Fred Thomas (athlete) facts for kids
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| Personal information | |||
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| Born | December 26, 1923 Windsor, Ontario, Canada |
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| Died | May 20, 1981 (aged 57) | ||
| Education | Assumption College, BA 1949 | ||
| Height | 6ft 3in | ||
| Weight | 175 lb | ||
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Baseball career |
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| Outfielder | |||
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 Baseball Hall of Fame |
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| Induction | 2021 | ||
| Sport | |||
| Sport | Basketball, Baseball, Football | ||
Fred Thomas (born December 26, 1923 – died May 20, 1981) was an amazing Canadian athlete. He played many sports professionally, including basketball, baseball, and Canadian football. He was especially good at college basketball and is known as one of Canada's best basketball players ever.
In 2019, a TV show called TVOntario said Thomas was "the greatest Canadian athlete you've never heard of". He probably would have been more famous if black athletes hadn't faced unfair rules in major sports leagues during the 1940s and 1950s.
Contents
Early Life and School Years
Fred Thomas grew up in Windsor, Ontario, Canada. His family had lived in Canada for many generations. His ancestors came from enslaved Africans who escaped North Carolina and immigrants from Barbados. Fred was the second oldest of eight children. He had one brother and six sisters.
He was a natural athlete and was great at many sports. He went to J. C. Patterson Collegiate Institute in Windsor in the late 1930s. There, he was a star in American football and track. He competed in hurdles, high jump, sprints, long jump, and triple jump. He also led his basketball team to win the provincial championship. They beat Ottawa Glebe Collegiate in Toronto to win the All-Ontario Basketball Title.
College Basketball Star
Fred graduated in 1943 and joined the Royal Canadian Air Force. He earned his pilot's wings just before World War II ended. After leaving the service, he went to Assumption College. He quickly became known as one of Canada's top basketball players. He played for four years under coach Stanley Nantais.
In 1945, Fred's Assumption basketball team beat the famous Harlem Globetrotters 49–45. The Globetrotters were considered the best team in the world. A newspaper article from 1952 said Fred was a "constant thorn" to the Globetrotters. It praised his amazing speed and ability to break up plays.
In 1949, his final year, Fred led his team to the Ontario Senior Men's Finals. They beat Toronto Central 90–56, and Fred scored 47 of those points himself! The Toronto Globe and Mail newspaper called him the "best Negro athlete in Canada" at that time.
During his four years at Assumption (1945–1949), Fred scored 2,059 points. This was the third-highest score in NCAA history when he graduated. He even set a record with 639 points in the 1948–49 season. His time at Assumption was called the "Thomistic Era." The 1952 newspaper article said Fred played with "the grace of a swan and the agility of a gazelle."
Baseball Career
Outside of college, Fred also played baseball. He played for the Negro league team, the Cincinnati Crescents, in 1946. Then he played for the Detroit Senators in 1947. In 1948, he joined the Farnham Pirates in the Quebec Provincial League.
Fred batted .351 in 58 games with Farnham. This caught the eye of scouts from Major League Baseball (MLB). The Cleveland Indians organization chose him to play for their minor league team, the Wilkes-Barre Barons. This team played in the Eastern League.
On July 4, 1948, Fred played his first game with the Barons. He was the first black player in that league. He had two singles, an RBI (runs batted in), and a stolen base in his second game. He broke the "colour barrier" in this league about a year after Jackie Robinson did so in Major League Baseball. Fred was the 21st black player to sign a contract with an MLB team and the first from Canada. He played 12 games with the Barons in 1949 but did not play professional baseball after that.
Playing for the Globetrotters
Unfair rules based on race stopped Fred from playing in the top professional basketball leagues. He played for the Cincinnati Crescents, a black all-star baseball team. This team was owned by Abe Saperstein, who also owned the Harlem Globetrotters.
Because of this connection, Fred was invited to the Globetrotters' training camp in Chicago in 1949. He arrived late because he was finishing the Canadian football season with the Toronto Argonauts. He was the first black player for the Argonauts in the Canadian Football League.
Fred played one season for the New York Renaissance, another all-black professional basketball team owned by the Globetrotters. After that, he moved to the Kansas City Stars, which was another Globetrotter team in the western division.
Later Life and Coaching
In 1951, Fred won the batting title in the Ontario Intercounty Baseball League. He played for the Kitchener Panthers, a semi-professional team. He batted 0.383 and was named the Most Valuable Player in that league. He also played for the Windsor Jets and Toronto Beaches.
In 1952, Fred was not chosen for the Canadian Olympic basketball team. He would have been the only black player on the team. After having surgery for a knee injury, he could no longer play professional sports. However, he kept playing in smaller independent leagues in Canada.
He played basketball for the Toronto Tri-Bells, a Canadian amateur team. He led them to win the 1953 Canadian senior men's basketball title. Later, Fred became a coach and physical education teacher at Valley Park High School in East York, Ontario. He taught there for over twenty years.
Fred Thomas passed away from cancer on May 20, 1981.
Why He Wasn't More Famous
Fred Thomas was mostly known in the Windsor area. He played sports during a time when there was a lot of racism, just before sports started to become more fair for everyone.
According to William Humber, a historian who studies Canadian sports, unfair rules based on race stopped Fred from becoming a national star. "Today, he would have been a star in any of those sports," Humber said.
Miriam Wright, a history professor, explained that Southern Ontario had unfair rules for black people, similar to the Jim Crow era in parts of the United States. Fred and his black teammates were often not allowed to eat in restaurants. His teams were also not allowed to play against white teams. Because he was black, Fred did not have the same chances as white athletes. Wright says Fred's story isn't well known because "African-Canadian history was not something that was considered important."
Awards and Honors
- Voted second in a 1950 Canadian Press poll for Canada's best basketball player from 1900–1949.
- Inducted into the Windsor/Essex County Sports Hall of Fame (1981).
- Inducted into the University of Windsor Alumni Sports Hall of Fame (1986).
- Inducted into the Afro-American Sports Hall of Fame (1994).
- Inducted into the Canadian Basketball Hall of Fame (1995).
- Fred Thomas Park (formerly Glengarry Park) in Windsor, Ontario, is named after him.
- Nominated for the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame.
- Honored during Black History Month at a Windsor Express game on February 22, 2015.
