Meet Syl Sobel author of Presidential Elections and Other Cool Facts: Understanding How Our Country Picks Its President on Wednesday, August 14th at 6pm!
Syl Sobel
About Syl:
I'm a writer, attorney, reporter, and retired director of publications for a government agency. I started writing books when my oldest daughter—then in first grade—asked me if I could “make a book on how the government works.” So I did, and was fortunate to get it published. Shortly after it came out, my younger daughter, predictably, asked me to write a book for her, too. So I asked her what to write about, and she said "cool things about presidents." That’s how my second book came to be. When my editor asked me if I had any more book ideas, I told her that my older daughter suggested the first book, and my younger daughter suggested the second book, but now I was out of ideas. So my editor said: "You know, Syl, you should have had more kids."
That was more than 20 years ago. Both girls have started their careers, I've had five books published, and self-published one. This year I've got a new book coming out, Boxed Out of the NBA: Remembering the Eastern Professional Basketball League, which I coauthored with my childhood friend from Scranton, Pa., Jay Rosenstein. The book recounts the history of the Eastern League, the second-best pro league behind the NBA during the 1950s and early 60s when the NBA had only 8-10 teams and an unwritten quota on African-American players. It tells the story of some of the best professional basketball players you never heard of.
Presidential Elections and Other Cool Facts: Understanding How Our Country Picks Its President
This book tells the story of the Eastern Professional Basketball League, a pro basketball institution for over 30 years. The league featured top players who just couldn't make the NBA--many because of scandals or because of unofficial quotas on Black players--with games played in tiny gyms across the northeast.