‘Undefeated: The Roger Brown Story’
Aug. 15, 7:30 p.m.
The Neon movie theater
130 E. Fifth Street, Dayton’s Oregon District
Tickets: $10 at theater or the EbonNia Gallery, 1135 West Dr. Martin Luther King Way, Dayton, OH 45402
All proceeds go to the Arlena Smith Hall of Fame Fund
Donations: Make checks payable to “The Arlena Smith Fund” and send to the EbonNia Gallery.
Questions: The Neon, 222-8452; EbonNia, 223-2290
It’s time to turn the tables on Arlena Smith.
Back in 1961, when the University of Dayton, a prominent media member or two in this town, and then the NBA unfairly — and unconscionably in my book — turned their backs on arguably the greatest basketball talent to wear a Flyer uniform, Arlena and her late husband Azariah refused to yield to pressure, harassment and threats and instead opened their arms, their home and especially their hearts to Roger Brown.
Put simply, they saved him.
Brown went on to become a cult hero to parts of this town and then a star in the old ABA with the Indiana Pacers. He’s now the subject of a fascinating new documentary done by Ted Green, a longtime sportswriter and editor turned filmmaker who will have a gala showing Thursday night at 7:30 at The Neon movie theater in the Oregon District.
And then on Sept. 8, Brown will be inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.
“I believe Roger Brown could have been totally lost to history if not for Arlena and Azariah,” said Green. “Without Arlena, there is no ABA career for Roger, there is no Hall of Fame. I’m totally convinced of that.”
Although her beloved husband — to whom she was married 61 years — passed away in 2011, Arlena is still opening her arms to others. At 84, she remains active in her Shiloh Baptist Church, where she does everything from teach classes to volunteer at the hot meals giveaway each Wednesday.
Now, though, we have a chance to turn the tables and help her.
When Brown, who died of liver cancer in 1997, is inducted next month, Arlena should be there as one of his representatives.
That’s why a small group of us, led by Green, is trying to raise funds to send her and her great, great nephew (a senior at Roosevelt University in Chicago who will serve as her escort) to Massachusetts for the Hall of Fame weekend.
To do that — and just as importantly to celebrate Roger Brown as he should have been here so long ago — the Neon Movies is showing Green’s documentary, entitled “Undefeated.” All proceeds from the celebratory night — which will include some of Brown’s old UD teammates, other local hoops celebrities and an auction of a piece of Bing Davis’ art — will go to funding Arlena’s trip.
A bank account has been set up for those who want to donate to the cause. Green said checks should be made out to “The Arlena Smith Fund” and can be sent to Davis’ EbonNia Gallery at 1135 West Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Dayton, Ohio, 45402.
“This is a time to celebrate an incredible woman who has given so much to people in Dayton over the years and especially to Roger,” Green said. “This will be a chance to say thank you.”
Exiled in Dayton
Most of Green’s career was spent working on newspaper sports staffs in Florida, with Cincinnati Enquirer and then the Indianapolis Star. A “mid-life career change,” as he called it, turned him into a filmmaker and it was while working on a segment about the early days of the Pacers that he came across a name that puzzled him.
“I could look up in Banker Life Fieldhouse at all the retired Pacers numbers and, of course, I knew Reggie Miller, George McGinnis, Mel Daniels and Slick Leonard, but I didn’t know much about the guy named Roger Brown,” he said.
He started talking to players, coaches and fans from that era and they all raved about him. Then he visited Brown’s ex-wife Jeannie, who eventually warmed up to him and brought out boxes of keepsakes. In one of them he said he found a column I had written on Brown just before he died.
It told the story of his Dayton past and that’s when Green said he became hooked.
“The fact that all this could happen to the guy and most people knew nothing of his story, I was just blown away,” Green said. “Think about it. Find another guy where the greatest people in the sport — (guys like Oscar Roberston, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Julius Erving) — say ‘he was as good as us’ and yet no one in the general public knows him?”
Yet, it didn’t start that way.
Brown and his pal Connie Hawkins, both from the Bedford Stuyvesant section of Brooklyn, were the two best schoolboy basketball players in New York City and considered among the five best recruits in the nation.
Hawkins decided to go to Iowa while the 6-foot-5 Brown went to UD, where he joined a talent-laden freshman team that included Bill Chmielewski, Gordie Hatton, Chuck Izor and Jimmy Powers. Their games that 1960-61 season drew packed houses, they were runners-up in the national AAU tournament and the following season — minus Brown — the same bunch won the then-prestigious NIT.
But the summer before he came to UD, Brown was befriended by Jack Molinas, who had starred at Columbia University before being kicked out of the NBA during the 1953-54 season for gambling on his own Fort Wayne Pistons team.
He let Brown use his car and gave him $200 spending money to introduce him to other schoolboy talents on the playground. Brown supposedly had no contact with Molinas after he got to UD. He was never charged with anything, nor were any of the players he introduced to Molinas.
The association only came to light when Brown had to return to New York for a court appearance concerning a summer auto accident he had had while driving Molinas’ car.
At the time college basketball was being tarnished by a point-shaving scandal that would involve at least 28 athletes from 17 different colleges over 39 games.
Investigators who were after Molinas and partner Joe Hacken — both of whom would eventually go to prison — pounced on Brown and Hawkins. The teenagers were isolated in a hotel for four days of interrogations without the presence of a lawyer and were not allowed to make a phone call.
After that, UD unceremoniously jettisoned Brown, in part, many thought, to reduce NCAA sanctions that were coming because the school had paid for three of Brown’s trips to New York for court.
Some of Brown’s former teammates and the late Herbie Dintaman, who coached the UD freshman team back then, thought Brown had gotten a raw deal from the school. A lot of other people here, especially on Dayton’s West Side, felt the same way.
The NBA did not and banned both Hawkins (who was similarly dumped by Iowa) and Brown. That decision would later cost the league $2 million in court.
Although crushed, Brown still loved Dayton — and UD — and wanted to remain here. He sent one of his friends to ask Arlena and Azariah, who worked at Inland Manufacturing and had coached a rival AAU team that played the Flyers, if he could live with them.
They took Brown into their Shoop Ave., home and soon after came some threatening letters and harassing phone calls. The couple didn’t flinch. They believed in Brown and loved him unconditionally.
Brown spent the next six years of his exile in Dayton, working at Inland, playing for various AAU teams here and, for a couple of those years, living with the Smiths. His reputation grew and finally, on the recommendation of Oscar Robertson, the newly-formed Pacers — sight unseen — made him their first-ever draft choice in 1967.
He played with the Pacers eight seasons, led them to five ABA championship games, three ABA titles, was a four-time All-Star, the MVP of the 1970 playoffs and has been named to the ABA’s all-time team.
Through it all he kept returning to Dayton and just before he died, I talked to him about what he had endured here.
Although he could barely speak above a whisper, his conversation became animated — and the affection noticeable — when he mentioned UD, and especially Arlena and Azariah.
Heaven on earth?
“The Dayton part of the story, in all honesty, is the most compelling,” said Green. “It’s where Roger came at his height of heights — he was THE next big thing — and it’s where he went down and then was resurrected by a loving couple, Arlena and Azariah Smith.”
Although Azariah died before Green could meet him, the Indianapolis filmmaker came to Dayton often and got to know Brown’s contemporaries, guys like Ike Thornton, Bobby Cochran and Bing Davis.
During the two years it took him to make the documentary, he said he developed a special affection for Arlena:
“There were a lot of bleak moments, times when there was no money and times when I was caught up in distribution and licensing talks, but whenever I was really down, I came over to Dayton and spent time with Arlena. Through her eyes I became rejuvenated time and time again. She reminded me of the important things in this beautiful, heartbreaking story.”
Arlena said she simply told Green about the Roger Brown she and her husband knew:
“Rog was such a lovable person. He was just a great guy to be with. And oooh, Az was so proud of him … just so proud.”
I remember sitting and listening to Azariah tell me why he thought Roger Brown was better than Michael Jordan. He would recount all kinds of feats on the court: hitting 13 straight shots in a game from what would be 3-point range today; jumping up and picking a 50-cent piece off the top of the backboard at Central State, drawing turn-away crowds to games at the Fairgrounds Coliseum.
“Until the day he died, Az believed that Rog was a Hall of Famer,” Arlena said quietly. “That’s why I couldn’t do anything but cry when I heard Roger finally had been chosen. The first thing I thought of was my husband.
“I’m always mindful of Az. I don’t ever forget him. I know his spirit is with me and I know that day Rog goes in the Hall of Fame, he will be rejoicing in heaven. That’s why I’m so excited to go.”
For Arlena it would be a chance to experience a little heaven on earth.
And we can make it happen.
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