This column first appeared in March 2012.
It cannot be denied that Basketball is connected to our state like a child to its mother. Whether you played it, watched it, or avoided it, you cannot deny that basketball is what Indiana is known for. Go ahead and make your argument for the Indy 500, but you can’t play Indy 500 in your driveway in the pouring rain or by the light of the moon.
For most Hoosiers, basketball conjures up images of Bobby Plump sinking a last second jumper, Reggie Miller raining 3-pointers from never-never land, or Neto, Roger, Mel, Freddie, Big Mac, Dr. Dunk and Billy tearing through opponents towards another ABA title. Still others believe that Indiana basketball is best defined by the greatest all-around Pre-Michael Jordan player to ever lace up a pair of Chuck Taylor’s, Oscar “The Big O” Robertson.
Any Hoosier basketball fan recalls those great Robertson-led Crispus Attucks high school teams that won back-to-back state championships in 1955 and 1956. For those readers unfamiliar with Crispus Attucks, it was the only all-black high school in Indianapolis. That 1955 team gained fame by becoming the first all-black school in the nation to win a state title as well as becoming the city of Indianapolis’ first state champion. Robertson led Crispus Attucks to another championship in 1956 and became the first Indiana high school team to complete an entire season undefeated. Okay, okay, you remember all that. But do you remember the Dust Bowl?
In the 1950s, the city had THE toughest basketball proving ground in the country, known as “The Dust Bowl.” Located near Indiana Avenue in Lockefield Gardens (the first public housing project in the city built by the WPA in the 1930s), it was a makeshift basketball court carved out of a flat, grassless vacant lot. It earned it’s colorful nickname due to the huge dust clouds that would kick up every afternoon at 3 p.m. The brown cloud would envelope the area in a thick choking blanket of fine windswept dirt. The failed social experiment known as Lockefield Gardens consisted of a 748-unit housing project bounded on the north by Indiana Avenue, on the south by North Street, on the east by Blake Street and on the west by Locke Street. During the dark days of segregation, it was home to many poor black and minority families. Today, much of the area is part of the IUPUI campus.
When no regulation basketball could be had, kids flocked to the court with tightly wound socks in place of a real basketball. Because Robertson’s family could not afford a basketball, he developed his shot by tossing tennis balls and rubber band bound rags into a peach basket behind his family’s home. This temporarily packed earth court would spawn the prototype player for a new breed of urban hoopsters. Until this era, basketball in Indiana was mostly the domain of rural, white farm boys shooting from grass surfaced courts at metal hoops nailed to the sides of barns. The Dust Bowl changed all that and a more innovative, fast paced aggressive game was born. It was here that future high school all-star, College All-American and NBA MVP Oscar Robertson learned to play the game. The Big O would change the sport, and race relations in his home city, forever.
Although undoubtedly a painful memory for Hoosiers of that era, Robertson and his Crispus Attucks teammates broke down the “air of superiority” that most white hoops fans felt towards their all-black school opposition. There was a feeling that Attucks could never compete with traditional white dominated powerhouse teams from Muncie, Evansville and Ft. Wayne. Keep in mind, the tiny Milan team led by Bobby Plump had won the state championship the year before in 1954, ending the small schools versus big schools argument. (Robertson played on the Attucks team that Milan beat in the state semi-finals that year.) Now Attucks came along to break the color barrier.
But it all started at the Dust Bowl. The rules were simple; winners stayed, losers walked. Robertson’s relationship with the Dust Bowl started early. Born on November 24, 1938, in Charlotte, Tennessee, he moved with his family to Indianapolis when he was four and took up basketball at the age of 6. He was too young and too small to do anything but watch the older, bigger kids take to the court to battle each other from the late afternoon into darkness of night. So he played during the only time allowed him, every day after school from 3 to 5:30 p.m. when the big kids started to make their way over. The court was vacant because of the dust clouds and the heat of the late afternoon sun. If he was lucky, he could retake the court in the darkness hours after most of the players had gone home. The Big O’s routine continued for several summers, watching, working and waiting for his chance to play.
The older players that dominated the Lockefield Gardens courts were well known by area residents. They developed natural cliques and often teamed up together. These cliques were very hard to penetrate. It was considered a high honor to be asked to substitute into these scrimmages, if only for a few plays. While still in junior high, Robertson learned to make the most of these rare opportunities and by the summer before his freshman year, he was fast becoming a Dust Bowl fixture during the evening’s main games.
The 6-foot-5, 220-pound Robertson led his teams to two high school state championships, two final fours at the University of Cincinnati, a Gold Medal at the 1960 Olympics, and one NBA Championship in the 1970-71 season. His pro career included a league MVP award, 12 All-Star appearances, and 11 appearances on the elite All-NBA Team in just 14 professional seasons. He remains the only player in NBA history to average a triple-double for an entire season. But in our city, he is remembered most for the feats he accomplished at the Dust Bowl.
For the quarter century following the Big O’s departure from Indianapolis, although the Lockefield Gardens complex was demolished in 1976, the Dust Bowl remained a Hoosier city hoops hotspot until IUPUI took over the property in 1983. The legend of Oscar Robertson grew and his shadow cast influence over every game played thereafter. Robertson’s time spent at the Dust Bowl was the most productive of his accomplished life. For it was there that he learned to play the game that would change the Hoosier landscape forever.
For his outstanding achievements, Robertson was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 1980, and was voted one of the 50 Greatest Players in NBA History in 1996. The United States Basketball Writers Association renamed their college Player of the Year Award the Oscar Robertson Trophy in his honor in 1998, and he was one of five people chosen to represent the inaugural National Collegiate Basketball Hall of Fame class in 2006. After the 1983 demolitions, only the units along Blake Street and Locke Street (now University Boulevard), remained. The remaining structures were placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Today, there are Dust Bowl residents who can recall how Oscar’s mom used to yank him off the darkened court near midnight. Neighbors remember the echoes of the solitary bounce of a basketball like a clock in the nighttime, keeping them from sleeping. Invariably, upon investigation, young Oscar would be found out on the court alone, practicing; always practicing. A rumor persists to this day that if it got too late, residents of the Dust Bowl would shoot BB guns at the backboard; a signal that it was time for Oscar to go home.
Al Hunter is the author of the “Haunted Indianapolis” and co-author of the “Haunted Irvington” and “Indiana National Road” book series. His newest books are “Bumps in the Night. Stories from the Weekly View,” “Irvington Haunts. The Tour Guide,” and “The Mystery of the H.H. Holmes Collection.” Contact Al directly at Huntvault@aol.com or become a friend on Facebook.
