Background
Born in Hiawatha, Kansas to John Blanche McLendon, Sr. (June 24, 1882 – October 15, 1973), a college teacher, and Effie Katherine McLendon (née Hunn) (1886 – 1918), one of his students at Washburn University. McLendon was part African American and part Delaware Indian from his mother's side. His mother died in the 1918 flu pandemic which would lead to the temporary break up of his family. John and his younger brother Arthur were sent to be with his Delaware Indian grandparents on a ranch near Trinidad, Colorado while his older sister, Anita, was sent to be with an aunt in Omaha, Nebraska, and his younger sister, Elsie, was sent to be with other relatives, but would end up with a foster family on a ranch in Idaho. John would not see his younger sister again for 45 years, but the rest of the family were reunited after his father remarried in 1921 to Minnie E. Jackson, a school teacher in Kansas City, Missouri.
The family settled in Kansas City, Kansas where John would first go to Dunbar Elementary school and later Sumner high school. John became enamored with the sport of basketball while on a field trip from Dunbar elementary to the new Northeast junior high school in Kansas City, Kansas, where he saw his first official basketball court. He soon became an all-around athlete at Sumner high school who chose basketball as his favorite sport, although he failed to make the basketball team at Sumner instead he lettered in gymnastics and was the basketball team manager.
After high school he first attended Kansas City Kansas Junior College where he finally made the basketball team. The team went undefeated although John only played sparingly. After 1 year at Kansas City Kansas Junior College he then transferred to the University of Kansas, where he learned the intricacies of basketball from the sport's inventor, Dr. James Naismith, who was the athletic director at the school. However, McLendon was not permitted to actually play college basketball, as the KU varsity team was segregated and would not suit up its first black player until 1951.
Read more about this topic: John Mc Lendon
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