Thomas Robert Brookins was an American sportsman and entertainer.
15 Facts About Tommy Brookins
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Tommy Brookins founded the basketball team that became the Harlem Globetrotters, and toured the world as one half of the vaudeville singing and comedy duo Brookins and Van.
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An African American, Tommy Brookins was born in St Louis, Missouri.
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Tommy Brookins moved with his family to the South Side of Chicago as a child, attended Hyde Park High School, and graduated from Wendell Phillips High School, the only all black high school in the city.
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Tommy Brookins hired businessman Abe Saperstein to promote and manage the team, and Saperstein gave them the name "Harlem Globe Trotters", recognizing Harlem's position as the center of black culture.
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In 1928, Tommy Brookins started singing regularly with Jimmie Noone's band in Chicago, and sang with other bands including that led by Fes Williams.
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Tommy Brookins moved to New York City with Noone and his band in 1930, and when there formed a song and dance trio with Arnold Wiley and Jesse Oliver.
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Tommy Brookins played piano and sang, and developed comedy routines, working for a time in a duo with Bud Harris.
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Tommy Brookins was seen by Fletcher Henderson, who then hired him as a singer for his orchestra's tour of Europe.
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Tommy Brookins remained in Europe at the end of the Henderson tour, and met fellow entertainer Sammy Van, originally from Charleston, South Carolina.
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Tommy Brookins had a brief and well-publicised personal relationship with the singer Ethel Waters, and opened his own nightclub in Chicago.
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Tommy Brookins returned to the United States by 1958, when it was reported that he was working as a doorman at Piro's restaurant in San Francisco.
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Tommy Brookins worked in clubs in St Louis in the late 1950s, before moving to Hawaii.
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Tommy Brookins moved to the Caribbean island of Sint Maarten, part of the Netherlands Antilles, in 1969.
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Tommy Brookins died in Sint Maarten, aged 81; his funeral took place on June 4,1988.