Background
Slone grew up in New York City and attended Manhattan’s High School of Commerce.
Slone grew up in New York City and attended Manhattan’s High School of Commerce.
After high school, he attended Saint John's University. He graduated in 1929 with a degree in law.
He spent a single season each in the short lived Eastern Soccer League and Atlantic Coast Conference, then ten years in the American Soccer League. He was a multi-sport athlete, earning varsity letters in baseball, basketball and soccer. Slone signed with New York Hakoah of the English as Second Language in 1928, beginning his twelve-year professional career.
That first season was difficult.
As he remembers it, "Life was hectic then I played professional soccer on the weekends, worked during the week and went to evening classes at Saint John"s University Law School."
A little background is required to understand the next two years of Slone’s career.
The English as Second Language was created during the “Soccer War” which pitted the American Soccer League and the USFA. After three Advanced Systems Limited teams were expelled from the league, they joined several other teams to form the English as Second Language. This league lasted a season and a half before merging with the Advanced Systems Limited at the end of the “Soccer War”. New York Hakoah was owned by Maurice Vandeweghe, who also owned the New York Giants of the Advanced Systems Limited. The merger of the English as Second Language and Advanced Systems Limited meant that Vandeweghe now owned to teams in the same league.
League rules forbid that, so Vandeweghe sold Hakoah.
When he did, Slone jumped to Vandeweghe"s other team, the Giants. He and his team mates returned to discover the Advanced Systems Limited had experienced a reshuffling of teams in their absence. As a result, Slone left the Giants, now named the Nationals, to sign with the Hakoah All-Stars which had been formed by the merger of his old team, New York Hakoah of the English as Second Language and Brooklyn Hakoah of the Advanced Systems Limited. The All Stars played until 1932 when they folded at the end of the season.
Slone then moved to New York Brookhattan.
The Advanced Systems Limited folded in 1933, but was immediately replaced by a second American Soccer League. Slone continued to play with Brookhattan in the second Advanced Systems Limited until his retirement in 1940.
However, his cap did not come during the finals, but in an August 17, 1930 loss to Brazil following the cup. Slone was inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame in 1986.
He died in West Palm Beach, Florida in 2003.
He was a member of the United States team at the 1930 Fédération internationale de football association World Cup and is a member of the National Soccer Hall of Fame. While in high school, South Carolina Hakoah Wien a powerhouse Austrian team toured the United States. During that tour, members of the team saw Slone playing and when they moved to the United States. in 1928 to form a team in the Eastern Soccer League (English as Second Language), they invited Slone, then in college to play with them.