Gates, "Pop" (William)
Basketball
b. Aug. 30, 1917, Decatur, AL
One of the first blacks to play on an integrated professional team, Gates grew up in Harlem and was an all-city high school player. He briefly attended Clark College in Atlanta but returned home because, in those depression years, there wasn't enough food on the school's training table. "I was hungry most of the time," he later told an interviewer.
The 6-foot-3 Gates joined the semi-professional Harlem Yankees, playing for just a couple of dollars a game. During a scrimmage against the Harlem Renaissance Big Five, he impressed owner-coach Bob Douglas, who signed him for $125 a month to play with the Renaissance. Gates was the team's high scorer when the Renaissance won the first world championship tournament in Chicago in 1939.
In 1946, Gates was signed by the Rochester Royals of the National Basketball League, becoming the league's first black player, and he was then sold to the Buffalo Bisons. He went with the Bisons when they became the Tri-Cities Blackhawks early in the season. During the 1950s, Gates played several seasons with the Harlem Globetrotters.