Rob Aston has been a literal globetrotter for much of his adult life, but the Carnegie native managed to find his way back home this weekend to help the local historical society celebrate its 35th anniversary.
A large collection of the former basketball luminary’s personal sports memorabilia will be featured in the James Sorbara Carnegie Sports Exhibit, part of the Historical Society of Carnegie’s museum.
And a number of family history books that Aston has written over the past dozen years will also be donated to help tell the community’s story.
Aston was scheduled to attend a VIP reception Friday night, Aug. 8, and return to the museum Saturday to sign autographs, share stories and answer questions about his extraordinary life. But an unfortunate fall in his hotel room will preclude Aston from attending either event.
“I feel so bad,” Jeffrey Keenan, the historical society president, said Friday afternoon. “Mr. Aston is in town from Houston and together we’ve put lot of work into this. He’s extremely upset.”
The museum will still hold a public open house from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 9.
Aston burst into the public eye during his days at Carnegie High School, when as a 6-foot-5 post player he led the Tartans to a pair of section basketball titles and was one of the top scorers in Pennsylvania scholastic history at the time he graduated in 1962.
He parlayed those accomplishments into a scholarship to the University of Toledo, where he grew to 6-8, and his exploits there earned him a spot in the Varsity T Hall of Fame.
He followed that by doing a stint with the Harlem Globetrotters, helping them transition from a serious basketball team into an entertainment franchise that still attracts scores of fans nearly 60 years later.
Given those exploits, Aston is no stranger to the spotlight, although he admits it’s been a while.
“I can’t remember the last time I stood in front of fans,” he said recently. “But I’m overwhelmed and humbled by this opportunity to represent the Harlem Globetrotters and dedicate this sports exhibit this weekend.”
While basketball enabled Aston to make a name for himself, he was by no means a one-trick pony. In fact, his father, Edward Aston, envisioned bigger things in store for his son and for that reason advised him to choose the Globetrotters over an opportunity to play in the NBA after he graduated from Toledo in 1967.
“My dad told me, ‘You don’t want to hang around pro basketball for too long because people might get the idea that’s all you can do,’” he said. “So I set a goal to play professionally for three years, and that’s what I did.
“My father was still guiding me. He wasn’t an educated man, but he knew more than I did about life.”
Aston made the most of his time with the Globetrotters, traveling the world, entertaining fans and working with basketball legends such as Meadowlark Lemon, Curly Neal and Geese Ausbie. His rookie season, in 1967-68, he was in charge of the “tricks” – the gags that the team would play on the flummoxed opposition.
“That was my job, taking care of the ball on the string or the paper in the bucket,” he said.
It was also his job, he said, “to make sure no one stole anything. I was security as a rookie.”
It was a far cry from the serious ball Aston played at Toledo, which had snared the high school standout by touting the university’s academic opportunities. Coming out of high school, Aston was coveted by major basketball powers including UCLA, Michigan and others. Some schools in the segregated South wanted to make Aston their first African American player.
“But my dad wasn’t willing,” he said. “These were dangerous times. It’s not a joke to say that if you went to one of those schools you could end up on the end of a rope.”
Instead, Aston focused on offers from northern schools, and a visit from Toledo coach Bob Nichols cinched the deal for the Rockets.
“My dad asked him what the average graduation opportunities were at the University of Toledo and the coach said in the last 10 years only one guy didn’t graduate,” Aston said. “My dad looked me in the eye and said, ‘That’s where you’re going, son.’”
Aston never second-guessed his decision, as he flourished both in the classroom – graduating with a degree in education – and on the basketball court, where rebounding was his specialty. The 6-foot-8 Aston still ranks fourth all-time in career rebounding with 10.9 per game and is tied for second in Mid-America Conference games at 11.7 per game. He still ranks third for most rebounds in a single game at 25.
He was no slouch on the offensive end either, as he averaged more than 18 points per game as a junior and senior and finished with over 900 points during his three-year varsity career. (Freshmen were not eligible to play varsity in those days.) His all-around play earned him a spot on the All-MAC first team his senior year.
Still, Aston never regretted going the Globetrotter route after his college playing days ended. It afforded him the opportunity to see parts of the world he’d never seen, and he even dropped the Globetrotter name a time or two when needed later in life.
Like the time he was at a restaurant in Brazil and no tables were available. He mentioned that he was a former Globetrotter and a table magically appeared.
“We were in some town whose name I couldn’t even pronounce,” he said. “People were still riding horses there. But I got a table just by saying I was a Harlem Globetrotter alum.
“If you had mentioned Larry Bird, they would have had no idea what you’re talking about. But the Harlem Globetrotters had been all over South America. There’s nowhere on the planet that the Harlem Globetrotters haven’t played.”
Aston said the magnitude of what he was doing with the Globetrotters hit him during a trip to Australia. “When that plan touched down in Brisbane, I knew that my life had changed forever,” he said. “Here’s a kid who’d grown up in Carnegie and now I’m in Australia. I was like a kid in a candy store – I was just blown away.”
Although it’s been some time since he suited up for the Globetrotters, those memories are never far away, as Aston currently plays in a jazz quartet whose keyboard player is his former Globetrotter roommate. The band has played professionally for the past 15 years.
“I’m so far away from being a Harlem Globetrotter that it’s almost like a fading memory,” he said. “But it keeps coming up. When (the keyboard player) and I are alone, we often talk about the Globetrotters.”
Aston’s time with the Globetrotters was just a warmup act for his actual globetrotting days, as he wore out a few suitcases while working for Digital Equipment Corp. One of his positions at Digital required him to travel three weeks out of every month.
“I’ve seen the pyramids, the Great Wall – anyplace you can name on six continents, I’ve been there,” said Aston, who has visited 40 countries — 20 with the Globetrotters and 20 in his post-playing career, a stretch that saw him work for such heavy hitters as Gillette, Compaq and Hewlett-Packard. He and his wife of 50 years, Phyllis, also spent 30 days on a five-continent, 55,000-mile second honeymoon in 2012.
Now 82, Aston is retired and lives in Spring, Texas – a suburb of Houston – with Phyllis and their two cats, Winny and Ebony. Aston is a pilot and a poet and spends time riding his Harley-Davidson in addition to playing music professionally.
“My first date with my wife, we went on my motorcycle,” said Aston, who met Phyllis while attending a Herbie Mann show during his time at Toledo. “When we got married, we took our honeymoon on a Harley and rode 2,000 miles. I figured the marriage might be over after that, dragging my wife all that way. But she’s owned five motorcycles herself since then.”
As if he’s not busy enough, Aston also has found time to write – and write and write. He’s written 25 books – mostly about his family – and more than a dozen of those books will be featured at the Carnegie Historical Society exhibit that traces his family’s history as one of the first African American families in Carnegie.
Aston’s great-great grandfather on his mother’s side, Fleming Lewis, was born a slave, while his great-great grandfather on his father’s side, Henry Aston, fought for the Union during the Civil War.
“One was fighting to free the slaves and the other was born a slave in the early 1800s,” Aston said.
Henry Aston bought property in Carnegie after the war in what was then Mansfield Borough. Rob Aston’s Aunt Cora was the first child born in the newly created Carnegie Borough in 1894.
Aston doesn’t get back to Carnegie all that often, although he did return in September 2023 as the guest of honor at an earlier Carnegie Historical Society event. There, he received a formal citation from the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, presented by Rep. Anita Kulik for his community contributions. At that time, he donated a four-volume history of the Aston family, a project he devoted a decade to, and that work serves as the core of a permanent exhibit in the historical society’s ancestry research area.
Aston is understandably proud of the work he’s done to preserve his family’s history for the greater community.
“Only 1% of all the 360 million people in the U.S. have a written family history,” Aston said. “And only half of that 1% have written a book about it.”
Aston anticipates that nearly two dozen family members will travel to Carnegie this weekend, and he’ll have a number of friends to visit with as well. Although he’s not often in Carnegie – his parents have passed and most of his family has moved out of the area – Aston remains close with the friends he grew up with, including Sorbara, who walked to school with Aston .
“All my friends are still (in Carnegie),” he said. “We grew up 50 years ago and we’re still friends.”
He’s glad both friends and family will be on hand to help the Historical Society celebrate and welcome his latest family history books into its collection.
“This exhibit,” Aston said, “will stitch us into the fabric of the historical narrative of Carnegie.”
Keenan characterized Aston’s latest contributions as significant.
“They will take us up one more step in being reflective of the community and its many varied aspects of sports, entertainment and education,” Keenan said. “We’re very excited.”
Godly proud of you Cuz, sending it to family members