2633330760.jpg &&& HE WAS CALLED "Tall" Harris Freeman because he was, well, tall. At 6-foot-5, Freeman dominated the basketball courts of city schools and playgrounds back in the late '40s, when he played with the likes of Wilt Chamberlain, Guy Rodgers, John Chaney, Tom Gola, Sonny Hill, Hal Lear and other Philly basketball legends when they were all kids. He was also an amazing pool shark, so good that his opponents made him bounce the cue ball off the cushion two or three times before hitting his ball. And he still won. "He would wipe out all the neighborhood sharpies and then take them out for sodas," said his nephew, Fred Lavner. "He must have done pretty well because he paid his way through Drexel and drove a white Chrysler convertible." Tall Harris, an executive with the Social Security Administration in Baltimore who was active in educational and community affairs in his native city, died Saturday. He was 80 and lived in Ellicott City, Md. Harris was a star center at Shaw Junior High School and at John Bartram High where he was on Menchie Goldblatt's legendary public league championship teams, the 11-0 squad in 1944 and the 13-1 team in 1947. He went on to Drexel University, continued to play basketball and as a senior was on the first team coached by Sam Cozen, who started Drexel on its Middle Athletic Conference Division II dynasty. "When I was a little kid, my uncle was my babysitter," Fred Lavner wrote. "He'd take me to the West Philly playgrounds and park me on a bench or under a tree while he played basketball for hours with his contemporaries. As I got older, I learned that the kids from the playgrounds grew up to become college, pro and local legends. "He took me everywhere, not just to all the courts across the city, but to such hot spots as the shops along 60th Street, Jim's Steaks at 62nd and Noble, Marrone's Water Ice at 63rd and Race, Fonzo's Pizzeria at 46th and Walnut. "He always had a few basketballs and a pair of sneaks in the trunk of his car and was looking for a game, followed by a milkshake at Barson's on 60th Street or Moe's candy shop." As a pool player, his home table was in Benny's Billiards at 60th and Locust, but he played all over the city. "He'd perch me on a stool in those smoky joints and would play for hours," his nephew wrote. "I remember once he ran off 87 shots in a row." Even after he moved to Baltimore, got married and raised a family, Harris always stayed connected to Philly. "He was always the first one to plan a reunion or keep up with his classmates from Longstreth Elementary, Shaw Junior High and Bartram," his nephew said. He started mentoring and scholarship programs at those schools, and did the same with his West Philly synagogue school, Beth Am Israel Hebrew School. He was also an active recruiter for Drexel. Harris also served as a docent every winter at an aeronautics museum in Palm Springs and the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum in Washington, D.C. "Wherever he went, people never forgot Tall Harris Freeman," Lavner said. "He was a great guy who did a lot of good." He is survived by his wife, Ruth; a son, Paul; a daughter, Helene Thorenson, and a sister, Rita Lavner. Services: Were yesterday in Columbia, Md.