The Kansas City T-Bones become the Kansas City Monarchs
Posted: January 22, 2021 Filed under: 21st Century | Tags: Baseball, history, Kansas City Monarchs, Kansas City T-Bones, Minor League Baseball, Negro league baseball, Negro Leagues, Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, sports Leave a commentIn case you missed it, yesterday, the minor league team Kansas City T-Bones announced they have changed their name to the Kansas City Monarchs. The name change comes as part of a partnership with the Negro Leagues Museum (also located in Kansas City).
Remembering Buck O’Neil, NLBM livestream
Posted: November 10, 2020 Filed under: 20th Century | Tags: Baseball, Bob Costas, Bob Kendrick, Buck O'Neil, history, Joe Posnanski, Kansas City Monarchs, Ken Burns, Negro Leagues, Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, sports 1 CommentIf you need something to do on Friday, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum will be hosting a conversation between Bob Costas, Joe Posnanski, Bob Kendrick, and Ken Burns in celebration of the great Buck O’Neil. This Friday, November 13th would have been Buck’s 109th birthday, and it sounds like the plan is for this group of speakers to share their memories and stories about the man, the ballplayer, the legend.
The even will begin at 12:30 pm Central Time on Friday. It can be streamed via NLBM’s YouTube page or their Facebook page.
TELLING TALES ABOUT BUCK! Join me, @KenBurns, Bob Costas & @JPosnanski this Friday as we share stories about the legendary Buck O’Neil on his 109th B-Day! Catch the conversation live on the NLBM’s @Facebook & @YouTube channel! @MLB @Royals @Sut_ESPN @MLBNetwork @vgregorian RT pic.twitter.com/08ZtbP9bwX
— Bob Kendrick (@nlbmprez) November 10, 2020
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Upcoming webinar: Negro Leagues 1920-2020
Posted: September 2, 2020 Filed under: 20th Century | Tags: Baseball, history, Negro league baseball, Negro Leagues, University of Kansas 3 CommentsFor anyone who is interested, the African and African-American Studies department at the University of Kansas has just announced that they will be holding a webinar about the Negro Leagues. The webinar will take place on September 17th at 7:00 pm Central Time.
Registration for the webinar is taking place here.
We are excited to announce this special event: Negro Leagues 1920-2020 [Sept 17 @ 7pm CST]
— AAAS KU (@KUafs) September 2, 2020
Join us for the conversation around the centennial anniversary of the leagues w/ @adburgosjr, @RaymondDoslelw, Leslie Heaphy & James Brunson
Free registration https://t.co/Kv7ikeulZO pic.twitter.com/xc3PhbvMG4
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Quote of the day
Posted: July 25, 2020 Filed under: Quote of the day | Tags: Baseball, Cool Papa Bell, history, Negro Leagues, quotes, racism, sports Leave a commentThat was the system they had in those days. That’s what they called states’ rights. States’ rights doesn’t mean much to the Negro. You don’t get justice with states’ rights. Which is a bad thing to happen.
~James “Cool Papa” Bell

NLBM
Pop Lloyd Baseball Field: PBS Investigations
Posted: June 9, 2020 Filed under: 20th Century | Tags: Atlantic City, Baseball, history, Max Manning, Negro Leagues, PBS, Pop Lloyd, sports 2 CommentsI stumbled across this PBS feature in the midst of some browsing yesterday. PBS Investigations ran an episode in 2004 about Pop Lloyd Baseball Field, a stadium in Atlantic City. What’s intriguing about the field is that not only was it named after a Negro Leagues ballplayer, but the stadium was built in 1949, at a time when racial prejudices ran particularly strong. Not only that, Atlantic City at the time was known to be especially discriminatory against the black community. The episode delves into why the stadium was built where it was built at the time it was built.
I wish PBS had posted the video of the episode on their site, but sadly, this is not the case. However, they do provide a link to the transcript of the episode, for anyone who is interested in the story behind the construction of this stadium. Reading the transcript feels a little trippy without the visual context to go along with it, but if you’re willing to venture into it, the history is pretty interesting (small spoiler: the motives behind the stadium’s construction were not exactly pure).
As part of the episode, PBS also interviewed pitcher Max Manning, which can be found in the transcript. What’s really cool, though, is that you can find an extension to his interview (with a video!) as a featured clip here.

Wikipedia
“(Give it Up For) Buck O’Neil,” Bob Walkenhorst
Posted: June 2, 2020 Filed under: 20th Century, Pop culture | Tags: Baseball, Buck O'Neil, Kansas City Monarchs, music, Negro Leagues, Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, sports 2 CommentsBuck O’Neil is hailed as a legend, especially here in the Kansas City area. Not only was O’Neil a great ballplayer, but his achievements off the field were arguably even greater. He not only worked to spread interest in the Negro leagues, he also played a huge part in the establishment of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City.
Bud Fowler
Posted: February 17, 2020 Filed under: 19th Century, 20th Century | Tags: Baseball, Bud Fowler, Cooperstown, Cuban Giants, history, International Association, International League, Kansas City Stars, National League, Negro Leagues, Northwestern League, Page Fence Giants, racism, sports, Western League, William Renfro 2 Comments
Bud Fowler (National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum)
Bud Fowler was the earliest known African-American player in organized professional baseball, as well as the first to play on integrated teams. Born John W. Jackson on March 16, 1858, Fowler was the son of a fugitive slave-turned-barber. His father had escaped from slavery and migrated to New York, eventually settling in Cooperstown. The young John Jackson learned to play baseball during his youth in Cooperstown, but it remains unknown why he went on to adopt the name “Bud Fowler.”
Fowler learned to be a barber like his father, working in the profession to supplement his income while he played ball. He played amateur ball for a few years, and his first year of prominence in the game came in 1878 at the age of twenty. By this time John W. Jackson was calling himself “Bud Fowler,” and would be known by this moniker throughout his baseball career. On April 24, 1878, he pitched a game for the Chelsea Picked Nine, who defeated the Boston Red Caps, champions of the National League in 1877. He pitched some more for the Chelsea team, then played a few games with the Lynn Live Oaks, and finally finished that season with the Worcester club.
The Lynn Live Oaks were a member of the International Association (IA), considered by some historians to be the first minor league, as they operated in cooperation with the National League. Thus, with his stint with the Live Oaks in 1878, Fowler became the first African-American to integrate a team in minor league history, and thus the game’s first African-American professional ballplayer.
Continuing to support himself as a barber, Fowler went on to play for baseball teams in New England and Canada for the next four years. He then moved to the Midwest, playing for teams in Niles, Ohio and Stillwater, Minnesota with the Northwestern League.
Fowler initially signed with the Stillwater team as a catcher. However, after the club lost its first fifteen games, Fowler was put on the mound. On May 25, 1884, he led the team to its first victory, a 13-7 win over Fort Wayne. The team relied heavily on his right arm from that point on, and Fowler delivered, winning five of Stillwater’s first seven victories. All his time on the mound took its toll on his arm, however, and that season marked his transition from the battery to the infield.
Fowler signed with the Keokuk (Iowa) club in February 1885 where he quickly became the most popular player on the team as a second baseman. Fans and newspapers alike admired not only his abilities as a ballplayer, but also his intelligence and his “gentlemanly” conduct. Unfortunately, the Western League folded in mid-June due to financial reasons, leaving Fowler without a team.
After short stints in St. Joseph, Missouri and in Portland, Maine, Fowler signed with the Pueblo Pastimes of the Colorado League to finish out the year. The impression he left in Colorado became evident when the Rocky Mountain News commented, “A league of colored baseball players has been organized in the South. It is safe to say there will be few of them as good as Fowler.” The following season, in 1886, Fowler joined a team in Topeka, Kansas where he led the league in triples, helping Topeka to the pennant.
Fowler continued to journey from team to team, however, racial tensions were starting to become more and more pronounced. One Sporting Life article commented, “Joe Ardner, in one game he played, shows himself to be … far superior to the ‘coon’ Fowler on second base.” Around this time, some exclusively black baseball leagues were forming, though Fowler continued to play on integrated teams, in spite of the racism he faced. In 1887, however, nine of Fowler’s white teammates with the Binghamton team signed a petition demanding that Fowler and black teammate William Renfro be released or they would quit. Finally fed up with the struggle, Fowler requested and was granted his release from the Binghamton team in late June.
Shortly after Fowler’s release, the International League formally banned any additional signings of African-American players.
Fowler continued to play for various integrated teams in other leagues over the next several years. However, racism was becoming more and more of an issue. In the fall of 1894, conditions led him to organize the Page Fence Giants, an all-black team sponsored by the Page Woven Wire Fence Company of Adrian, Michigan. From 1894 to 1904, Fowler played and/or managed the Page Fence Giants, the Cuban Giants, the Smoky City Giants, the All-American Black Tourists, and the Kansas City Stars.
At the end of his career Bud Fowler insisted that he had played on teams based in twenty-two different states and in Canada. No doubt the journeyman characteristic of his long baseball career was due in large part to the racism factor.
Bud Fowler died on February 26, 1913 of pernicious anemia after an extended illness, just shy of his 55th birthday.
Quote of the day
Posted: January 11, 2020 Filed under: Quote of the day | Tags: Baseball, Major League Baseball, MLB, Negro Leagues, quotes, Satchel Paige, sports 1 CommentI never rush myself. See, they can’t start the game without me.
~Satchel Paige

satchelpaige.com
Quote of the day
Posted: November 25, 2019 Filed under: Quote of the day | Tags: Baseball, Buck O'Neil, history, Major League Baseball, MLB, Negro Leagues, Satchel Paige, sports Leave a commentDepending on how he gripped the ball and how hard he threw it, Satchel Paige had pitches that included the bat-dodger, the two-hump blooper, the four-day creeper, the dipsy-do, the Little Tom, the Long Tom, the bee ball, the wobbly ball, the hurry-up ball and the nothin’ ball.
~Buck O’Neil

Wikipedia
Pride and Perseverance
Posted: November 24, 2019 Filed under: 19th Century, 20th Century | Tags: Baseball, Bob Mitchell, Branch Rickey, Buck O'Neil, Bud Selig, Cool Papa Bell, Dave Winfield, documentaries, history, Jackie Robinson, John Miles, Major League Baseball, MLB, Moses Fleetwood Walker, Negro Leagues, Rube Foster, sports, Ted Radcliffe, Willie Mays 2 CommentsThis weekend I watched a short documentary produced by Major League Baseball, Pride and Perseverance: The Story of the Negro Leagues. While the time period covered in the documentary spans from Moses Fleetwood Walker playing major league ball in the 1880s on up to the induction of Negro League players into the Baseball Hall of Fame starting in 1971, the documentary focuses primarily on the story of the Negro Leagues.
Dave Winfield narrates the documentary, and it includes footage from Negro League games, as well as some Major League games. It also features interviews with Negro Leagues players, including Buck O’Neil, Bob Mitchell, Willie Mays, John “Mule” Miles, Cool Papa Bell, and Ted Radcliffe. The interviews highlight just how good many Negro Leagues players really were, especially compared to white Major Leaguers, and it’s a lot of fun to see how much these guys light up when they talk about the level of talent.
The documentary touches on the racial struggles faced by black players. For example, many players accepted the fact that they would have to go around to the backs of restaurants to get food, and it was not uncommon to sleep on the bus because the hotels in a given town would not give them rooms. Nevertheless, the players talk about how much fun they had traveling and playing ball. The eventual recruitment of Jackie Robinson by Branch Rickey to break the color barrier, of course, receives due attention.
Overall, Pride and Perseverance is a fantastic overview of the history of the Negro Leagues. For a documentary that runs less than an hour long, it manages to cram a lot of interesting information into the film. It’s definitely worth checking out.