Detroit History: 'Your Serve, Chairman Mao!'
Forty years ago, the world gasped when a Detroit auto executive, moonlighting as head of the U.S. Table Tennis Association, crossed the Bamboo Curtain and began the process of China's transition from a hated enemy to a top trading partner.
Graham Steenhoven's ping pong diplomacy cleared a public opinion path for President Nixon's 1971 Beijing visit bombshell. The U.S. team also planted new attitudes among the Chinese who had been strictly indoctrinated to regard Americans as Running Dog Imperialists.
Take a look back with WWJ's Joe Donovan in his Detroit History Report:
