Globetrotters Move Training Camp After Burbank Practice Site Is Sold

The Sherman Oaks-based Harlem Globetrotters moved their training camp from Burbank to Lake Placid, N.Y., earlier this month and may not return to the Valley next year, a team official said.

The Globetrotters, who leave Saturday on a three-month tour of Europe, had conducted a two-week training camp each of the last five years at L.A. Lutheran High School in Burbank. But last December, the Lutheran High School Assn. of Southern California--an organization comprised of 25 churches--sold the 32-acre site to Woodbury University.

Woodbury, a 102-year old business school with an enrollment of 950, is constructing a new campus and will move from its downtown Los Angeles location to Burbank next September.

“They’re going through a year of rehabilitating the site,” said Globetrotters spokesperson Marie Linehan. “It’s a fabulous place, but I have no idea if the team will return to train there or if our offices will be in the same place next year. Nothing is etched in stone.

“The facilities in Lake Placid are good. We were familiar with them because the team had taped a television special there.”

The Globetrotters moved their headquarters from Chicago to Sherman Oaks after the team was bought by Metromedia Inc. in 1976.