For two seasons starting in January 1931, Robert Gilkerson sponsored a barnstorming basketball team under the same moniker as his baseball team, Gilkerson's Union Giants.
Like the Harlem Globe Trotters, who had formed a few years prior, Gilkerson claimed that his new team would be comprised of players from the Savoy Big Five, a legendary African American team from Chicago.
Gilkerson already had several connections to members of the Savoy team including Joe Lillard, who had played baseball for Gilkerson in 1929. Lillard, a multi-sport athlete, would go on to play football in the NFL for the Chicago Cardinals.
The Big Five's assistant coach Robert "Bobby" Anderson had played baseball for Gilkerson as well and would become the head coach and occasional forward for Gilkerson's new team.
Before the start of the season it was advertised that Tommy Brookins, another member of the Savoy team, would be playing forward for the Union Giants. Brookins played in a few of the early games but doesn't appear to have stayed with the team long.
Instead, the star of the Union Giants basketball squad was Sol Butler, world's champion long jumper and member of the 1920 Olympic team. Butler had been a member of the Savoy Big Five in 1930 and was previously on the Forty Club and Chicago Defender basketball teams.
The Union Giants started the season off with a game near Spring Valley, Illinois at St. Bede College before heading to St. Louis. The St. Louis Argus reported that "the team has just been outfitted with some of Leacock's flashiest uniforms and is reported to be one of the finest looking aggregations in basketball."
For the next several months the Union Giants barnstormed in Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota playing against mostly local teams.
On April 18, 1931 the Chicago Defender reported that the Union Giants finished the season with an overall record of 66 wins and 12 losses. The paper claimed the team had "38 consecutive wins, playing 30 games in 28 days during February, winning all of them."
Nine months later, the Union Giants started the 1931-32 season in Springfield, Illinois. Sol Butler did not return and was instead replaced with Phillips. The rest of the team stayed mostly the same except center Tom Hall was replaced by ? Wharton.
Like the year prior, the team barnstormed in Illinois, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota. As before, they played primarily local teams but occasionally faced off against other travelling squads such as Olsen's Terrible Swedes and the House of David.
The team that had eluded them for most the season however was the Harlem Globe Trotters, who traveled in much of the same territory as the Union Giants.
On March 10, 1932, the Rochester Post-Bulletin reported, "The Giants last night challenged the Harlem Globe Trotters to a game any place at any time, winner take all. According to Mr. Gilkerson, manager, he has been trying to get a game with Abe Saperstein's outfit for two years."
On March 30th, the Union Giants finally clashed with the Globe Trotters in Des Moines, Iowa, defeating them 39 to 14. In a second game that same night, members of the Globe Trotters and the Union Giants combined to take on the Terrible Swedes. Playing two games back to back proved to be too much. They lost 33 to 19.
Two nights later, the Union Giants and the Globe Trotters met again in Marshalltown, Iowa. This time the Globe Trotters won, 41-31. Bobby Anderson committed nine personal fouls in the game.
The Union Giants finished the season with two games in Iowa against Olsen's Terrible Swedes; winning one and losing the other. These would be the last games that Gilkerson's basketball team would ever play.
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