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The Harlem Globetrotters is an American exhibition basketball team. They combine athleticism, theater, and comedy in their style of play. They have played more than 26,000 exhibition games in 124 countries and territories. The team's signature song is Brother Bones' whistled version of "Sweet Georgia Brown." Their mascot is an anthropomorphized globe named "Globie." The team plays over 450 live events worldwide each year. The team is currently owned by Herschend Family Entertainment. The executive offices for the team are located in the Atlanta suburban city of Peachtree Corners.
Abraham Michael Saperstein was the founder, owner and earliest coach of the Harlem Globetrotters. Saperstein was a leading figure in black basketball and baseball from the 1920s through the 1950s, primarily before those sports were racially integrated.
The Philadelphia Sphas, also stylized SPHAs or SPHAS, were an American basketball franchise that existed in professional, semi-professional, and exhibition forms. They played their home games in the ballroom of Philadelphia's Broadwood Hotel. The team's name is an acronym, derived from South Philadelphia Hebrew Association, and the team's players, at least in its earlier years, were primarily Jewish. Future Philadelphia Warriors owner Eddie Gottlieb founded the team as an amateur group shortly after he and some close friends graduated from high school, and it later became a professional team. The Sphas played in many leagues around the Philadelphia area and the East Coast, most notably the Eastern Basketball League and the American Basketball League (ABL), between which the Sphas won 10 championships. The Sphas won a total of 12 championships, their first two coming from the early Philadelphia League and Philadelphia Basket Ball League.
The Chicago Stags were a National Basketball Association team based in Chicago from 1946 to 1950.
Reece "Goose" Tatum was an American Negro league baseball and basketball player. In 1942, he was signed to the Harlem Globetrotters and had an 11-year career with the team. He later formed his own team known as the Harlem Magicians with former Globetrotters player Marques Haynes. He is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame. Tatum's number 50 is retired by the Globetrotters.
Clarence Reginald Jenkins, nicknamed "Fats", was an American professional baseball and basketball player from about 1920 to 1940. He played when both professional sports were racially segregated as an African-American. Primarily he played left field in baseball's Negro leagues, and point guard for the barnstorming New York Renaissance on the hardwood, where he was also team captain. He will be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame as part of the Class of 2021.
Marques Haynes was an American professional basketball player and member of the Harlem Globetrotters, notable for his remarkable ability to dribble the ball and keep it away from defenders. According to the 1988 film Harlem Globetrotters: Six Decades of Magic, Haynes could dribble the ball as many as 348 times a minute.
The Chicago Majors was a basketball team based in Chicago, Illinois, that was a member of the American Basketball League from 1961 to 1963.
William Watson was one of the first African-American basketball players to lead an integrated team to a championship. In 1924 Watson's Lane Tech High School met Wendell Phillips High School to dispute the championship of the Chicago Public High School League. Watson's quintet won 18-4, and he was hailed by the black Chicago Defender newspaper as a hero, despite the newspaper's preference for the all-black Wendell Phillips club.
The World Professional Basketball Tournament was an invitational tournament held in Chicago and sponsored by the Chicago Herald American. The annual event was held from 1939 to 1948, and the winner was generally acknowledged as the World Champions of basketball. Many teams came from the National Basketball League, but it also included the best teams from other leagues and the best independent barnstorming teams such as the New York Rens and Harlem Globetrotters. Games were played at various sites including Chicago Coliseum, International Amphitheater and Chicago Stadium.
Wyatt "Sonny" Boswell was an early African American professional basketball player. He was born in Greenville, Mississippi and grew up in Toledo, Ohio, where he attended Scott High School. He played for the Harlem Globetrotters from 1939 to 1941 and again from 1943 to 1944.
David "Big Dave" DeJernett was a pioneer of integration in early basketball in the United States. He is best known for leading the integrated Washington Hatchets to the Indiana state title as a high school junior in the 1929–30 season.
The ICC AllStars was an early integrated professional basketball team of the barnstorming era led by David DeJernett. In 1935 DeJernett finished his fourth year of eligibility at Indiana Central College and started a pro career with former teammates from Indiana Central as well as Washington (IN) High School. The ICC All-Stars also featured Burl Friddle, a Franklin Wonder Fiver and Twenties pro who had coached DeJernett in high school.
Jackie Bethards was a pre-World War II African American professional basketball player from Philadelphia. As a boy, Bethards played at the Christian Street YMCA along with Charles "Tarzan" Cooper, Zack Clayton, and Bill Yancey. There they began four fruitful careers on a squad called the Tribune Men.
Harlem Magicians was a basketball enterprise founded in 1953 by Lon Varnell through his Varnell Enterprises, that was similar in fashion and activities to the basketball entertainment program the Harlem Globetrotters. The full name of the barnstorming basketball team was The Fabulous Harlem Magicians with the main star attraction of the team being Marques Haynes. Haynes had been a member of the Globetrotters, but had left the team due to a contract dispute to join the Magicians. Other famous players in the team were Goose Tatum, Bob "Ergie" Erickson, and Ron Cavenall. Dempsey Hovland, founder of 20th Century Booking Agency and himself owner of several barnstorming teams was recruited to book the Harlem Magicians' games.
The Cuban House of David were a traveling Negro league baseball team that played from about 1928 to 1936 featuring players primarily from Cuba.
Robert M. Hahn was a professional basketball player who spent one season in the National Basketball Association as a member of the Chicago Stags during the 1949–50 season. He attended North Carolina State University.
The 1948 Globetrotters–Lakers game was a dramatic match-up between the Harlem Globetrotters and the Minneapolis Lakers. Played in Chicago Stadium, the game took place two years before professional basketball was desegregated. The Globetrotters' 61–59 victory – by two points at the buzzer – challenged prevailing racial stereotypes about the abilities of black athletes.
Winfield Scott Welch, nicknamed "Gus" and "Moe", was an American Negro league outfielder and manager. Welch spent most of his playing career with minor Negro teams. He is best known as a successful manager, lauded by some as "the Connie Mack of Negro baseball"
Thomas Robert Brookins was an American sportsman and entertainer. He founded the basketball team that became the Harlem Globetrotters, and toured the world as one half of the vaudeville singing and comedy duo Brookins and Van.