The McMahons & Black Basketball Pioneers

This week, 85 years ago, the white-owned all-black basketball team known as the Commonwealth Big Five made their debut in Harlem. The “Commons” were the first fully professional African American basketball team, but they’ve never gotten credit for that important distinction...Who were the owners? Two Bronx-born sports promoters, Roderick “Jess” McMahon and his brother Eddie McMahon. They were into boxing, wrestling, and Negro Leagues Baseball, having previously owned the Philadelphia Giants and the New York Lincoln Giants before opening their Commonwealth Sporting Club and Casino on 135th Street between Madison and Fifth Avenue in Harlem.

Friday of this week also marks the day, 53 years ago, that Jess McMahon had a massive stroke while watching a wrestling match in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. He died there five days later. At McMahon’s bedside was his son Vince, a sports promoter in Washington, D.C. Vince’s own son, then 9-year-old Vince, Jr., wasn’t there, and wouldn’t meet his father until three years later...More?