Contributor – Basketball
Melvin Boyd Cunningham was the son of Grace Bell Lindsay and Carl Boyd Cunningham, and grew up in the Charlotte Court neighborhood. The original Dunbar High School graduate had three siblings, Madeline, Donald Lee, and Carl Lee Cunningham, of which Donald Lee is the only survivor and now lives in Brooklyn, NY.
Mr. Cunningham met his lovely wife, the former Sandra Mosley of Charleston, SC, while they were teachers at Laing High School in Mt. Pleasant, SC. Mr. Cunningham was the music and band teacher, and his soon-to-be wife taught biology. He brought his wife back to Kentucky, where they had three children, Melony, Monica, and Maxie. Melony and Maxie are still living and are proud to accept their father’s induction in the Lexington African-American Sports Hall of Fame.
Mr. Cunningham was part of the founding team of the nationally known Dirt Bowl Summer Basketball League in Douglass Park. From the Dirt Bowl’s beginning in the early 1970s, Mr. Cunningham volunteered his time helping to run the Dirt Bowl, and he was instrumental in garnering college scholarships for many young men and women who found their way to Lexington’s basketball Mecca in the 1970s and 80s. He was especially instrumental in mentoring LAASHOF Class of 2023 Inductees Leroy Byrd, Melvin Turpin, and Tony Wilson, along with dozens of other players.
A great humanitarian, Mr. Cunningham worked with Lexington’s youth throughout the community. He also returned to his alma mater to work as a dorm director at Kentucky State University, where he was affectionately and respectfully called “The Warden.” Mr. Cunningham was the neighborhood center director for both Carver Center and Charles Young Center until he retired. For his decades of humanitarian work in Lexington, Cunningham Lane in the Equestrian View neighborhood near William Wells Brown Elementary School was named in Mr. Cunningham’s honor in 2013.
