History with ‘Hud’: African Americans with Wilmington connection who left their mark on the world
WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY) — Thursday marks the start of Black History Month, which has been commemorated each February since 1926. Numerous African Americans have been born in Wilmington or come through the Port City before leaving their mark on the region and the world.
The most famous African American to pass through Wilmington is undoubtedly Michael Jordan. While he grew up here, Jordan was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1963. He moved to the Cape Fear with his family at age 5, going on to graduate from Laney High School in 1981. Jordan eventually went on to have a Hall of Fame NBA career, winning six NBA championships with the Bulls in the 1990s.
While Jordan is one of the top basketball players of all time, another star hooper came through the Cape Fear.
Meadowlark Lemon was born in Wilmington in 1932. Known as the “Clown Prince of Basketball”, he entertained fans as a member of the Harlem Globetrotters for 24 years, joining the famous team in 1954 at the age of 22. He appeared in more than 16,000 games in more than 100 countries during his career, playing before Popes and Presidents. Lemon was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame in 2003.
Keeping the sports them going, another sports star came through the Wilmington area around the same time Lemon joined the Globetrotters.
Althea Gibson was the first black athlete to cross the color line of international tennis. In 1956, she was the first African American to win a Grand Slam title. The next year, she won both Wimbledon and the U.S. Nationals, winning nearly 100 professional titles over her career. Though she wasn’t born in Wilmington, she lived here for some time, going to Williston High School and training under physician and tennis enthusiast, Hubert A. Eaton.
As with Gibson, Eaton was a great tennis player in his day. In 1932 at age 15, he became the first African American to win the North Carolina Interscholastic Tennis Championship. But his lasting legacy moment came decades later. Eaton was the lead plaintiff in a 1964 federal lawsuit that led to the complete 1971 desegregation of New Hanover County schools.
Around a decade earlier, another group of African Americans, one of which was from Wilmington, made headlines in their own effort to end segregation.
Joseph McNeil was born in Wilmington in 1942, joining three other African American students at North Carolina A&T University in the 1960 sit-ins at Woolworth’s in Greensboro – later known as the ‘Greensboro Four’. Their acts resulted in youths joining to fight segregation across the southeast. As sales at boycotted stores began to be impacted by the protests, owners began serving all customers – regardless of their color.
While this is a non-comprehensive list of African Americans with connections to Wilmington who became known outside of the region, it serves as representation of how anyone from anywhere can make a difference.
