World-wide, Lemon is probably the most famous basketball player to ever come out of Wilmington, NC (and yes, that includes that guy who starred in the NBA .. Meadowlark was the face of basketball in places where they never heard of Michael Jordan).
His career illustrates some of the hurdles black basketball players had to endure in the pre-integration era. Growing up in Wilmington and unable to play on the public courts that were reserved for whites, Lemon had to fashion his own goal out of an onion sack and a coat hanger. His first “ball” was an empty Carnation Milk can. The facilities were only slightly better at Williston High School (a school chosen in his senior year to test in court the separate but equal fiction that ruled in North Carolina at the time). Even though Lemon led Williston to a black state title in 1952, there were no college offers and he served two years in the Army before finally hooking up with the Globetrotters.
I would argue that North Carolina has produced two of the greatest characters ever to grace the basketball court -- Lemon and the late Bones McKinney. What a great entertainer! And his comic presence often obscured his basketball abilities (think about the halfcourt hook shot he attempted in every game -- and maybe well over half the time)!