Jesse White Tumbling Team
Encyclopedia
Acrobatics
Acrobatics is the performance of extraordinary feats of balance, agility and motor coordination. It can be found in many of the performing arts, as well as many sports...
that was founded in 1959 by Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
athlete and politician
Politician
A politician, political leader, or political figure is an individual who is involved in influencing public policy and decision making...
Jesse White
Jesse White (politician)
Jesse Clark White is a Democratic American politician. He is currently the 37th and second-longest serving Secretary of State of Illinois, after James A. Rose, and the first African American to hold this position....
. Their acrobatic performances can frequently be seen during half-time
Half-time
In some team sports such as association football and rugby, matches are played in two halves. Half-time is the name given to the interval between the two halves of the match...
shows for the National Basketball Association
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association is the pre-eminent men's professional basketball league in North America. It consists of thirty franchised member clubs, of which twenty-nine are located in the United States and one in Canada...
, the National Football League
National Football League
The National Football League is the highest level of professional American football in the United States, and is considered the top professional American football league in the world. It was formed by eleven teams in 1920 as the American Professional Football Association, with the league changing...
and Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...
games.
White, who still coaches, created the team for children residing in Chicago's inner city housing projects. It serves a juvenile delinquency prevention program. Members are required to abide by White's rules, which include staying in school, maintaining a C average in academic coursework and staying away from gangs and drugs. Since the team's inception, over 10,000 children, ages 6 and up, have participated in the program.
The tumblers have appeared in the movies Heaven is a Playground
Heaven Is a Playground
Heaven Is a Playground is a 1976 book by Rick Telander. It describes Telander's observations of the streetball culture in Brooklyn during the summer of 1974. Among the players featured in the book are Fly Williams and Albert King...
, Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Ferris Bueller's Day Off is a 1986 American teen coming-of-age comedy film written and directed by John Hughes.The film follows high school senior Ferris Bueller , who decides to skip school and spend the day in downtown Chicago...
, and The Meteor Man
The Meteor Man (film)
The Meteor Man is a 1993 superhero film written, directed, and starring Robert Townsend, and featuring an ensemble cast. Townsend stars as a mild-mannered schoolteacher, who becomes a superhero after his neighborhood in Washington, D.C. is terrorized by street gangs.Although the film is set in...
. They have performed at the half time for every NBA team, as well as two presidential inaugural parades.
The Jesse White Tumbling Team makes over 1,500 appearances each year, in state and out of state. They've gone to states as far as Hawaii, and have even made international performances. They've gone to Canada seventeen times, Tokyo, Japan to appear on television, China for the Chinese New Year, Bermuda, and the Cayman Islands.
The Team celebrated their 50th anniversary at the United Center in February of 2010.