Shooting baskets every day after school, Jack Burns Stirling honed his skills on the streets and playgrounds of Beaver Falls, PA.

Jack Burns Stirling was born November 16, 1917. After graduating from Beaver Falls High School, Jack enrolled in Geneva College, where he played basketball as a center for two seasons starting in 1936 and playing through the 1938 season.

In 1937, Jack joined the Warren Penns of the National Basketball League. The Penns played 12 games that season, with Jack playing in six of those games and averaging 6 points per game. The Penns had a 3-9 record and played home games in the Beaty High School Gym in Warren, PA.

In 1938, Jack joined another National Basketball League team: the Pittsburgh Pirates. The Pirates played 27 games during the second season of their two seasons in the NBL, with Jack appearing in 12 games. The Pirates played their home games in the Duquesne University Gym in Pittsburgh with a record of 13-14. Among Jack's teammates were two Beaver County Sports Hall of Famers Hymie Ginsburg and Herb Bonn. Jack averaged 2.2 points per game in his professional career.

For the remainder of the 1938-39 season, Jack played for the East Liverpool Riverview Florista Club in an independent league. Jack stayed in the independent league with the Youngstown Tubers in the 1939-40 season.

On October 26, 1943, Jack enlisted in the U.S. Army Air Corps and would serve in the Air Corps in the Bergstrom Air Base near Austin, TX, during World War II from 1943-46, playing basketball for the Air Corps in the 1945-46 season. After his military discharge, Jack returned home and, from 1946 to 1951, played with the Beaver Falls Tommies, a local American Legion basketball team in an independent league for the first years but in 1950 joined the All-American Basketball League.

The Tommies, organized in 1946 by Beaver County Sports Hall of Famer Dom Casey, won five State Legion championships and a national title in 1948 and were National Legion runners-up in 1950. From 1947 through 1949, the Tommies won 88 consecutive games against American Legion competition. Tommies players included Beaver County Sports Hall of Famers George Mrvosh, Dick Peete, Lou Veltri, and Al Vlasic.

A lifelong resident of Beaver County, Jack Burns Stirling died September 27, 1970, at age 52, in Rochester, PA.