Today in 1936, the birthday of Wilt Chamberlain, a legend on the basketball court who, after retirement, took a detour into the world of professional volleyball!
Chamberlain is likely best known today for scoring 100 points in a single NBA game, a record that nobody else in the league has even come close to breaking.
He was a 13 time All-Star, led the league in scoring seven times, won four Most Valuable Player awards and won two NBA championships.
Chamberlain was so dominant the league had to change its rules to make the game more competitive.
But he wasn’t just a great basketball player.
Chamberlain was an exceptional all-around athlete who had excelled at track and field in high school.
While rehabbing a knee injury from basketball, he got very big into volleyball.
He once said of that time, “Volleyball kept me alive and well.”
It also gave him a new focus after he wrapped up his NBA career.
Chamberlain formed his own traveling exhibition team, the Big Dippers; his star power helped bring people to the games, and soon some big names in the movie and music industries were investing in a pro volleyball league.
The International Volleyball Association debuted in 1975.
It was a co-ed league, and thanks to Chamberlain’s star power, it got coverage in Sports Illustrated Magazine and on national television.
Chamberlain played in two seasons, including one where he was also the league’s president and goodwill ambassador.
No surprise that other players found the 7-footer was exceptionally good at spiking the ball.
I mean, how would you like to be on one side of a volleyball net and see Wilt Chamberlain spiking the ball at you?
The IVA only lasted a few years in all, and while Chamberlain didn’t reach the same heights there that he’d reached in the NBA, he could at least say that he was a member of the Basketball and IVA Halls of Fame.
Today in 1953, the Los Angeles Evening Citizen News reported on a Zelda Gerber.
She was divorcing her husband because she’d seen him out dancing with another woman.
Delbert Gerber’s defense: the other woman was not a person but a life-size dummy from his stage act!
The judge was described as “puzzled.”
Remembering Wilt Chamberlain’s Short-Lived but Momentous Volleyball Career (Inside Hook)
Dummy Divorce (Weird Universe)
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Photo via Wikicommons
