The Champ Tells His Story

One white player thought because Arthur Tyson is African-American, he must have a tail.

When Tyson beat white players at a tournament in Virginia, the championship trophy mysteriously would disappear. The $250 winner’s check could not be found

None of that deterred ​“the champ.” Because Tyson, born and bred in the old Elm Haven projects, was determined to become the greatest black horseshoe player in the world. And he made it, coming in second three times in the world championships.

Those tidbits of the history of a little known sport — and the life story of the best black player in its history — emerged in an interview with Tyson on WNHH FM’s ​“Dateline New Haven.”

Tyson appeared on the program along with his co-author and fellow horseshoe enthusiast Glenn Ellis to mark the publication of Art Tyson, Second Best In The World Ain’t Too Bad.

In the interview Tyson recalled growing up in a family of 13 kids, hanging out at Bazooka’s and other stores that had stuff for kids in the Dixwell neighborhood of the 1950s, and going to the nearby Wonder Bread outlet, where he picked up more than a dozen loaves of bread a day for the hungry family.

He himself ate a dozen or so pieces a day. He cut his toast into little squares that he arranged precisely on his plate before eating. ​“I’m a neat freak,” he confessed.

That precision was also the reason — and the gift — that led him from tossing horseshoes with the kids in the Elm Haven courtyards to, in the 1970s and 1980s, world championship play. He would pitch horseshoes seven hours a day, seven days a week, growing up in Elm Haven.

“Someone said there’s a horseshoe league in Westville,” Tyson recalled. That became the turning point in his life. When he discovered that there was a club on Springside Avenue off of Blake Street and real courts, instead of the makeshift courts with stakes driven into the ground where he played with his kid friends, Tyson was launched.

Through a long life with two wives, three children, a cleaning business and a vending business, he practiced tossing the shoes hours a day and became known as the Champ in New Haven and as a fierce competitor among top line players from around the world.

He eventually was ranked number two in the world, with an 83 ringer percentage, and is now the only African-American in the National Horseshoe Pitchers Hall of Fame.

In 1992 the countrywide organization, the National Horseshoe Pitchers Association, sent Tyson in a delegation to give demonstrations in Japan.

At age 80, Tyson has recently returned to live in a senior complex off of Dixwel Avenuel, not far from Foote Street, where he was born.

And he hasn’t stopped competing.

He’s still practicing three to four times a week, two to three hours each time.

“The idea is that it becomes automatic,” he said, that is the motion, the release, and the level of concentration required to get your ​“ringer” percentage up to championship level, which is usually around 80 percent.

His new goal: To pitch in the competition on a court 30 feet long, which is primarily for older players — as opposed to 40 feet. ​“I’m going to try to become the 30-foot champion,” he writes on the last page of a book, which is not only a revelation of details of some great local history, but also a guidebook to a relatively unknown sport, and the life of one of its unheralded great achievers.

Art Tyson, Second Best In The World Ain’t Too Bad is available on Amazon, or better yet directly from this email address: glenn.ellis77@gmail.com.

Click on the video to watch the full interview with Art Tyson and Glenn Ellis on WNHH FM’s ​“Dateline New Haven”: