The Madness Ain't Yours, It's Ours!

Everybody knows March Madness is a billion-dollar brand, but did you know the phrase started in High School? This episode breaks down how Henry V. Porter coined it in 1939, how the NCAA finessed it, and why his family never saw a dime!

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
What's happening? Welcome to another episode. If I didn't know,
maybe you didn't either. A random applause, Man, we a
month in? Huh we a month in? A random facts
that I didn't know maybe you didn't either. And I've
been thinking I need a name for us. You did
what I'm saying, Like Siblings of Mine is on the
Black Effect podcast network, they got nicknames for they squads.

(00:22):
Eighty five South got the eighty five percenters. We need something.
I was leaning towards the know It Alls, not because
we know it all, but because we want to know
it all all types of random facts. So hit me
up on Instagram. I dk myde with an underscore before
it and after it, and let me know how you're
feeling about the know it Alls, and I will open
up the show like I, what's haddening? Know it Alls?

(00:44):
Welcome to another episode. If I didn't know, maybe you
didn't either. And on today's episode, I think I like that. Man. Okay, Now,
before we get in today's episode, we have to revisit
a previous episode and show you how this thing then
came full circle. Now, in the very first episode of
the expanded series, I gave you a random fact, there

(01:04):
was only one NFL team that had a plant as
a logo. Do you remember what it was? The Saints
that plant on the side of their head is the
Florid de Lyse. I'm Peru's in Instagram the other day
and I find out that in New Orleans or is
the locals call it now Leans during the enslavement periods

(01:26):
on the plantations. You gotta understand, the French was winning
down there, so whenever a black person would escape and
get caught, they would get branded. It would be a
logo of the French heraldry. I know, dot, what's a heraldry? Well,
if you've seen a coat of arms before, that's how
they're described. Now what is the French heraldry. Yeah, it's

(01:46):
the Florid de Lese. They might get branded on their
cheek or on their shoulders with the Florida Lease logo,
the same logo that's branded on the side of them
Saints helmets down in New Orleans. Now, if you hear
you're probably very familiar with my Black history version of
I didn't know maybe you didn't either. Where We dropped
twenty eight episodes daily in February and have done so

(02:07):
for the past four years. So how serendipitous was it
to have the very first episode of the expanded series
connect the dots to the theme that kicked off this
entire movement. I told you never know where you're gonna
need them random facts. I'm bringing them back next episode,
but for today. As you know, right now, the whole
world is captivated by March Madness basketball everywhere. My Tar

(02:30):
Heels got sent home in the first weekend. Very unfortunate,
and as a tar Hiell fan, it sickens me to
my stomach that Duke is probably gonna win a national championship.
They just so stacked Cooper flag is amazing. That boy
Slim is from right here in Charlotte. They got two
starting five's. John Shiire is doing his big one as
a coach. He crying at the press conferences Tyres Procter

(02:51):
and turned into a baby Dame Lillard out there. And
now I'm just an ABD fan. Anybody but Duke and
I haven't filled out of brackets since Carolina didn't make
the turn in a couple of years ago. But I
know millions upon millions upon millions of people are all
caught up into March madness, and it got me to thinking,
where did the term March madness even come from. I
didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't I didn't know.

(03:19):
I didn't know. I didn't know. I didn't know. Well,
let's take it back to nineteen thirty nine. Henry V. Porter.
Now Henry V. Porter. He wasn't out here coaching duke
or cutting nets down. No, he was a high school
administrator in Illinois, and he was poetic with it. He
wrote a whole article calling the state basketball tournament March madness,

(03:41):
saying the game was wild, unpredictable, and straight up chaotic.
Then he doubled down and wrote a poem, Yes, a
poem called basketball IDEs of March, with lines like a
sharp shooting mite, It's keen tonight, the madness of March
is running. Basically, brother was spitting bars about hoops before

(04:03):
ESPN was even thought of. But then the NCUBA came through,
like the Repo Man in the eighties. It was a
CBS sportscaster, Brent Mussburger. He started saying March madness on
national TV, and boom, it became the brand of college basketball.
Now here's the plot to its Henry Porter He passed
away in nineteen seventy five, so when the NCUBA started

(04:25):
making that crazy bank off the term, his family could
have looyed it up and hit him with the where's
my cut energy, But back then, the Illinois High School
Association the IHSA had already locked a turn down for
high school hoops. So instead of beefing with the NCUBA,
the IHSA and the NCUBA did the business equivalent of
a fist bump. They teamed up in two thousand, split

(04:47):
the rights, and kept it moving, so by the time
anybody thought about a lawsuit, it was too late. The
nc double A had already had the bag secured. So
now Henry Reporter's family never sued. But next time you're
filling out your breath, I could remember the phrase that
built this whole empire of march madness started in high
school in Illinois. And I didn't know. Maybe you didn't either,

(05:11):
I didn't know. No