One strand of basketball diplomacy’s technical and cultural exchange that enriched the game in the 1960s came once again from elite French amateur side, Paris Université Club (PUC), and its American, Martin Feinberg. Given the club’s history of being open to outside influences, it wasn’t a surprise that they embraced Feinberg, who by the early 1960s coached the team, but other cosmopolitan forces, too. In 1962, Feinberg introduced his latest recruit, the American-born Henry “Gentleman” Fields, a power move with lasting repercussions.

For Fields, basketball was a way to see the world, just as for Feinberg and generations of players since. Born in New York in 1938 and raised in North Carolina, the six-foot-five Fields played basketball at the University of Elizabeth City (North Carolina) where he earned all-conference honors. While finishing his studies, Fields read the 1957 Sports Illustrated feature on Jean-Claude Lefebvre, then in his freshman year at Gonzaga, and was inspired. “[Lefebvre] spoke of French basketball,” Fields told La Depeche. “At the time, I had to do my military service. If you remained in the army for three years you were able to choose your assignment. So, I chose France.” [16]

Fields was posted to the US military base in Orleans in 1960, where he plied his game. He helped the US military team to the European and World Military Basketball Championship. But he also traveled to Germany to attend a basketball clinic run by Adolph Rupp, coach at the University of Kentucky. Despite Rupp’s record of racial exclusion, Fields admired his teaching abilities and considered him the father of modern basketball. “The first fifteen minutes [of that clinic], I learned more basketball than I had learned all my life,” Fields later recalled. “Everything Adolph Rupp taught was so simple.” [17]

His reputation on-court caught the attention of several clubs, but it was PUC that tweaked his interest, in part through Feinberg. PUC’s “American” saw Fields play at a Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) NATO tournament outside of Paris and approached with an offer to join the team, which Fields joined once his military service ended. Although the team was technically amateur, he received a subsidy of 450 francs a month and use of an apartment. [18]

With PUC, Fields was an effective defender who blocked and rebounded shots with finesse rarely seen at the time. “My idol was Bill Russell,” Fields confessed.

I studied his movements, watched him when he played. I worked on that when I was in the Army, I worked all day on that, I worked eight, nine hours a day, a lot of the time by myself, just to work on different moves I see that the player does.

For Fields, the ultimate end-goal was to coach basketball, and the more time he spent in France, the more he wanted to remain in-country. It was a plan that had first percolated during his army service when he spent dedicated time in the language lab to learn and perfect his French so that he could coach.

Fields brought the same work ethic that he used to learn Russell-esque techniques to the hardcourt. “I played the Bill Russell-type defense,” he said of his idol.

When I went to PUC, all they said about American players was “oh, all Americans want to do is shoot.” And I said, “I’m going to impress them because I’m not going to shoot. I’m gonna pass. I’m gonna block shots and pass the ball and let the other guys shoot.” We had guys who could shoot. And people loved me because I passed the ball. That made [PUC] strong.

The aerodynamic and defensive style of play pioneered by Russell was, through Field’s transmission, a form of technical exchange that laid the groundwork for future French defenders.

During the 1962–3 season, Fields put this finesse into play when he teamed up with Bamako-born Roger Antoine for a title. “People didn’t talk about rebounding, blocking shots, defense, that wasn’t talked about,” he recalled of the team’s victory over Bagnolet, 66–57, for the league championship on May 3, 1963. But Fields put on a defensive masterclass each time he took to the court for, “with me, nobody came to the basket.”

It was just the second time that PUC was crowned Champion of France, a title their opponents had previously held. Bagnolet were known for their speed and improvisation, but the defensive techniques introduced and perfected by Fields defined the game. PUC brought an “impeccable defense, a superior athleticism, an organized attack, a tactical surety, and a grand bonhomme,” Robert Busnel wrote in Basket-Ball, with a note that Fields, Antoine, and teammate Michel Rat were among the game’s best players. [19]

The French tactician applauded PUC’s efforts and noted the impact of their two American sages. He credited Feinberg for the win, “well done Monsieur Feinberg!” Busnel also praised Fields:

The only foreigner operating in France who has been able to comply with the discipline of a team, instead of forcing the team to comply with his game. A model teammate who reminds me of someone . . . Let’s see, let’s see! Perfect positioning, vision of the game, model teammate, intelligence . . . But [Fields reminds me of] FEINBERG, naturally. [20]

Among the more than 5,300 spectators in the Stade Pierre de Coubertin stands that evening was a young man, Jean-Pierre Dusseaulx, who watched Fields orchestrate PUC’s victory. Dusseaulx was in the habit of attending PUC ’s matches for he lived near their home stadium, Stade Charlety; it was only later in the decade that he began to cover basketball for L’Équipe, the start of a decades-long career chronicling the sport’s evolution and revolution. “Of the players of that era,” he said, “Henry was perhaps the first real professional. He was a true pro.” [22]

Fields was embraced by the basketball establishment, such as it was, and helped impart his style of play through clinics and workshops. “He was a model,” former National Technical Director Gérard Bosc told La Croix. [23] He was eventually asked to work with French, Swiss, and German national teams and coaches to teach these defensive actions and help make players more technically sound. “They didn’t know this type of training existed,” Fields recalled. “I was giving them what I learned at the basketball clinic with Adolph Rupp. They thought I was a genius because they had never worked on those types of techniques [like faking and driving].”

He also introduced them to his basketball work ethic, putting on-court drills and preparation over leisure-time relaxation. At the time, French players trained once or twice a week, whereas Fields was used to the American-style workouts of two to two-and-a-half hours per day. The difference was stark and, in his mind, helped explain why France wasn’t better internationally.

I’ve said from the first time I came to France: France should be the second-best basketball country in the world, because they have a mixed culture, they have all these Black guys from the Antilles, they have the guys [of Polish heritage] in the northern part of France, they’ve got the Spanish; they can probably go back and forth, they’re running, they have everything. The only thing they were missing was coaching. The basic individual techniques.

The country’s cosmopolitanism and immigration heritage translated into a culture open to outside influences, a phenomenon that extended to basketball, and, notably PUC. The team was the first French one to visit the United States in December 1955 and January 1956 but was otherwise well versed in playing abroad. It often traveled internationally to play matches, especially in Eastern Europe, including Moscow [24], and Africa for tournaments in Senegal, Morocco, and elsewhere.

In December 1962, PUC again returned to the United States, a trip organized by Feinberg to further expose his players to US basketball culture and tactics. This informal sports diplomacy initiative helped a new generation of players to improve their game while at the same time learning first-hand about American culture and society, even its uglier facets. As Feinberg later confessed, “I loved the United States and wanted them to learn about basketball and Americans.” [26]

On December 15, members of PUC, which included Fields and Rat, flew to the United States. Three days later, the team tipped off a series of games through the mid-Atlantic with a 42–39 win against Gallaudet University in Baltimore. A 37–87 loss to Oglethorpe two days later and shortly thereafter to AAU team Brownston, 66–68, dampened spirits slightly, but the team focused on the overall experience, not the game outcomes.

Part of the exercise was to learn new game techniques and tactics. Rat recalled how once again the team was given copies of technical documents, which he translated, to take home and incorporate into their repertoire. During this trip PUC also learned the shuffle offense, a system to move the ball via all five players through a series of screens. This was just one example of people-to-people sports exchanges that helped to enrich French basketball’s technical know-how.

Another aspect was learning about US basketball cultural phenomena, such as sneakers. Although the French market began to feature basketball-specific kicks, such as the Busnel, according to Feinberg these models couldn’t compare with the lighter, nimbler Converse. Thus, he strategically booked the team to conduct a radio interview after which they would receive a pair of the iconic sneakers for free. “They were very generous, the Americans, wherever we asked for the tennis shoes [basketball sneakers], we got them,” he recalled. Such gestures were not lost on the visitors. As Rat later articulated, “everyone was crazy for Converses because they were American products.”

The team also was indoctrinated into the realities of Jim Crow racial segregation. The supposedly “separate but equal” division of public spaces between those who were white and Black, from restaurants and hotels to drinking fountains and public transportation seating, such as on buses, was known of in France. But it was different to directly experience it and have a teammate targeted. In 1962, with Fields in tow, the French had a first-hand crash course on American racial attitudes when they traveled to the South.

After PUC won against Gallaudet they took a bus to Atlanta to play Oglethorpe. It was a long ride and when the bus driver stopped to refuel, the team took the opportunity to get out, stretch, and search for food. The roadside restaurant looked promising but, when the team entered, they were stopped by the proprietor. “The lady [owner or server] said nicely, ‘I’m sorry we can serve you [referencing the white players] but we can’t serve him,’ ” Fields recalled of how he was singled out.