About Tom Meschery
Thomas Nicholas Meschery ( meh-SHAIR-ree; born Tomislav Nikolayevich Meshcheryakov (Russian: Томислав Николаевич Мещеряков); October 26, 1938) is an American former professional basketball player. Born in China to parents who had fled Russia, he spent his childhood in a Japanese internment camp during World War II before he moved to the United States with his family in 1946. Meschery was a power forward with a 10-year National Basketball Association career from 1961 to 1971. He played for the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors and the Seattle SuperSonics. Meschery played in the 1963 NBA All-Star Game as the first foreign-born NBA All-Star. After his playing retirement, he worked as a basketball coach and then a high school teacher. Meschery has written poetry, memoirs and novels. == Early years == Meschery was born as Tomislav Nikolayevich Meshcheryakov in Harbin, Manchukuo. His parents were Russian emigrants who fled from the October Revolution in 1917. Meschery's mother worked for the American consulate in Harbin and aided in the release of White Russian soldiers imprisoned by the Chinese; one of them was Meschery's father, Nicholas Vasily Meshcheryakov, who was a family friend from Russia.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.