Author : Dick Burdette
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781518645549
Total Pages : 498 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (455 download)
Book Synopsis The Lives, Times and Glory Days of the Harlem Globetrotters 1946-1963 by : Dick Burdette
Download or read book The Lives, Times and Glory Days of the Harlem Globetrotters 1946-1963 written by Dick Burdette and published by . This book was released on 2016-01-12 with total page 498 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through the hazy looking glass of myopic hindsight, the Harlem Globetrotters have long been perceived as a wholly orchestrated minstrel show: colorful, novel, slapstick, entertaining, most of all, timeless. They have always been, the thinking goes, what they are today: a traveling cartoon show. Handclapping, audience-participation fun for the whole family. A welcome, belly-laugh relief from the worrisome realities of everyday life. Like the circus, they come to town once a year, same time, same place, same script. Only the cast changes. But during their 1946-1963 glory years Americans and fans all the world revered them not only for their showmanship, but their amazing shooting, precision passing and dazzling ball handling.. In 1948, the 'Trotters laid legitimate claim to being the best basketball team in the world. They proved it on the court. On Feb. 19, 1948, before a Chicago Stadium crowd of 17,823, they beat 6-foot 10 George Mikan and the all-white Minneapolis Lakers 61-59. That same season, the Lakers won the professional American Basketball League championship. By 13 games ahead of their nearest rival. The following February 28, the 'Trotters did it again, this time 49-45 in front of 21,866 Chicago Stadium fans. A few months later, the Lakers would win the first-ever National Basketball Association- their first of five in six years -- en route to becoming the NBA's first dynasty. In 1950, the 'Trotters and the nation's best college All-Americans played an 18-game, coast -to-coast series billed as "The World Series of Basketball." The 'Trotters won 11 of the 18. Over the next several springs, they won 65 of 91 all-star games, all played before sellout crowds, including 36,256 in the Los Angeles Coliseum, at the time a new national attendance record; 31,000 in the Rose Bowl; and more than 20,000 in Madison Square Garden and the Chicago Stadium. By the time the annual college all-star series was discontinued in 1962, the 'Trotters had won 166 and lost only 44. This is the behind-the-scenes story, as told by , among others, men who lived it, including not only their unparalleled successes and zany antics on the court but what life was like after the lights went out and they walked off the court and became merely 12 black men touring segregated America on a bus.
