Wilt, 1962
Page 32
For this book, a reconstructive period piece that is a hybrid of history and journalism, that was no small challenge. The hundred-point game was not televised; the print media coverage was limited. I turned necessarily to the people who were there. I conducted more than 250 interviews, many lasting two hours and more. As I probed deeper, I often returned to an interview subject multiple times, trying not to be intrusive. In that regard, I wasn’t always successful. Once, broadcaster Bill Campbell, hearing my voice on the phone line, said, wearily, “Not again…”
From the two teams’ rosters in Hershey, I interviewed fifteen players (besides Chamberlain and Jordon, two other players died before I started this project: the Warriors’ Guy Rodgers from a heart attack and the Knicks’ Al Butler from cancer, both in 2001). For the most part, players from the hundred-point game were overwhelmingly kind and generous with their time and reflections. I sat in the living rooms of Paul Arizin and Tom Gola in Philadelphia and Tom Meschery in Truckee, California. The poet is married to a novelist, Joanne Meschery, and their home is brimming with books and warmth. The Rev. Willie Naulls and his wife, Anne, served me lunch in their home in north Florida. Dave Budd gave me a tour of his produce packaging plant in New Jersey. At the U.S. Basketball Academy near Eugene, Oregon, I shared time on a basketball court with Darrall Imhoff, who demonstrated his defensive tactics against the Dipper and even put his well-placed elbow between my shoulder blades. (All these years later, Imhoff still knows how to inflict momentary discomfort.) At the Golden State Warriors offices in Oakland, California, Al Attles gave me a copy of Campbell’s WCAU play-by-play call. Sam Stith walked me along Seventh Avenue in Harlem, regaling me with stories about the Knicks and Harlem. (On another occasion, former NBA players Fred Crawford, Tom Stith, and Cal Ramsey joined us over lunch in Harlem and shared their favorite Wilt stories.) After an interview in San Francisco, Joe Ruklick fired off lengthy email responses to my legions of follow-up questions. Ruklick’s emails from Chicago were full of fire, full of deep thought, and often lengthy. “Longueurs,” Ruklick called his dispatches. (“It’s amazing,” Ruklick wrote once, “how time has transformed the players from that game into historical figures.”) Only two players from the hundred-point game declined to be interviewed: Richie Guerin and Cleveland Buckner. “That part of my life is over. I’ve moved on,” is how Guerin explained himself over the phone. Members of Buckner’s family urged him to add his voice—his story—but for whatever reasons, he did not. An interview with the Warriors’ Ed Conlin, suffering from illness, could not be arranged.
The majesty of oral history is that it fills the spaces beyond the reach of written documentation. It adds texture and luster to our understanding of the past. In all, I heard the stories of fifty-six people who were at the Hershey Arena on that long-ago night; a handful of others claimed to have been there, though I could not discern whether truly they had.
With memory, Emory University psychologist Robyn Fivush says, “There is always a self-serving or self-defining function. We want to place ourselves closer to moments of great historical import or joy and further away from [the negative]…. We remember in ways to be consistent with our present goals.” At the time of my interviews for this book, players of the hundred-point game ranged in age from sixty-three to seventy-four years old. Fivush says there is a memory phenomenon known as the “reminiscence bump.” “There is a bump [in recalled memory of events] between the age of fifteen to the middle twenties; it’s when we are defining ourselves,” she says. “They are important markers for who we are.” I attempted to corroborate, when possible, every fact and anecdote in this book. With several players from the hundred-point game I listened to the fourth quarter play-by-play; the audiotape jarred their memories and prompted revealing observations about the game.
Of course, some memories proved imperfect. For years, Knicks players had talked of their bus ride from New York to Hershey—a bus ride that did not happen for the March 2 game. In his attic in New Jersey, Dave Budd found an old box of materials from his Knicks career. He phoned me: “It’s mostly programs, stat sheets, and some team itineraries, a lot from that 1961–62 season,” Budd said. “You interested in seeing them?” Days later, I opened the box and found the Knicks itinerary from the week of the hundred-point game; the team had flown from Chicago to Hershey and stayed at the Hotel Penn Harris. The only bus ride was from the Hotel Penn Harris to the game. I’m indebted to Budd for sharing that material.
The basketball community in Philadelphia is tightly knit and so once tapped it quickly produced the Dipper’s coach at Overbrook, Cecil Mosenson, Chamberlain’s boyhood friend Vince Miller, and the hundred-point game referee, Pete D’Ambrosio. (“You probably thought I was already dead, didn’t you?” said D’Ambrosio, still spry at eighty-three.) During my trips to Hershey, Pam Whitenack of the Hershey Community Archives and her staff showed me kindness, professionalism, and transcripts—such wonderful transcripts—of interviews conducted down through the years with prominent and not so prominent Hershey townsfolk. These oral histories offer fascinating insights into the people and pacing of community life in the chocolate factory town. I’m also grateful that Kerry Ryman offered his time and candor. Together we walked through Hershey Arena while a youth hockey game was being played. He walked me along the path of his escape with the basketball. We strolled along Chocolate Avenue, through the old neighborhood, past the back alley where Kenny Snyder’s basket once hung on the detached garage, though no more.
For a day-to-day understanding of the Warriors’ 1961–62 season, I turned to microfilm to read Jack Kiser’s work in The Philadelphia Daily News (available in Philadelphia at the Free Library and the Van Pelt Library at the University of Pennsylvania) and Jim Heffernan’s coverage in The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin (available at Temple University’s Paley Library). Two excellent books about the NBA also provided wonderful context of the league’s formative years: Ron Thomas’s They Cleared the Lane: The NBA’s Black Pioneers; and Terry Pluto’s Tall Tales: The Glory Years of the NBA, in the Words of the Men Who Played, Coached, and Built Pro Basketball.
Many claimed to have been in Hershey on the night the Dipper scored one hundred points. With the help of Jim Carlson, assistant sports editor of The Harrisburg Patriot-News, I placed a brief story in the sports section of that newspaper, seeking to identify and interview fans that attended the famous game in Hershey. In all, that story prompted ten responses, by phone, letter, and email. Whether or not each respondent had actually been in the Hershey Sports Arena that night I could not be certain; some reminiscences offered little. But several other respondents provided revealing details that convinced me they had attended the game. These details, which either corroborated stories I’d already learned or told small new ones, resonated in ways small and large. They had the power of truth.
I’m also indebted to a panel of readers who read parts or all of this manuscript in its earlier forms and helped me to eradicate errors of fact and/or interpretation: Professor Gerald Early, Director of African and Afro-American Studies at Washington University in St. Louis, a Philadelphia native, and author of This Is Where I Came In: Black America in the 1960s; Sandy Grady, retired sports columnist and political columnist for The Philadelphia Daily News, who knew or covered most of the characters in this book for The Daily News and earlier for The Philadelphia Evening Bulletin; Neil D. Isaacs, Emeritus Professor of English at the University of Maryland and author of Vintage NBA: The Pioneer Era, 1946–56, a wonderful oral history of the NBA’s earliest years; and Dick Weiss, The New York Daily News sportswriter and basketball griot in his native Philadelphia, known affectionately as “Hoops.” Other readers offered helpful suggestions: Andy Mathieson, Ben Lefkowitz, Eric Segall, and Greg Pomerantz. In Philadelphia, I received some timely research assistance from April White (www.knowmoreresearch.com) and in Atlanta from Randy Gue. I’m indebted, too, to the longtime NBA referee Norm Drucker and to my uncle, Robert Katz (a longtime basketball referee in Westchester County, New York), for their
wisdom about the game, its history, and its ever-evolving rules.
My editor at Crown, Chris Jackson, is smart and insightful, and a tenacious reader. Plus, he’s got a splendid bedside manner for overstressed writers. His colleague, Genoveva Llosa, was a model of efficiency and kindness. Steve Ross, Crown’s publisher, remains a fabulous ally and advocate. My literary agent, David Black, is nearly two feet shorter than Wilt Chamberlain. (He’s even shorter than Gotty.) But he’s got Richie Guerin’s spit and fire and will to win, and as the Zink might say with affection, “He’s meshugs.” His colleagues at the David Black Literary Agency—Joy Tutela, Gary Morris, Susan Raihofer, Leigh Ann Eliseo, and Jason Sacher—make a great starting five.
A family bears the burden of living with a grumpy author. By family, I include my buddy Dave Kindred, who, on the other end of my phone line, remains an incorrigible voice of reason and my life raft from the doldrums. My wife, Carrie, and our sons, Ross and Win, and daughter, Leigh, have noticed me occasionally wearing a rubber band on my wrist. (“What’s that for, Daddy?” asks Leigh. Answers big brother Win, proving he listens to the tales I spin: “To hold up Dad’s socks, in case one breaks. It’s a spare.”) Watching NBA games on television together at home, I’ll say to the kids, “Betcha nobody catches Wilt’s one hundred tonight.” My son Ross (a big fan of Peja Stojakovic) has heard me say this so often he only rolls his eyes. Without Carrie and the kids, I am lost. Writing a book is an obsessive process of immersion. I’d like to say that one day they’ll understand. More than likely, they never will.
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The young Dipper, a soft touch with kids, sits on a street corner in August 1960, chatting with four of his fans. (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
At Big Wilt’s Smalls Paradise, a historic Harlem nightclub, Wilt Chamberlain often greeted guests. “Twist” dance contests on Tuesday nights were the rage in 1962 as taxis and limousines triple-parked in front of the nightclub on Seventh Avenue. (© Bettmann/CORBIS)
The signing of Wilt Chamberlain in 1959 had Warriors owner Eddie Gottlieb looking up. He chortled, “Wait until the people in Convention Hall see Wilt dunking that apple.” (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
Gottlieb was a tireless promoter. But when hardly anyone showed up to see his Warriors play a game in 1961, it caused Gotty to slump. (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
Coach Frank McGuire, new to the pro game, meets with his Philadelphia Warriors at training camp in Hershey, Pennsylvania. (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
McGuire gathers with a veritable Rushmore of homegrown Philadelphia stars (left to right): Tom Gola, Guy Rodgers, Paul Arizin, and Wilt Chamberlain. (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
Richie Guerin, the Knicks’ all-star guard, played with a competitive fury. (Temple University Libraries, Urban Archives, Philadelphia, PA)
The 1961–62 Philadelphia Warriors. Seated (left to right): Owner Eddie Gottlieb, Paul Arizin, Al Attles, captain Tom Gola, York Larese, Guy Rodgers, Coach Frank McGuire. Standing (left to right): Ted Luckenbill, Joe Ruklick, Wilt Chamberlain, Frank Radovich, Tom Meschery, Ed Conlin. (Courtesy of Joe Ruklick)
The New York Knicks struggled to avoid another last-place finish. Among the team’s key players (left to right) were Willie Naulls, Phil Jordon, Johnny Green, Dave Budd, and Darrall Imhoff. (© Bettmann/CORBIS)
The chocolate baron Milton S. Hershey and his wife, Kitty, with no children of their own, created a school for orphan boys in 1909. Here, in 1923, he holds a student. (Courtesy of Hershey Community Archives, Hershey, PA)
The Hershey Arena opened in 1936. Its monolithic barrel shell roof was state-of-the-art, a technology brought over from Europe. (Courtesy of Hershey Community Archives, Hershey, PA)
Dave Zinkoff produced The Wigwam game programs for the Warriors. Showing foresight, he placed Wilt Chamberlain’s picture on the cover for the game against the Knicks on March 2, 1962. (Courtesy of Hershey Community Archives, Hershey, PA)
During the first quarter, the Dipper swept around flat-footed Darrall Imhoff for a finger-roll. Paul Arizin trails the play. (The Patriot-News of Harrisburg, PA)
The Dipper scores his final basket to reach one hundred points. His voice rising, Bill Campbell told his WCAU Radio listeners, “He made it! He made it! He made it! A Dipper dunk!” (AP/Wide World Photos, Paul Vathis)
Teammate Ted Luckenbill and young fans congratulate the Dipper, exhausted yet energized by his climb to one hundred. (AP/Wide World Photos, Paul Vathis)
In the postgame locker room in Hershey, Warriors publicist Harvey Pollack, thinking photo op, penned “100” on a borrowed sheet of paper. The Dipper, trademark rubber bands at his wrists, held the paper in his hands and smiled sheepishly. This photograph has become the most enduring image of the famous night. (AP/Wide World Photos, Paul Vathis)
Copyright © 2005 by Gary M. Pomerantz
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Three Rivers Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.
www.crownpublishing.com
Three Rivers Press and the Tugboat design are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Crown Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., in 2005.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Pomerantz, Gary M. Wilt, 1962: the night of 100 points and the dawn of a new era / Gary M. Pomerantz.
1. Basketball—United States—History. 2. Chamberlain,
Wilt, 1936—1999. I. Title.
GV885.7.P66 2005
796.323′0973—dc22 2004025391
eISBN: 978-0-307-54938-9
v3.0