Basketball Jews, by Arieh Sclar

The ABL provided a central location in which to examine the Jewish presence in basketball.  By the middle of the decade, many of ‘old-time’ players of the pre-war era had started to retire, and though a new infusion of Jewish talent began to trickle into the professional game, only Holman and teammate Davey Banks served as preeminent Jewish talents.  In the first two years of the ABL, Holman and Banks of the Celtics were joined by Washington coach Lou Sugarman, also from the lower East Side, as prominent Jewish representatives of the league.  In addition, Eddie Gottlieb owned and Jules Aaronson managed the Philadelphia Warriors.  According to historian Peter Levine, Jews made up 19 of 101 players on ABL rosters during the 1927-28 season.[1]  At a time when American Jews consisted of less than four percent of the American population, such a disproportionate number of Jews in the major professional basketball league would have legitimized the claims of Conzel, Joel, and other commentators that Jews ‘dominated’ basketball.  The notion of Jewish dominance and innate ability also received notice in one of the era’s most thorough articles on Jewish basketball.

On November 3, 1929, the English-section of the Yiddish daily, the Jewish Daily Forward, published “Basketball Jews.”  The Forward and other Yiddish papers served a distinct role in American Jewish life.  They provided the daily news that English readers of the American Hebrew and other weekly Jewish newspapers would get from the mainstream media.  The Forward contained a full weekend sports page in Yiddish that provided information on broad athletic events as well as Jewish athletes, although in general, the Yiddish press provided little information on sports.  For instance, the same weekend as the publication of “Basketball Jews” in the English section, the newspaper’s Yiddish sports page contained no information on basketball.[2]  Nonetheless, “Basketball Jews” reflected the growing presence of Jews in a changing sport.

The Forward article did not view Jewish participation as illustrative of Jewish acceptance, but rather as a normal experience within basketball.  The author stated that basketball had become “a major activity among the young Jewry of New York and the vicinity.  In the YMHA’s of innumerable small cities in the New York region, regular Saturday night games are staged, where dancing before and after the games are a feature of the evening.”  These “community houses” produced “excellent basketball players, whose names later appear in the rosters of high school, college, and professional teams.”  The article also provided the name of 17 Jewish professional players and singled out Nat Holman, who remained “the greatest basketball player in the country. …[He] has been taken for granted for so long that one runs the risk of becoming a bore to repeat his praises.”  The Forward claimed Holman “is as full of deception as the traditional fox,” and praised the professionalism that made him “a great showman.”[3]

“Basketball Jews” advanced the notion that basketball “may almost be said to be a Jewish sport.”  Basketball became popular among Jews because “there are no football fields or baseball diamonds to speak of in lower Manhattan.”  Popularity, however, did not explain success and Jewish athleticism remained embedded to racial identity.  The Jewish professional presence was so great because basketball “is not essentially a sport where a huge body is a requisite. Brains, nimble thinking and speedy coordination between mind and muscle are more important and effective than mere physical brawn and power.”  The ideal player needed intelligence as much, if not more, than strength.  “The average athlete is a chap whose brains are located in his biceps and whose head is stronger outside than inside. Not so, however, with the average basketball player. …Of course, a strong and husky physique is an asset in basketball as in other sports, but in general basketball players are not so dumb.”[4]

Like previous commentators, the author of “Basketball Jews” presented basketball as a sport that required certain characteristics.  He distinguished Jewish basketball players from the ‘average athlete.’  The Jew succeeded because of Jewish intelligence and an unchanged Jewish body.  The Jewish athlete did not, and should not, need to conform to the physical ideal to succeed.  Indeed, the body of the basketball Jew could not change if Jews wanted to maintain their advantage in the sport.

---

[1] Levine, Ellis Island to Ebeet’s Field, 61.

[2] Oriard, King Football, 34.  According to historian Eddy Portnoy, many immigrants received their sports news from the New York Daily Mirror, whose Jewish readership was large enough that the paper occasionally printed messages in Yiddish on the sports page.  Portnoy also explained that the Yiddish press contained virtually no coverage of sport during the interwar period.  The author’s brief examination of the Forward confirmed this.  Eddy Portnoy, e-mail message to author, October 12, 2006.

[3] Bob Shelley, “Basketball Jews,” The Jewish Daily Forward, November 3, 1929.

[4] Ibid.

The growth of professional basketball, by Ari Sclar

Basketball’s growth in urban areas and among immigrant groups attracted both Jewish and non-Jewish entrepreneurs who sought to expand the sport’s scope.  Basketball promoters and commentators had discussed forming a ‘national’ basketball league in the 1910s and a national commission failed to control the various professional leagues of the northeast in the early 1920s.  In the middle of the decade, however, promoters formed the American Basketball League (ABL) as a ‘national’ league and attempted to reconstruct professional basketball into a mass, commercialized sport.[1]

The ABL attempted to turn basketball into a respectable sport.  The league banned profanity, used amateur rules, abandoned the ‘cage,’ and played its games in large urban arenas.  Moral condemnations of professional basketball declined as outright violence occurred less frequently.[2]  The ABL became the first league to serve as the pinnacle of a linear, though unstable, basketball hierarchy as a younger generation of former college players entered professional basketball.  Media attention remained fairly sparse, however, until the Celtics joined the league during its second season in 1926-27.[3]

ABL owners wanted to leave behind the chaos and instability of Progressive-era professional basketball where players had more control over their production.  The Celtics had illustrated the importance of continuity in building team success.  Other teams adopted the contractual model that both intensified the commodification of players and provided a massive salary surge.  ABL owners attempted to challenge all aspects of local basketball cultures, including scheduling, ticket prices, and most importantly, fan loyalties.  In some cities, fans decried an ABL team’s “unpopular attendance charge” and the possibility that the league would “unfavorably affect the popularity of local basketball games.”[4]

---

[1] For information on the national commission and discussion of the need for a national league, which would standardize rules of professional basketball, see Introduction, Reach Official Basketball Guide 1921-22 (Philadelphia, A.J. Reach & Co.: 1922);  Applin, “From Muscular Christianity to the Marketplace,” 194-196; Peterson, Cages to Jump Shots, 55. 

[2] As a ‘national’ league, the ABL had teams in New York, Brooklyn, Cleveland, Washington D.C., Rochester (N.Y.), Fort Wayne, Boston, Chicago, Detroit, and Buffalo. On the ban against profanity, see “’Oh, Pshaw,’ Limit in Epithets for Pro Fives; $10 a violation,” New York Times, December 31, 1927. For sporadic incidents of violence during basketball games, see “Celtics Win from Rosenblum Five, “New York Times, April 15, 1924; “Fist Fights as Jewels Defeat Celtics,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, November 26, 1932. Jewish players were involved in both fights as Marty Friedman and Nat Holman squared off in 1924 during a game played for U.S. Olympic fund under the auspices of the Mayor’s Committee on Municipal Athletic Activity.  The 1932 fight occurred during another fundraiser, this time for a retired player.

[3] “Youngsters Crowding Cage Pros,” Los Angeles Times, December 25, 1927.  The article describes the generational transfer within the professional game as “college-trained youngsters” began to replace “old-timers.” 

[4] The ABL owners suspended a Brooklyn player during the first season for playing with a non-ABL team during the season.  See “Brooklyn Basketball Star Suspended,” Washington Post, November 20, 1925. Quote from “Thru Sportdom,” Baltimore Jewish Times, September 19, 1926. On salaries, see Peterson, Cages to Jump Shots, 84-94.  Holman received an annual salary of $10,000 from the Celtics during the mid-1920s.

Nat Holman, basketball hero - by Ari Sclar

During the 1920s, many sports commentators considered Nat Holman the best player in professional basketball.  Born on the lower East Side to Jewish immigrant parents, Holman played in settlements and public schools before moving to a variety of Northeastern leagues in the late 1910s.  Unlike the majority of professional players of the era, Holman attended college and began his professional career while still at the Savage School of Physical Education.  After his first full season of professional basketball in 1918, Reach recognized his ability, and stated that he “is a natural-born basket ball player, has a wonderful physique, a good head, and there is every reason to believe that with a little experience, he will exceed in skill and cleverness the best man that ever stepped on the court.”[1] 

In 1920-21, Holman played with Barney Sedran and Marty Friedman for the New York Whirlwinds.  That season, the Whirlwinds scheduled a three-game series against the Original Celtics to determine basketball’s ‘world champion.’  The first two games drew thousands of fans in New York City.  They did not play the third game.  The reason remains unclear, although the Reach basketball guide indicated that gamblers attempted to fix the game.  Although the teams did not complete the series, it illustrated the popularity of professional basketball and helped launch the sport into a new era.[2]

The Celtics’ owners took advantage of the growing importance of spectators in America’s post-war athletic culture.  The Celtics offered exclusive contracts to players, and turned the former settlement house team into an all-star team.  For instance, two weeks after the 1921 series, Holman signed with the Celtics.  These contracts allowed the team to take long barnstorming tours to the Midwest and South, which increased the team’s popularity and profitability.[3]  The Celtics frequently played over 100 games in a single year, and rarely lost more than ten games in one season.  One basketball historian emphatically stated: “The Celtics were so superior to most of the teams they played that they were able to perfect their new theories under actual game conditions without much fear of losing.”[4]

---

[1] For information on the Holman’s career, see Murry Nelson, The Originals: The New York Celtics Invent Modern Basketball (Bowling Green, OH.: Bowling Green University Popular Press, 1999), 1, 5-6, 34-36.  Quote from “Norwalk, CT,” Reach Official Basketball Guide 1917-18 (Philadelphia, A.J. Reach & Co.: 1917).  Upon his retirement, Holman had become widely considered the greatest player in the history of the young game. In 1950, the Associated Press named Holman the third best basketball player of the first half of the twentieth century. 

[2] Peterson, From Cages to Jump Shots, 70-72; Postal, Silver, and Silver, Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports, 86-88. The series attracted close to 10,000 fans, but was not mentioned in the New York Times.

[3] On the reaction of intellectuals to spectatorship in the 1920s, see Dyreson, “The Emergence of Consumer Culture and the Transformation of Physical Culture,” 262-279. On the importance of contracts, see Peterson, Cages to Jump Shots, 69-79.

[4] Zander Hollander, ed., The Modern Encyclopedia of Basketball (Garden City, NY: Doubleday and Co., 1979), 274.

CCNY makes history in 1950, by Ari Sclar

In 1950, the CCNY team included a class of sophomores that sportswriters considered the best recruiting class in school history.  Jewish starters, 6’3” sophomore guard Al ‘Fats’ Roth, 6’6” sophomore center Ed Roman, and 6’4” senior forward Irwin Dambrot played alongside two African-American starters, sophomores 6’3” guard Floyd Layne and 6’4” forward Ed Warner.  Basketball historian Neil Isaacs described the team as “taller than a typical Holman squad and more versatile.”  The team played well early in the year, rose to a No. 7 ranking in the Associated Press (AP) poll, and finished the season with a record of 17-5.  The team went undefeated against Metropolitan opponents and earned an invitation to the NIT.[1]  Many believed the team would again lose in the first round.  Instead, over an 18 day span, CCNY achieved one of the greatest feats in college basketball history.

On March 12, 1950, CCNY defeated San Francisco, the twelfth ranked team in the country, in the first round of the NIT.  The team then triumphed over the two-time defending NCAA champion, No. 3 Kentucky by a score of 89-50.  CCNY defeated No. 6 Duquesne in the semifinals before beating No. 1 Bradley in the championship game.  CCNY then played in the NCAA tournament, which began four days after the NIT final.  CCNY proceeded to defeat No. 2 Ohio State and No. 5 North Carolina State to set up a rematch with Bradley in the final.  The game began with Holman absent due to a 103 degree temperature and became a thrilling affair that came down to the final seconds.  With a one point lead, CCNY’s ‘super sub’ Norm Mager stole the ball from Bradley’s star Gene Melchiorre and scored a final basket to complete CCNY’s 71-68 victory.[2]

CCNY became the only school in basketball history to win both the NIT and NCAA tournaments in the same season, considered the ‘Grand Slam.’  After winning both tournaments, the school cancelled classes and parades honored the team.  Sport magazine named Holman its “Man of the Year.”  According to historian Edward Shapiro, Holman also “received invitations to speak at Congregation Rodeph Shalom and the Ramaz School, an Orthodox day school” in Manhattan.  New York newspapers hailed the coach and the players, who the New York Herald Tribune called “our boys.”  When asked about his players’ “exceptional gifts,” however, Holman downplayed their talent and “insisted that the 14 players – all of them products of a teeming city’s public schools – were essentially ‘just a group of intelligent boys in excellent physical condition.’”[3]

---

[1] Isaacs, All the Moves, 95.

[2] On the CCNY championships, see Isaacs, All the Moves, 97-100; Bjarkman, Hoopla, 63-68; Stanley Cohen, The Game They Played (New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1977).  Many believed Mechiorre was fouled, which was not called because the game was held in New York City.

[3] See Edward Shapiro, “The Shame of the City: CCNY Basketball, 1950-51,” in Kugelmass, Jews, Sports, and the Rites of Citizenship,  181-183. “Basketball: Bradley Weardown,” Newsweek, April 10, 1950.  Levine, Ellis Island to Ebbet’s Field, 78-81.  In the early twentieth century, it became common to hail the coaches for their ability to turn players, including those not considered athletics, into winning teams.  See Overman, The Influence of the Protestant Ethic on Sport and Recreation, 166-169.

'The New York Massacre,' by Ari Sclar

Despite the reemergence of Holman’s CCNY teams in 1946 and 1947, New York basketball, and its connection to Jewish basketball, seemed to have suffered in the post-war era.  The New York and Jewish presence in the NIT declined during and immediately following the war.  Three New York City teams played in the NIT in 1943 and two teams played in 1947, but only one city school appeared in 1944, 1945, 1946, and 1948.  The declining number of schools inevitably impacted the success of New York and Jewish basketball.  Between 1945-1948, no New York school won the NIT, and only one school, NYU in 1948, even reached the championship game.[1]  In 1949, the NIT expanded its field to 12 teams in order to include more city schools.  The result brought the entire culture of New York and Jewish basketball into question.

In 1949, four New York teams received invitations to the NIT because tournament officials did not want to decide between them for the eighth, and final, spot.  New York sportswriters had argued prior to the tournament that “New York rated no representative in the tourney,” and the result seemed to prove that “none of the local quintets justified its presence on the court.”  All four New York teams, CCNY, NYU, St. John’s, and Manhattan, lost in the first round, which led the New York Times to state that, “some fans are calling it the ‘New York Massacre.’”[2]  The ‘massacre’ led commentators to conclude that New York basketball had fallen to previously unseen depths.  Louis Effrat of the New York Times blamed a peculiarity of New York basketball for local schools’ failure.  The losses “proved that what New York needs, possibly even more than a good ten-cent cigar, are good big men on its college quintets.  Whereas, invariably, visiting teams move in with elongated talent, the locals have to play with comparatively small athletes.”[3]

Much like the condemnation of the ‘Metropolitan player’ after the Stanford-LIU game in 1936, negative values were attached to the New York player.  The belief that the ‘Metropolitan’ player could not compete with taller, more athletic players had been proven unequivocally false during the late 1930s and 1940s.  The ‘massacre’ appeared to concretely illustrate that the city’s short, speedy player no longer had a place in college basketball.  Effrat did not explicitly connect the ‘small’ New York player to the ‘Jew,’ but New York basketball had long been associated with Jewish basketball and Effrat’s ‘small’ athletes conformed to the continued perception of Jewish players.  Yet, the following season, CCNY’s recovered from the ‘massacre’ in a manner which indicated that even Nat Holman had determined the basketball Jew could no longer succeed.  As Holman put together the greatest team in school history, he did so with players that bore little physical resemblance to the traditional CCNY player. 

---

[1] Douchant, Inside College Basketball.

[2] “Afternoon, Night Twin Bills Today on Invitation Court Tourney Slate,” New York Times, March 14, 1949.

[3] Louis Effrat, “Loyola Conquers City College Five in Garden 62 to 47,” New York Times, March 13, 1949.

Anti-Semitism at the Garden, by Ari Sclar

Despite the disappointment of the 1946 season, CCNY had greater success in 1947.  That year, Holman led the team to a regular season record of 15-4, including a 91-60 victory over NYU.  CCNY then defeated Syracuse to qualify for the NCAA tournament, where it finished in fourth-place.  CCNY included Holman’s first African-American players, Sonny Jameson and Joe Galiber, both of whom would serve as captains in future seasons.  The team, which remained predominantly Jewish with four starters and five reserves, became involved in an incident at the Garden that reflected the intensity of college basketball.  The incident’s aftermath indicated American Jews’ growing acceptance in American society and their continued anxiety regarding the permanence of this acceptance.

On December 27, 1946, CCNY played the University of Wyoming at the Garden.  A close game until the final minutes when CCNY pulled away, the “thrill packed struggle” almost turned into “bedlam” as a result of “two near-fights, one on the court involving the players and the other on the rival benches.”  The New York Times reported that “when the players tangled on the floor, everyone knew what it was about – a lot of tense athletes, pushing each around in the heat of battle.”  In contrast, “no one could imagine what was behind the verbal conflict – with threatening gestures – that went on on the benches.”

During the game, CCNY’s Nat Holman advanced toward Wyoming coach Everett Shelton twice.  Holman then refused to shake Shelton’s hand at the end, which made it “apparent that something was radically wrong.”  After the game, Holman explained in an interview that, “I heard Shelton uttering derogatory remarks and took exception.  In fact, I threatened to punch him if he repeated them.”[1]  Newsweek quoted Shelton as stating: “those New York Jews are getting away with everything.”  Three days after the game, Shelton apologized, although he “denied that his words…were anti-Semitic.”  He explained: “I am very sorry that my remarks caused such a disturbance…what I said about Jews had nothing to do with religion or anything else.  The word ‘Jew’ was merely descriptive.  I did not swear.  In our section of the country, when we play against Indians we call them Indians and we call Swedes Swedes.”[2]

The incident triggered an outpouring of anti-Semitic letters sent to Holman.  ‘Anonymous’ exclaimed that Christians “hate you and your hooked-nose foreigners.”  A letter from Dallas differentiated “we Americans” from the “Jew” and stated that “Hitlers” will continue “springing up all over the world unless the jew changes himself…it is not the people that need changing as much as it is the jew.”  Another letter broached the stereotype of the weak Jew.  “You people should learn to punch and not squeak and everyone would give you more credit. That is the real American way.”  Finally, a self-proclaimed Irishman declared that when “we Irish” were attacked, “we simply laugh the jackass down.”  Jews needed to learn this skill, since, “the jockeying in sports is part of the game and this incident at the Garden was much akin to such doings.”[3]

Holman also received supportive letters from both Jews and non-Jews.  The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) hoped Shelton would provide a sincere apology because he “was guilty of an unsportsmanlike, an un-American and a dangerous act.” [4]  The CCNY faculty athletic committee passed a resolution that the school would no longer schedule games “against teams coached by Shelton.”  Milton Gross, the former vice president of the Metropolitan Basketball Writers Association, declared that “Shelton had forfeited his right to coach a basketball team.” [5]  Other individuals and organizations condemned Shelton’s remarks and sent letters of support to Holman.  The Labor Sports Federation, the Jewish Postal Workers Welfare League, National Negro Congress, and the American Labor Party all praised Holman for his actions.  Some of Holman’s former players also expressed pride in his actions as “a long step in striking against racial and religious intolerance which unfortunately prevails in our institutions of higher learning today.”[6]  The incident and response, from Holman’s supporters and opponents, reflected the experiences of American Jews in the 1940s.

---

[1] “City College Tops Wyoming Quintet in Garden, 57 to 48,” New York Times, December 28, 1946.

[2] “Basketball Coach Makes An Apology,” New York Times, December 31, 1946; “Basketball: Heated Words,” Newsweek, January 6, 1947.  One report found in the Nat Holman archives indicated that Shelton actually stated that, “those New York Jews and Niggers are getting away with everything.”  However, the press focused on Shelton’s use of the word ‘Jew’ and no other correspondence or report confirmed this account.

[3] Many of the correspondence held in the CCNY Archives contained vicious attacks on Holman personally and American Jews in general.  See Anonymous to Nat Holman, January 2, 1947; W.B. Johnson to Nat Holman, undated; George Biltman to Nat Holman, January 6, 1947; John J. Hurley to Nat Holman (and Dan Parker of the New York Daily Mirror), January 3, 1947. All letters in the Nat Holman Papers, Box 2, Holman, Nat. Correspondence. Wyoming Game. 1946. CCNY Archives, New York.

[4] Meier Steinbrink to Harry Wright, December 31, 1946, Nat Holman Papers, Box 2, Holman, Nat. Correspondence. Wyoming Game. 1946. CCNY Archives, New York.

[5] “Basketball Coach Makes An Apology,” New York Times, December 31, 1946.

[6] See Leon Slofrock to Nat Holman, December 30, 1946; Louis Brumberg to Nat Holman, December 30, 1946; Max Yergen to Nat Holman, December 30, 1946; Samuel Kaplan to Nat Holman, December 30, 1946. All letters in Nat Holman Papers, Box 2, Holman, Nat. Correspondence. Wyoming Game. 1946. CCNY Archives, New York. Quote from player Sam Liss to Nat Holman, January 7, 1947.