Personal information | |||
---|---|---|---|
Full name | Gilbert Heron | ||
Date of birth | 9 April 1922 | ||
Place of birth | Kingston, Jamaica | ||
Date of death | 27 November 2008 | (aged 86)||
Place of death | Detroit, United States | ||
Playing position | Centre forward | ||
Senior career* | |||
Years | Team | Apps† | (Gls)† |
– | Detroit Corinthians | ? | (?) |
– | Detroit Wolverines | ? | (?) |
1951–1952 | Celtic | 1 | (0) |
1952–1953 | Third Lanark | 0 | (0) |
– | Kidderminster Harriers | ? | (?) |
– | Detroit Corinthians | ? | (?) |
Total | ? | (?) | |
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only. † Appearances (Goals). |
Gil Heron (9 April 1922 – 27 November 2008) was a Jamaican professional footballer. He was the first black player to play for Scottish club Celtic, and was the father of poet and musician Gil Scott-Heron.
He died in Detroit of a heart attack on 27 November 2008.[1]
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Born Gilbert Heron in Kingston, Jamaica,[2] he came from a family of means.[3]
He moved to Canada as a youth and was later enlisted in the Canadian Air Force. As well as being an athlete and a boxer, he played football and broke through during his stay there. A centre forward, he signed for Detroit Corinthians and the champion Detroit Wolverines, where he was top goalscorer in the 1946 season of the North American Soccer Football League.[4]
He was spotted by a scout from Glasgow Celtic while the club was on tour in North America, and he was signed by the Scottish club in 1951 after being invited over for a trial. Becoming the first black player for Celtic,[2] Heron went on to score on his debut, on 18 August 1951 in a League Cup tie against Morton that Celtic won 2-0. Heron only played five first-team matches in all, scoring twice.[5] He was released by the club the next year and joined Third Lanark where he played in seven League Cup matches, scoring five goals but did not appear in the League.[6] Next he went to English club Kidderminster Harriers before moving back to Detroit Corinthians. At Celtic he earned the nicknames "The Black Arrow" [5] and "The Black Flash".
While in Chicago, Heron met Bobbie Scott, a singer, with whom he had a son in 1949, the poet and musician Gil Scott-Heron. They separated when Heron left for Scotland[7] and didn't meet again till Scott-Heron was 26.[8] Heron had three more children, Gayle, Denis[2] and Kenny, who was killed in a drive-by shooting in Detroit.[8] His older brother, Roy Trevor Gilbert Heron, served with the Norwegian Merchant Navy during World War II and then joined the Canadian army,[9] later moving to Canada, where he became active in black Canadian politics.[8]