August 15, 1968: A charity basketball game is played by NBA stars, in memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., who had been assassinated 4 months earlier.
The game was played outdoors, at the Singer Bowl, built in Flushing Meadow-Corona Park as one of the venues of the 1964-65 New York World's Fair. Proceeds would be split between Dr. King’s Southern Christian Leadership Conference and New York City Mayor John Lindsay’s Youth and Physical Fitness Fund.
The game became a telethon: Organizer Oscar Robertson of the Cincinnati Royals was the president of the players' union, the NBA Players Association. He and Larry Fleisher, the union's director, handling legal matters, convinced New York's WPIX-Channel 11 to broadcast it. On the site, they had operators working a battery of telephones, and, instead of commercial breaks, entertainment personalities appeared on screen to collect pledges throughout the night.
Wilt Chamberlain, newly traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, played on the West team. The East team was captained by Robertson, and featured 2 hometown players, New York Knicks Willis Reed and Walt Bellamy. The West won, 77-61. The game raised $85,000 -- about $715,000 in 2022 money.
“It was the kind of show men of good will or all creeds could appreciate,” Norm Miller wrote in the New York Daily News.
Robertson has said he’s proud to see how players have continued using their platforms: "I think players today are more informed about what's going on, and also they have a great advantage of getting their voices out to people because of the social media and whatnot. I'm so glad that the NBA and the players association have gotten together to try to confront all these issues."
Officially, NBA players began participating in games that were scheduled to celebrate and honor the life of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in 1986, when the federal holiday commemorating the civil-rights leader was observed for the first time.
Robertson knows the tradition dates back long before that: "What happened years ago with Dr. King is still part of our social fiber."
The Singer Bowl became Louis Armstrong Stadium, part of the National Tennis Center, site of the U.S. Open. It was torn down, and in 2018 was replaced on the same site with a new Louis Armstrong Stadium, with a retractable roof.
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August 15, 1968 was a Thursday. These baseball games were played that day:
* The New York Yankees lost to the Oakland Athletics, 4-3 at the Oakland Coliseum. John "Blue Moon" Odom outpitched Mel Stottlemyre. Mickey Mantle, in his final season, hit his 533rd career home run. Reggie Jackson, with the A's and in his 1st full season, hit his 23rd. Mickey would finish with 536, all with the Yankees; Reggie would finish with 563, 144 of them with the Yankees.
* The Boston Red Sox beat the Chicago White Sox, 3-0 at Fenway Park in Boston. Gary Bell pitched a 4-hit shutout. Carl Yastrzemski went 1-for-3 with a walk and 2 RBIs.
* The Houston Astros beat the Philadelphia Phillies, 3-2 at Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia.
* The Pittsburgh Pirates beat the San Francisco Giants, 2-0 at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh. Steve Blass pitched a 4-hit shutout. Roberto Clemente did not play. Willie Stargell went 0-for-3 with a walk. Willie Mays went 0-for-4.
* The St. Louis Cardinals beat their arch-rivals, the Chicago Cubs, 8-0 at Wrigley Field in Chicago. Nelson Briles pitched a 7-hit shutout. Ernie Banks did not get any of those hits, going 0-for-4. Mike Shannon went 3-for-5 with a home run and 5 RBIs.
* A doubleheader was split at Metropolitan Stadium in the Minneapolis suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota. The Baltimore Orioles won the opener, 4-3. The Minnesota Twins won the nightcap, 2-1. Harmon Killebrew did not play in either game. Rod Carew went 1-for-3 with an RBI in the opener, and pinch-hit into a fielder's choice with an RBI in the nightcap. Brooks Robinson hit a solo home run in the opener, but went 1-for-8 overall. Frank Robinson did not play in the opener, and in the nightcap, went 0-for-2 with a walk and an RBI on a fielder's choice.
* The California Angels beat the Washington Senators, 3-1 at Anaheim Stadium (now Angel Stadium of Anaheim).
* And the New York Mets, the Atlanta Braves, the Cincinnati Reds, the Los Angeles Dodgers, the Cleveland Indians, and the team that would go on to win the World Series that season, the Detroit Tigers, were not scheduled to play.
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