their overlooked contributions to the development of the sport. Through archival research and narrative storytelling, Johnson’s work brings attention to the players, teams, and communities that shaped basketball during segregation and helped lay the groundwork for the modern game.
Unearthing the Pre-NBA History of African American Basketball
Author: Claude Johnson
Date: May 20, 2022
Outlet: Literary Hub
URL:
https://lithub.com/unearthing-the-pre-nba-history-of-african-american-basketball/
Opening Paragraph
“One summer day during the early 1970s, an elderly man showed up at outdoor basketball courts in Harlem carrying a plastic bag from Duane Reade. The drugstore bag was filled with vintage photographs and aged newspaper clippings about what he claimed—if anyone would listen—were his amazing achievements in the game more than fifty years earlier.”
Pull Quotes
“That is why I have spent more than two decades digging into Will and his contemporaries, loading up my own plastic bag, getting this important African American basketball history out into the world, to anyone who would listen.”
“In writing The Black Fives, I wanted to pick up that baton and carry it forward.”
“I aimed to leave no stone unturned, to go down every side street to tell these stories before they were lost.”
“Even then, there were countless moments where things could have gone awry, where my research and writing could have been irretrievably derailed.”
“Will’s story is nothing if not a tale of redemption, and so is the entire pre-NBA history of African American basketball itself, finally unearthed.”
“How easily all this history could have been lost, forgotten, and disappeared.”
Summary
In this Literary Hub essay, Claude Johnson recounts the story of Will Anthony Madden, an early African American basketball pioneer who spent the later years of his life trying to ensure that the achievements of Black basketball teams before the NBA era would not be forgotten. Madden carried photographs and newspaper clippings documenting the accomplishments of early Black teams and players, hoping someone would listen to the history he was trying to preserve.
Johnson uses Madden’s story as a lens to explore the larger hidden history of African American basketball prior to integration. Drawing on more than two decades of archival research, Johnson explains how he worked to recover these stories from old newspapers, records, and firsthand accounts. His book, The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era, seeks to ensure that the contributions of early Black basketball pioneers are recognized and preserved rather than lost to time.
Stone Book Award Presentation for The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era
Presenter: Charles W. McKinney Jr. (Juror)
Organization: Museum of African American History
Date: 2023
Source
MAAH Stone Book Award Livestream
Opening Remarks
“So I’m Charles McKinney, Associate Professor of History and Director of Africana Studies at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee. And I’m very honored to be one of the jurors for the Stone Book Award. The title of Claude Johnson’s award-winning book is The Black Fives, The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era.”
Pull Quotes
“The scope of the book does, in fact, reach the epic, from New York City to Pittsburgh to Iowa, following along the trails of the first generation of barnstorming amateur and later professional basketball teams.”
“Brother Johnson with this book is at his best, is to take a moment or a movement or an individual and place them or it deeply within their own context.”
“Think of Taylor Branch, America in the King Years. It’s not the King Years, it’s America in the
King Years. King is brought to life, rendered in three dimensions by placing him in the times in
which he lived.You can’t understand King without understanding the context. It doesn’t make any sense.
Johnson does something very similar here with one of my new heroes, one of the stars of the
book, a brother by the name of Will Madden, who you will get to know once you read this
amazing book.”
“His name should be known by every baller and fan of the sport in the country. But he’s dropped off of the radar, buried in a pauper’s grave in New Jersey. His story almost lost to history until Brother Johnson produced this powerful, lyrical, deeply researched, epic excavation.”
“This book, ladies and gentlemen, is monumental.”
“Johnson shows us what sorts of magic can happen when you follow a thread of a story and take it to its full conclusion.”
“This book is meticulously researched.”
“The Black Fives represents history at its very best.”
“It is a compelling story that will draw you in, educate you, and remind you of the beautiful, brilliant, powerful things that people can do when they set their minds to doing them.”
Summary
This transcript from the 2023 Stone Book Award ceremony at the Museum of African American History features remarks from juror Charles McKinney discussing Claude Johnson’s book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era. McKinney describes the book as an expansive and deeply researched work that reconstructs the early history of Black basketball and restores overlooked figures such as Will Madden to their rightful place in the sport’s history. By situating individuals, movements, and communities within their historical context, Johnson’s work uncovers the origins of Black basketball and the broader social forces that shaped it. The juror characterizes the book as monumental, meticulously researched, and a compelling example of historical storytelling that brings forgotten pioneers and their achievements back into the public record.
Examining Baltimore’s Roots as a Basketball Juggernaut
Author: Alejandro Danois
Date: June 23, 2022
Outlet: The Baltimore Banner
Opening Paragraph
Baltimore is indisputably a basketball hotbed. Year after year, the city churns out talent that fills the rosters of major Division I college programs across the country.
A cursory glance across the NBA and WNBA landscape presents a string of names that are familiar to those with an intimate relationship to the local high school scene: Towson Catholic’s Carmelo Anthony, Lake Clifton’s Will “The Thrill” Barton, Archbishop Spalding’s Rudy Gay, Saint Frances’ Damion Lee and Angel McCoughtry, Mount St. Joseph’s Jaylen “Sticks” Smith, and Aberdeen’s Brionna Jones, to simply name a few.
Pull Quotes
“His new book, The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era, delves with a unique precision and narrative force into the history of the pioneering African-Americans who helped to popularize the sport in urban communities nearly five decades prior to the integration of the NBA.”
“I was disheartened that they only briefly made mention of the Black pioneers and pro teams that were playing at an extremely high level, going back to the early 1900s, decades before the league integrated.”
“I read Arthur Ashe’s book, A Hard Road to Glory, and became fascinated with the story of The Smart Set Athletic Club, the first fully independent African-American basketball team, which was founded in Brooklyn, New York in 1906.”
“I knew that there were so many stories about that pre-integration era that had yet to be told.”
“Yes. In the early 1900s, the phonograph and radio became available on a large scale to consumers for the first time. Ragtime, an original African American art form, along with jazz and the blues, created a dance craze.”
“Dance halls and ballrooms got built, and enterprising promoters, looking to pack the house, would have bands and dance party afterwards. So these games went beyond mere sporting contests; they became meaningful social events where people showed up dressed in their Sunday finest.”
“The key figure is a man by the name of Edwin Bancroft Henderson, E.B., who became known as ‘The Father of Black Basketball.’”
“In 1906, E.B., Ralph Cook and a small group of other Black physical education teachers in the area got together to form the ISAA, The Interscholastic Athletic Association of Middle Atlantic States.”
“So it’s no wonder why Baltimore, D.C. and New York became important in the development of the game because those cities were connected very early on.”
Summary
In this Baltimore Banner feature, journalist Alejandro Danois explores the deep historical roots of Baltimore’s basketball culture through a conversation with Claude Johnson, historian and executive director of the Black Fives Foundation. Johnson discusses the forgotten pre-integration era of Black basketball and the research behind his book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era. He explains how early Black teams, educators and community institutions—particularly YMCAs and high schools in cities like Washington, D.C., Baltimore and New York—helped spread and organize the game in the early 20th century. Johnson also highlights the cultural environment surrounding early Black basketball, where games were intertwined with music, dance and social life. His work reconstructs this overlooked history and restores recognition to the players, teams and organizers who shaped the sport decades before the NBA integrated.
The First Kings of Brooklyn: Historian Aims to Rescue and Rejuvenate the Social History of African-American Basketball
Author: Wayne Coffey
Date: February 2, 2013
Outlet: The New York Daily News
URL
Opening Paragraph
Hudson Oliver has never been in a sentence with LeBron James, until now. He never threw down a dunk on SportsCenter or made a Decision before a breathless nation, preferring to keep his considerable talents, and intellect, in New York City.
You have almost certainly never heard of Hudson Oliver, a fact that an indefatigable, self-styled historian named Claude Johnson aims to change, beginning next Sunday night, when the Brooklyn Nets host the San Antonio Spurs and a permanent photo exhibit will be unveiled in the main concourse.
Pull Quotes
“You have almost certainly never heard of Hudson Oliver, a fact that an indefatigable, self-styled historian named Claude Johnson aims to change.”
“Johnson calls it the Black Fives Era, and seeing that he has done more research into it than any person on earth, why shouldn’t he get to name it?”
“I like to explore. I like to unearth new things,” Johnson says.
“This is our family tree. These are our basketball ancestors,” Johnson says. “There is a real and visceral meaningfulness to this.”
“When you see black history in America, often it has to do with drinking fountains, fire hoses and images of sharecroppers,” Johnson says. “Often it doesn’t have any positive associations, but here you see something different, an essence and a strength.”
“(Claude) is a force of nature,” historian Rob Ruck says. “Nobody knows more or has done more to capture this story. He has rescued these men from historical oblivion.”
“Claude isn’t interested in writing a book for 150 other people,” Rob Ruck says. “He wants what he is finding to get to people and to make it matter to them.”
“When he’s deep in the recesses of a library, whether it’s at Yale or Schomburg or Washington, D.C., Claude Johnson says he feels as though he is an explorer… unlocking secrets.”
“This is our history. It’s not my history. It’s important for it to be shared,” Claude Johnson says.
Summary
In this New York Daily News sports page feature, Wayne Coffey profiles historian Claude Johnson and his mission to uncover and preserve the hidden story of early African-American basketball teams known as the “Black Fives.” Johnson’s years of archival research uncovered the achievements of pioneering players and teams such as the Smart Set Athletic Club of Brooklyn, which he identifies as one of the earliest organized Black basketball teams in the country. The article highlights Johnson’s work researching newspapers, genealogical records and historical archives to reconstruct the lost social history surrounding these teams and their communities. Through exhibitions, public programming and scholarship, Johnson seeks to restore recognition to these forgotten athletes and demonstrate how their contributions form a vital lineage in the history of basketball.
Author Explores Pittsburgh’s Role in Early Black Basketball
Author: Bill O’Driscoll
Date: February 16, 2023
Outlet: WESA 90.5 FM (NPR)
Opening Paragraph
Odds are the average Pittsburgh sports fan doesn’t know what a big role the city played in the early development of Black basketball. Yet even many non-fans will recognize the name of the man most critical to that process: Cumberland Posey, the renowned Homestead Grays owner and the only person in both the pro baseball and pro basketball halls of fame.
Pull Quotes
“Pittsburgh became a center for Black basketball,” Johnson said. “As a result of Cumberland Posey’s success, other teams from all over the place, from New York City, from Chicago and D.C. and elsewhere, started to come to Pittsburgh.”
Claude Johnson’s 2022 book “The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era” is, in part, a monument to Posey’s genius as a player, manager and sports impresario.
It’s also a window on the wider world of Black sport from the early 1900s to the mid-century founding of the National Basketball Association, an era of rampant segregation across the country.
Johnson said the lone team excluded from the merger between the National Basketball League and the Basketball Association of America that formed the NBA was the New York Rens, the Black squad that many consider the finest of its time.
“What I was trying to do here was unearth some more things that Pittsburghers could be proud of,” he said.
Summary
In this WESA public radio feature, journalist Bill O’Driscoll highlights historian Claude Johnson’s research into the early history of Black basketball and the pivotal role Pittsburgh played in that story. Johnson’s book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era explores the career of Cumberland Posey and the development of pioneering teams such as the Monticello Athletic Association and the Loendi Big Five. According to Johnson, Posey’s success helped turn Pittsburgh into a national hub for Black basketball in the early twentieth century, drawing teams from major cities like New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C. The article also discusses the broader context of segregation in sports, the exclusion of the New York Rens from the merger that formed the NBA in 1949, and the later breakthrough of Chuck Cooper as one of the first Black players drafted into the league. Johnson’s work aims to uncover overlooked chapters of sports history and restore recognition to the communities and athletes who helped shape the game.
Pre-NBA Black Players Rescued From History’s Dustbin
Author: Charles Hallman
Date: June 2, 2022
Outlet: Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder
URL
https://spokesman-recorder.com/2022/06/02/pre-nba-black-players-rescued-from-historys-dustbin/
Opening Paragraph
Before the NBA, Black basketball players blazed a trail, battled discrimination, and were virtually marginalized from the game’s invention in 1891 to the racial integration of all-White professional leagues in the 1950s.
Pull Quotes
“It took me years to understand how to actually weave [the book] together and what it meant, and the genesis of it all, like when did this all began,” explained Johnson in a recent MSR phone interview. “I didn’t just want to say, ‘Hey, check this out.’ But here’s how it started from the inception.”
“I started with a description of what’s called a narrative nonfiction,” he continued. “It talks about these pioneers as people, not as statistics or milestones. I try to get into who were they, what were they thinking about. Why did they make the decisions they made? What was the context where they come from?”
“I start out with a description of this man [Will Anthony Madden] who was perhaps the greatest African American pioneer in pre-NBA history,” Johnson explained. “Yet he’s buried in an unmarked grave.”
“I can’t help but write about Black history,” said Johnson. “If you’re writing about Black basketball history, at some point you have to explain why were Black communities in Northern cities overcrowded, which is one reason why basketball became popular.”
“There was an exodus from the South. If you want to understand it, if you really want to understand it, you have to understand the background.”
“I want NBA players to read it. I want NBA coaches to read it, NBA team officials to read it.”
“I also want people who are Black cultural leaders… to read it because it’s as much about Black culture, Black history, as it is about basketball. NCAA basketball coaches should read this so that they’re aware of it so that we can have that conversation with their players.”
“One of the reasons I wrote this book,” said Johnson, “is to give voice to the voiceless. That’s a big deal for me.”
Summary
In this Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder article, columnist Charles Hallman discusses historian Claude Johnson’s work uncovering the overlooked history of Black basketball before the NBA. Johnson, founder of the Black Fives Foundation, spent more than two decades researching the pioneers of early Black basketball and documenting their stories in his book The Black Fives: The Epic Story of Basketball’s Forgotten Era. The article explains how early Black teams, often called “fives,” barnstormed across the country and frequently defeated White opponents while operating under the constraints of segregation. Johnson’s work focuses on telling the human stories behind these players and restoring recognition to forgotten figures such as Will Anthony Madden. Through archival research and storytelling, Johnson aims to preserve this history and encourage players, coaches, and cultural leaders to understand the broader social and cultural significance of Black basketball before the formation of the NBA in 1949.
My Sons, All Division I-Caliber Athletes, Truly Stand on Their Grandfather’s Shoulders
Author: Claude Johnson
Date: July 18, 2018
Outlet: Andscape
URL
My sons, all Division I-caliber athletes, truly stand on their grandfather’s shoulders
Opening Paragraph
This is a personal story about the power of family trajectories.
I have three teenage sons: Cassius, 19, Cornelius, 17, and Carnegie, 13. My oldest just finished his freshman year as a business major and cornerback at the University of San Diego, a top academic school and a top-ranked NCAA Division I FCS football program. My middle son, a rising high school senior, is a four-star wide receiver and has football scholarship offers from Division I FBS programs including Stanford, Michigan, Notre Dame, Penn State, Nebraska and Alabama. In early July, he participated in the Nike Football The Opening Finals, high school football’s most elite showcase, as the only player from New England on the invitation-only roster. My youngest, an honor roll student who just completed seventh grade, has won an AAU Division I basketball national championship as a point guard and a Pop Warner football national championship as a running back-wideout.
Pull Quotes
This is a personal story about the power of family trajectories.”
“All three of these young men are not only wonderful people whom I admire but also the continuation of a remarkable journey.”
“The term unheard-of has become a staple motivational phrase in our family.”
“Using his survival instincts, my granddad had changed our family’s trajectory.”
“Like my grandfather and my father, I didn’t have to set goals for my kids; the goal was to help them succeed.”
“It was my turn to carry the baton.”
“That’s when I dove into researching, preserving and teaching the pre-NBA history of African-Americans in basketball, an effort that today has become a nonprofit, The Black Fives Foundation.”
“My wife was the major income earner in our household, while I provided most of the time and attentiveness for our sons.”
“Many parents and youth sports programs aim for the outcomes we’ve experienced so far… but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try.”
“Start by looking at your family trajectory. Realize that every family trajectory has to start somewhere. Why not with you? Why not make history now?”
Summary
In this personal essay for Andscape, Claude Johnson reflects on family legacy, generational progress and the role he played in raising three highly accomplished student-athlete sons. Johnson traces his family trajectory from his grandfather William Johnson, who fled racial violence in Louisiana during the Great Migration and worked as a Pullman porter in Chicago, to his father, who became a college professor, and ultimately to his own children who achieved elite success in Division I athletics.
Johnson describes intentionally restructuring his career and home life to support his sons’ development, dedicating time to coaching, training, travel and mentorship while his wife provided primary financial support. During this period he also launched the historical research that became the Black Fives Foundation, devoted to preserving the pre-1950 history of African Americans in basketball.
The essay argues that success in sports — and in life — often reflects generational progress and family commitment rather than individual achievement alone. Johnson frames his sons’ athletic opportunities as the latest chapter in a long family trajectory shaped by resilience, education, sacrifice and the determination to turn previously “unheard-of” possibilities into reality.