Tom Meschery

Thomas Nicholas Meschery (born Tomislav Nikolayevich Meshcheryakov (Russian: Томислав Николаевич Мещеряков); October 26, 1938) is a Russian American former professional basketball player. He was a power forward with a 10-year National Basketball Association career from 1961 to 1971. He played for the Philadelphia/San Francisco Warriors and the Seattle SuperSonics. He led the league in personal fouls in 1962 and played in the 1963 NBA All-Star Game. His jersey, number 14, was retired by the Warriors.\n', ' Meschery was born as Tomislav Nikolayevich Meshcheryakov in Harbin, Manchukuo. His parents were Russian emigrants who fled from the October Revolution in 1917. The Meschery family was later relocated to a Japanese internment camp near Tokyo during World War II.\n', ' After the war, Meschery and his parents emigrated to the United States. It was also in this phase of his life where his father renamed the family "Meschery" due to the anti-Communist/anti-Soviet Red Scare under Joseph McCarthy, and Tomislav Nikolayevich was renamed Thomas Nicholas, which later was abbreviated to Tom. Living in San Francisco, California, Meschery attended Lowell High School.\n', '