The Forgotten League, Ep. 4: Crossing the Line

Summary

Reclaimed: The Forgotten League

Episode 4: Crossing the Line
Release Date: October 16, 2023
Host: Vanessa Ivey Rose
Production: ABC News

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Introduction and Historical Context

In Episode 4 of ABC News' acclaimed podcast series, Reclaimed: The Forgotten League, host Vanessa Ivey Rose delves deep into the tumultuous journey of Negro League baseball players striving for recognition and equality in America’s favorite pastime. The episode, titled "Crossing the Line," unpacks the systemic barriers that excluded Black athletes from Major League Baseball (MLB) and chronicles the relentless efforts to dismantle these racial barriers.

Efforts to Integrate Baseball

The narrative begins in 1939, with Vanessa recounting how Wendell Smith, a young and determined sportswriter for the Pittsburgh Courier, spearheaded a national campaign to desegregate baseball. Smith's series of articles, such as the headline “What Big Leaguers Think of Negro League Baseball Players” published in the Pittsburgh Courier, revealed an emerging support among many National League players and managers for integrating the sport.

Vanessa Ivey Rose [00:35]: "...the majority of the National League players and managers who were interviewed didn't have a problem with black people playing in the majors."

Smith's efforts, alongside those of other Black press members, amplified the voices of Negro League players, putting increased pressure on MLB to reconsider its exclusionary practices.

Branch Rickey and Jackie Robinson

A pivotal figure in this movement was Branch Rickey, the General Manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Despite his conservative views and initial perceptions of the Negro Leagues as merely a profitable venture, Rickey recognized the opportunity to integrate baseball both morally and economically.

Branch Rickey [05:44]: "Fellow, and he was wrong about the."
Jackie Robinson [05:49]: "Black thing, but they were all wrong about it. And he was just doing what they wanted him to do about that."

Rickey's strategic maneuvering led to the creation of the United States League and the fictitious Brooklyn Brown Dodgers, a ploy to scout and integrate Black talent without arousing suspicion among other MLB owners. His most significant achievement was signing Jackie Robinson, a decorated athlete and World War II veteran, who became the first Black player to break MLB's color barrier in 1947.

Jackie Robinson [07:37]: "I felt that if the right man not to exploit a sociological problem, but if the right man and ability on the field and with control of himself off the field, if I could find that kind of a man, the American public would accept him."

The Challenges of Integration

Jackie Robinson's integration into MLB was met with severe resistance. Despite his exceptional performance on the field, Robinson endured relentless racist attacks from both players and fans. The psychological toll was immense, as he endured threats against his family and constant hostility.

Earl Smith [10:18]: "You have people spit on you and call your names and spit on your wife when she's sitting in the stand just watching the game, all that crap. Now we have fancy words for PTSD and anxiety, et cetera."

Initially, Robinson adhered to Rickey's advice to remain composed and avoid retaliation, showcasing immense mental strength. However, by his third season, Robinson felt empowered to speak out against blatant racism, transitioning from a compliant player to an outspoken civil rights advocate.

Branch Rickey [09:29]: "I don't think anybody could have done the job had it not been for Mr. Rickey. He was constantly advising and guiding and I had so much confidence in him."

The Decline of the Negro Leagues

As MLB began integrating, the Negro Leagues faced a rapid decline. Star players were poached by major league teams, leading to dwindling ticket sales and financial instability. By the mid-1950s, the Negro Leagues were collapsing, unable to sustain themselves without their marquee talents.

Shakia Taylor [12:16]: "It took until, I believe, 1959 for every team that was a part of the league at that time to integrate."
Shakia Taylor [15:19]: "Then all of a sudden they come along and say, well, we're going to start taking your star players like Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcomb and those guys. And now all of a sudden, now the fans almost immediately started abandoning Negro league baseball and waiting to see Jackie Robinson and other players like that."

This integration inadvertently expedited the downfall of the Negro Leagues, stripping Black-owned teams of their talent and financial viability. Players left without contracts or adequate pensions, leading many to abandon baseball altogether or take on low-paying, labor-intensive jobs.

Vanessa Ivey Rose [23:22]: "And others, like Satchel Page, would join the major leagues when they were past their prime. He was in his 40s when he joined the Cleveland Indians in 1948 and became the first African American pitcher to pitch in the World Series."

Effa Manley and the Fight for Rights

Amidst the decline, Effa Manley emerged as a formidable force within the Negro Leagues. As co-owner of the Newark Eagles, Effa resisted the exploitation of Black players by major league teams. She ensured her players were compensated fairly and supported them in securing off-season employment.

Effa Manley [17:12]: "Now, when he took, you know, he took those three Negro ball players from our Negro baseball and didn't give us five cents or say, thank you, Bracky Robinson, Roy Tynronella and Don Newcomb."

Effa’s leadership not only protected her team but also paved the way for future negotiations and better treatment of Black athletes within professional baseball. Her relentless advocacy led to her induction as the first and only woman in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Personal Stories: Legacy of the Players

Vanessa Ivey Rose intertwines her personal narrative with the broader historical account, sharing the story of her grandfather, Tony Stearns, a Negro League player who quietly faded into obscurity after the league's collapse. Despite his prowess on the field, Stearns struggled to find recognition and financial stability post-baseball, reflecting the harsh realities faced by many Negro League players.

Jackie Robinson [26:09]: "For some reason, they said if you played up until 1947, if you played in just one game, you would get a pension. I played in 1948. 1948 was the year that the Negro League really ended."
Vanessa Ivey Rose [24:06]: "The part of this story that hits me the hardest are the players who were left behind, those with big dreams."

Stearns' life post-baseball, filled with labor-intensive jobs and limited recognition, underscores the loss of identity and the financial hardships endured by many former players.

Reclaiming the Legacy through Statistics

The episode highlights the crucial role of modern researchers, like Kevin Johnson of SeamHeads, in reviving the legacy of Negro League players. Through meticulous archival research, they are uncovering box scores, player statistics, and personal stories that were long neglected.

Kevin Johnson [29:21]: "We all do some research. Just some people do more of the grunt work in the box. So the process is to get a newspaper. Usually, newspaper is almost always the source."

Vanessa emphasizes the importance of statistics in immortalizing these players’ contributions, allowing stories like her grandfather’s to gain recognition beyond oral histories.

Vanessa Ivey Rose [33:14]: "Baseball loves stats, maybe more than any other American sport. It's the cornerstone of the leagues... But here's the tricky part."
Kevin Johnson [34:05]: "We found the ones that are easy to find, but it's those hard ones that somebody's got to go and find. And those will be, you know, we'll get pretty excited when we find some."

The discovery of detailed box scores not only quantifies the players' on-field achievements but also provides a foundation for their stories to be officially recognized and celebrated.

Conclusion

Reclaimed: The Forgotten League succinctly captures the intricate tapestry of race, sports, and society in mid-20th century America. By intertwining personal narratives with historical analysis, Vanessa Ivey Rose honors the legacy of the Negro Leagues and underscores the enduring importance of recognizing and preserving these pivotal chapters in baseball history.

Jackie Robinson [39:05]: "We got seven or eight ball players that should be in the hall of Fame that played in the Negro Leagues..."

This episode not only sheds light on the challenges faced by Black athletes but also celebrates the ongoing efforts to honor their contributions through research and storytelling.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Vanessa Ivey Rose [00:35]: "...the majority of the National League players and managers who were interviewed didn't have a problem with black people playing in the majors."
• Branch Rickey [05:44]: "Fellow, and he was wrong about the."
• Jackie Robinson [05:49]: "Black thing, but they were all wrong about it. And he was just doing what they wanted him to do about that."
• Jackie Robinson [07:37]: "I felt that if the right man not to exploit a sociological problem, but if the right man and ability on the field and with control of himself off the field, if I could find that kind of a man, the American public would accept him."
• Earl Smith [10:18]: "You have people spit on you and call your names and spit on your wife when she's sitting in the stand just watching the game, all that crap. Now we have fancy words for PTSD and anxiety, et cetera."
• Branch Rickey [09:29]: "I don't think anybody could have done the job had it not been for Mr. Rickey. He was constantly advising and guiding and I had so much confidence in him."
• Shakia Taylor [15:19]: "Then all of a sudden they come along and say, well, we're going to start taking your star players like Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcomb and those guys. And now all of a sudden, now the fans almost immediately started abandoning Negro league baseball and waiting to see Jackie Robinson and other players like that."
• Effa Manley [17:12]: "Now, when he took, you know, he took those three Negro ball players from our Negro baseball and didn't give us five cents or say, thank you, Bracky Robinson, Roy Tynronella and Don Newcomb."
• Jackie Robinson [26:09]: "For some reason, they said if you played up until 1947, if you played in just one game, you would get a pension. I played in 1948. 1948 was the year that the Negro League really ended."
• Kevin Johnson [29:21]: "We all do some research. Just some people do more of the grunt work in the box. So the process is to get a newspaper. Usually, newspaper is almost always the source."
• Jackie Robinson [39:05]: "We got seven or eight ball players that should be in the hall of Fame that played in the Negro Leagues..."

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Key Takeaways

• Desegregation Efforts: Pioneers like Wendell Smith and Branch Rickey played crucial roles in challenging baseball's racial barriers.
• Jackie Robinson's Legacy: Robinson's bravery and excellence not only broke the color barrier but also ignited broader civil rights movements.
• Negro Leagues' Decline: Integration, while a monumental step forward, inadvertently led to the dissolution of the Negro Leagues, impacting Black communities economically and culturally.
• Effa Manley's Advocacy: As a female team owner, Effa Manley exemplified resilience and fought tirelessly for the rights of Black players.
• Reclaiming History: Modern researchers are vital in resurrecting the rich history and achievements of Negro League players through meticulous data collection and storytelling.

Reclaimed: The Forgotten League serves as a poignant reminder of the intersection between sports and social justice, honoring those who paved the way for equality both on and off the field.

Transcript

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[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

In 1939, the Pittsburgh Courier, one of the largest black newspapers, published an eye catching headline, what Big Leaguers Think of Negro League Baseball Players. The series of articles told a story that was surprising. The majority of the National League players and managers who were interviewed didn't have a problem with black people playing in the majors. The author was Wendell Smith, a young sportswriter who was part of a national campaign to desegregate baseball. The campaign was led by him and other members of the black press. These writers worked tirelessly to amplify black baseball players, and people around the country were starting to pay attention. The pressure to integrate baseball was growing. Some white owners appeared to play along. At one point, Wendell was able to secure tryout for Negro league players with teams like the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Boston Red Sox. But these tryouts went nowhere and none of the teams signed any of the black players. It felt like a performative stunt by the owners. But there was an exception. Branch. Rickey Branch was the general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers and had already been quietly pondering what and who it would take to integrate baseball. Wendell had a name for him, Jackie Robinson. The rest is history. Jackie Robinson would go on to break baseball's color barrier. But that is only part of the story. From ABC Audio this is Reclaimed the Forgotten League. I'm Vanessa ivy Rose. Episode 4 Crossing the Line Change doesn't just happen all at once. There are specific events that usher it in. While Jackie and Branch are the faces of baseball integration, they didn't do it alone. In the 1930s, there was a movement happening across the country for the rights of black people in every pocket of society, housing, education and wages. America's favorite pastime became a focus too. It wasn't just Wendell and other black writers who were demanding an end to segregated baseball. It was also progressive white journalists, unions and even the Communist Party. Plus, if Jesse Owens, a black man, could represent the United States at the 1936 Olympics and young black Americans could go to war in Europe to defend American values, why Couldn't they play baseball with their white counterparts? Why couldn't my grandfather play in Detroit, Michigan for the Tigers? It was these questions that led to the headlines in the black press calling for an end to baseball's color barrier. There were petitions and picketers in front of ballparks like Yankee Stadium in New York and Wrigley Field in Chicago. The time was ripe for change. Finally, Branch Rickey knew it too. By 1945, he had held leadership roles in baseball for over 30 years, first as a manager and later as a general manager and team president. And he had already created the farm system, essentially a way to secure top tier talent for cheap. Branch was known for having a nose for talent and for being a shrewd businessman. Both of those came into play when he set his sights on Negro league's players. Now it's hard to determine what's inside a man's heart. Branch was far from a civil rights trailblazer. He was a fierce conservative who once compared the Negro leagues to a racket. But he also believed integrating baseball was the right thing to do. And he saw an opportunity to make a lot of money doing it. Major League Baseball's first commissioner, Kennesaw Mountain Landis, died the year before, and a fresh commissioner brought a new perspective. While he denied it publicly, many believed that Landis perpetuated the owners gentlemen's agreement, which kept black players out of the league. The new commissioner, Albert Happy Chandler, might be more open to integrating the leagues. Happy Chandler shared his thoughts about landis in a 1980 interview with the University of Kentucky Judge Landis was an unusual.

[Branch Rickey]

Fellow, and he was wrong about the.

[Jackie Robinson]

Black thing, but they were all wrong about it. And he was just doing what they.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Wanted him to do about that. Because of Fellow, Chandler was different. According to the Pittsburgh Courier, he wanted owners to recruit the best players, whatever their origin or race. So with Chandler now at the helm of Major League Baseball, Branch Rickey made an announcement. He had created a new negro league called the United States League, and he was starting a new team, the Brooklyn Brown Dodgers. The team was a way to scout black players without anyone knowing. It was a smoke screening that kept other owners from growing suspicious of his secret mission. Jackie Robinson was a shortstop with the Kansas City Monarchs when Branch sent one of his scouts to watch him play and try out for the Brown Dodgers. But when Jackie later arrived in Brooklyn, he realized that Branch had something else in mind. This wasn't about joining a Negro league's team. This was about the majors. Jackie had only been playing with the Monarchs for a few months before meeting Branch, and he hadn't been happy there. In a 1948 Ebony magazine article titled what's Wrong with Negro Baseball? He talked about the poor travel and hotel accommodations. He didn't think there was enough discipline and structure among the team members. So Jackie was ready for something different. And Branch Rickey just happened to be looking for someone like him. Here's branch in the 1965 documentary the Old Ball Game, describing the kind of player he needed for integration to work.

[Jackie Robinson]

I felt that if the right man not to exploit a sociological problem, but if the right man and ability on the field and with control of himself off the field, if I could find that kind of a man, the American public would accept him.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Jackie had earned All American honors in football playing for UCLA and served in the army during World War II. And according to Earl Smith, a professor of American ethnic studies and sociology at the University of Delaware, that made him the easy choice.

[Earl Smith]

When Branch Rickey figured out that he could pull in somebody like Jackie Robinson. Carefully vetted, you know, a college graduate, a military person, somebody who understood structure. He wasn't wild and loose, quote, unquote, like the stereotype of the African American male.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The Dodgers started Jackie out with their top minor league team in Montreal, Canada in 1946. They were trying to ease the 27 year old in, and it worked. He played well, really well. At the end of the season, he led the league with a.349 batting average, 25 doubles, eight triples, three home runs, 66 RBIs and 40 stolen bases. And he was well received by players and fans in Canada. Branch was convinced that Jackie was ready for the big stage and brought him to Brooklyn to play the next year. Jackie Robinson had done it. He arrived. In a 1972 interview on the Dick Cavett Show, Jackie reflected on how he, he and Branch have made history together.

[Branch Rickey]

I don't think anybody could have done the job had it not been for Mr. Rickey. He was constantly advising and guiding and I had so much confidence in him. I would have jumped off the bridge if he told me to do it. That's how much I believed in him.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

With the Dodgers, Jackie broke baseball's 60 year color barrier, but the game tried to break him in the process. Being the first, anything is never easy. That's especially true when you're black in America. Jackie faced racist attacks from both the players in the league and the fans. Teams threatened the boycott if he played and there were death threats against his family. Even though Jackie was chosen for his mental Toughness, mistreatment like that inevitably takes a toll.

[Earl Smith]

You have people spit on you and call your names and spit on your wife when she's sitting in the stand just watching the game, all that crap. Now we have fancy words for PTSD and anxiety, et cetera.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

What made it even harder was that Jackie had to show restraint and remain poised. Jackie made a promise to Branch Rickey during his first meeting in Brooklyn. Branch told Jackie, I'm looking for a ballplayer with guts enough not to fight back. He knew it wouldn't work if Jackie reacted to what was sure to come his way. Branch watched Jackie's unbelievable mental strength on the field. Game after game, Jackie ignored vile racist taunts. But before the start of his third season with the Dodgers, Branch told him he no longer had to play by those rules. He just needed to play along. In the beginning, to ensure integration was a success, Jackie Robinson began to speak out about blatant racism. He wasn't the agreeable black guy anymore. He began disputing calls on the field and off the field. He became more visible in the civil rights movement even after retiring from baseball. Here's Jackie at a civil rights rally.

[Branch Rickey]

Let everybody know that we really are at the crossroads. They can no longer sit on the fence. They've got to get off of it and join the struggle if we are to achieve equality and freedom in our time.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

By 1949, there were 10 other former Negro leagues players in the major leagues, according to the center for Negro League Baseball Research, including Satchel Page and Monte Irvin. Shakia Taylor, the sports and culture editor at the Chicago Tribune, says it was a long road for other black players.

[Shakia Taylor]

It took until, I believe, 1959 for every team that was a part of the league at that time to integrate.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

That's 12 years.

[Shakia Taylor]

The last team was the Boston Red Sox with Pumpsey Green. And I think about him constantly because of that. He had such a negative experience in professional baseball, and he's not talked about. We focus on the first. Everyone seemed to think, oh, goodness, things must be better because Jackie already went through that. But it wasn't the case at all.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The first black player to join the Boston Red Sox in 1959 still couldn't step onto the field at a major league game without fear of being threatened.

[Shakia Taylor]

By many accounts, he didn't really want to be there. He didn't want to be the person to integrate a team, because why would he?

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Why?

[Shakia Taylor]

Why would anyone willingly put themselves in a position to deal with, you know, threats of violence and name calling when you just want to play a game.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Jackie Robinson had already retired by the time the Boston Red Sox begrudgingly allowed a black player to join their all white team. And they had only done so after the Massachusetts Commission against Discrimination threatened to take legal action for discriminatory hiring practices. How welcome could Pumpey have felt? He couldn't even stay in the same hotel as his team and was forced to find his own miles from where his teammates stayed. Baseball had begun integrating before the rest of America did. When Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson In 1947, black children couldn't attend school with white children and their parents were still being forced to sit in the back of the bus. The landmark Brown v. Board of Education case didn't happen until seven years after Jackie signed his contract. And the ruling of Browder versus Gayle, which made segregated buses illegal, didn't happen until two years after that. So black players were left to do the hard work that came with baseball's integration. They were willing to put up with mistreatment because playing in the major leagues had been the dream for many of them. Maybe it was human nature to want something that doesn't want you. They were willing to endure for the love of the game and the opportunities it promised. Many black players in the Negro leagues longed to be seen as equal or at the very least just seen. And slowly they were seen and poached. Owners in the major league went after the Negro League star players. 96 year old former outfielder Ron Teasley was a witness to all of this.

[Jackie Robinson]

Then all of a sudden they come along and say, well, we're going to start taking your star players like Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Don Newcomb and those guys. And now all of a sudden, now the fans almost immediately started abandoning Negro league baseball and waiting to see Jackie Robinson and other players like that.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The major league owners in essence rated the Negro League's locker room for the best of the best and offered these players contracts that the Negro League's owners couldn't compete with. It was clear that major league owners didn't think much of Negro league owners. Here's Shakia Taylor again.

[Shakia Taylor]

When teams would poach players from the Negro leagues, they would simply take them. There would be no negotiation with owners. Owners would receive no recompense in the situations. Players would get the promise of playing in major league and they would get money and they would leave.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

But some Negro league team owners fought back. Effa Manley and her husband Abraham Manley owned the Newark Eagles. Abe gave her plenty of room to lead.

[Shakia Taylor]

Abe didn't run the team. Effa ran the team. She took care of everything. The everyday, you know, day to day operations of the team and her husband just funded it. And because of that, she was one of the most powerful women in baseball.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

She wasn't afraid to fight. She had no choice. When she saw Branch sign Jackie Robinson without paying the monarch's one cent, she knew what that meant for her business. Here she is in a 1977 interview with the University of Kentucky.

[Jackie Robinson]

Now, when he took, you know, he took those three Negro ball players from our Negro baseball and didn't give us five cents or say, thank you, Bracky Robinson, Roy Tynronella and Don Newcomb.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Effla's fight paid off. She sold the contract of one of her star players, Larry Doby, to the Cleveland Indians for a reported $15,000. It was still far less than a team would pay for a white player, but it was far better than what some other Negro league team owners got. Many teams sold players at a fraction of the cost to make sure they at least got something. Effa had a lot of power and heart. She didn't just love the game, she loved the Negro league players too. Effa's success at getting herself and her players what they deserve was remarkable. She made sure her players were paid and even helped them secure jobs in the off season.

[Shakia Taylor]

It's interesting that Effa Manly, as a woman in professional baseball, was the person who was demanding more, not only for owners, but for players as well. Effa Manley is the first and only woman inducted into the National Baseball hall of Fame.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

But as hard as Effa and other Negro leagues owners fought for their players and teams, they were facing an entirely new world. The Negro Leagues were birthed from a place of exclusion. They were a yes. When America screamed no. They made their own rules and played by them. And that worked. The Negro Leagues even flourished. But now all that was in jeopardy. The institution that refused to see their greatness had suddenly changed its mind about them. And that decision threatened their existence.

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[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The black baseball leagues fought hard. Teams struggled to hold on as their star players, those who drew the largest crowds, began to disappear from their rosters. Owners didn't have the money to replace them and ticket sales declined. Money was drying up and the value of the teams plummeted. And soon, team by team, the leagues themselves began to collapse.

[Shakia Taylor]

I would even say integration expedited the downfall of the Negro Leagues. It didn't happen immediately, it took time, but it definitely happened reasonably fast. It was within a decade that we started to see just the decline of interest in Negro teams simply because people could go watch the majors. They were watching integrated baseball.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Gus Greenleaf's Negro National League disbanded in 1948. It morphed into the Negro American League, but that also struggled through the 1950s as star players were plucked from the league. What was once once thought of as a dream for many, the integration of baseball had become a nightmare. The Negro Leagues took years to build, but were dismantled in a fraction of the time without care or consideration. And the collapse of the Negro Leagues devastated the black economy. As the leagues died, the attendance numbers for big gains decline.

[Shakia Taylor]

It affected owners and communities financially. There's a loss of ticket sales, loss of entertainment, loss of, you know, just that value is now being put into the integrated professional teams, the Negro Leagues.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Allowed the black dollar to be reinvested back into black communities and businesses. But integration interrupted that and ultimately cost black people control, control over the sport, control over money, and control over their futures. The decline of the Negro Leagues had a direct effect on players too. The Negro leagues had over 3,000 black players. By 1953, there were only 36 Negro League players in the major leagues. And of 16 teams, only six had black players. That's a lot of black players left behind with no place to play or work. While Negro leaguers were paid substantially less than their white counterparts in the majors, their salaries were still solid in comparison to what the average American was earning. They had to find a new way to earn income. And their options were limited to mostly blue collar, labor intensive jobs with lower paychecks. The part of this story that hits me the hardest are the players who were left behind, those with big dreams.

[Shakia Taylor]

Some of them definitely wished that their careers, you know, had gone into major league baseball. So by the time they would have, a lot were too old. A lot just weren't even considered.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

And others, like Satchel Page, would join the major leagues when they were past their prime. He was in his 40s when he joined the Cleveland Indians in 1948 and became the first African American pitcher to pitch in the World Series. He went on to play with the St. Louis Browns before returning to the Miners and barnstorming. He actually barnstormed well into his 60s. To him, age was just a number. He is considered one of the greatest pitchers of all time. But imagine if he played for the major leagues in his heyday. What would a 25 year old page have done to the game if he had been included earlier in his career? There were so many others who didn't get to show their best on the biggest stage. Like my grandpa Turkey who stopped playing in 1945, two years before Jackie Robinson was signed to the majors. Many of the Negro league players did what people think they should do when they reach a certain age, floating to obscurity. Popular players once known for hitting home runs or throwing lightning speed pitches had morphed into average guys headed to work like everyone else in the neighborhood. Many built their lives around their reputation and baseball Persona. They were a part of a well respected and admired league and recognized by the jersey they proudly wore. But who were they without baseball? On top of losing their identities and having to find new ways to make a living, former players didn't have a financial cushion. Some ultimately did receive a pension from Major League Baseball. Years later. But others, like Ron Teasley, didn't.

[Jackie Robinson]

For some reason, they said if you played up until 1947, if you played in just one game, you would get a pension. I played in 1948. 1948 was the year that the Negro League really ended.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

My grandfather didn't get a pension either. He died years before MLB implemented pension plans for Negro League veterans. When he first moved to Detroit, he worked in an auto plant that was owned by a man named Walter Briggs Sr. Briggs also owned the Detroit Tigers, the second to last team to integrate. I'm not sure how my grandfather did that, how he showed up to a job every day for a man who didn't consider him good enough to play for his team, but good enough to work in his factory. But somehow he did it. After he retired from baseball, he returned to auto plant work. And it was not an easy job. For his golden years, he worked in the foundry.

[Jackie Robinson]

It was a very, very tough place to work.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The foundry was where molten metal was pressed into car parts. It was hot and dangerous and excruciatingly loud. My granddad, a quiet man in one of the noisiest jobs in Detroit, ended up with severe hearing loss by the end of his time there. But apparently he never complained. When he finally retired from the foundry, he wanted to stay busy. So he got a job managing a laundromat near the house. His life was quiet and simple. My Aunt Rosalynn was born a year after he retired from the Negro Leagues, and my mother, Joyce, a little more than a year after her. If he wasn't working, he was with our family or at a Tigers game. That's what filled up his days. After the Negro Leagues, he would take the bus to Tiger Stadium and watch all the games. He liked to sit in the stands with the regular people. He was never looking for attention or accolades or special treatment. He just wanted to see the game. In the same way that my granddad faded into the background, so did the Negro Leagues. The legends, the players and their stories were lost. Most people just know about Jackie Robinson. But decades later, Negro League players have a second chance to be seen. Not just through oral stories passed down from generation to generation, but through stats. These numbers allow us to see just how good these players really were. Researchers like Kevin Johnson have brought these players back from the dead. Kevin is a baseball researcher, historian, and co founder of the Seam Heads Negro League Database. Hey, how are you, Kevin?

[Kevin Johnson]

Well, hello.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Nice to meet you.

[Kevin Johnson]

Yeah, we. We met very briefly in Detroit a couple years ago, I think.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Right. What was that 2014. Kevin's website, Seam Heads, is a place where Negro League stats live. Kevin and others like him has spent many long hours gathering Negro leaked facts and figures from the depths of library archives and newspaper microfiche. Everything is evidence, from ticket stubs to newspaper columns. Okay, so you're all like a super team over there, huh?

[Kevin Johnson]

Kind of. Like I said, we all do some research. Just some people do more of the grunt work in the box. The go find the box scores. So the process is to get a newspaper. Usually, newspaper is almost always the source. I guess not 100% of the time.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Here's what happens. Kevin and his colleagues might get a tip off that there's a game from 1926 between the monarchs and the Black Barons. It's a game they know about, but they've never been able to track down the final score. Someone from the army of volunteers will say, I'll get that one, and drive out to see if the tip off is true. They'll press their eye close to the tiny, faded local newspaper sports section from 100 years ago. And sometimes, but not always, they strike gold. What they're looking for is a box score. A tiny table with the final game score. Ideally, this will tell them how many runs were scored, who scored them, who made the catches, and who pitched the inning. Then they get to add this new data into their spreadsheets. One more piece of the puzzle of understanding the Negro League players.

[Kevin Johnson]

Oh, well, new box scorers are always feeling great, but probably the real diamonds are the player information. Right There could be. Sometimes where we start out, we only know a player's last name and we don't know anything else because that's all the box scores are showing. But then you get a little blurb somewhere. You know, where you've been reading the box score, and there's this guy named Wood. But then you get a little blurb on the side that says, Joe Wood from who came from Alabama is, you know, been playing good shortstop lately. Well, that. Those are really great to find because then now you have.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Kevin says that's where the stats transform into something else. The stats give you a story about.

[Kevin Johnson]

A person, when's his birthday, you know, when was he born, when did he die, where's he buried? All that stuff that we want to try to capture about the player can come from just a little side blurb sometimes. So those are ones, I guess I get excited about.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

There wasn't a uniform process for Negro League's record keeping, so dedicated researchers like Kevin and the Negro League's Committee at the Society for American Baseball Research have done and continue to do the painstaking and important work of gathering data.

[Kevin Johnson]

Some people have a kind of try to create a stats versus stories thing with the Negro leagues, but I don't think that's really the way to look at it.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Baseball loves stats, maybe more than any other American sport. It's the cornerstone of the leagues. Fans study their favorite player's stats, from total bases to batting averages to earned run averages, and commit them to memory for heated conversations about the best of the best. Sports commentators and analysts dissect these numbers and use them to quantify their opinions and predictions or simply to win a debate. Baseball's obsession with statistics is unique in that way.

[Kevin Johnson]

If you talk about, like the NFL, you don't really hear much about, oh, in the 1950s, this quarterback had the statistics right. They don't. They're more in the present, the same for, like, the NBA. But baseball's different.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

If you ask a baseball fanatic to list the best player to ever play, some might mention Negro leaguers who made it to mlb, like Satchel Page. But you'd be hard pressed to hear my grandfather's name. Or other Negro league greats like first baseman Buck Leonard. Or Cool Papa Bell, who was considered one of the fastest runners ever. This is why stats are so important in baseball. They drive the narrative. But here's the tricky part.

[Kevin Johnson]

We found the ones that are easy to find, but it's those hard ones that somebody's got to go and find. And those will be, you know, we'll get pretty excited when we find some.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Of those hard ones, like Charlie Blackwell, who played in the 1920s. There's little information about the Negro League's right fielder, but what is known is impressive. In 2021, ABC News538 published an article comparing the stats of Negro leaguers to major leaguers. It said Charlie Blackwell could be considered as good as Babe Ruth. Kevin says there's still so many more player statistics to be found, still part of the puzzle missing. And even if they can be found, some stats are difficult to quantify.

[Kevin Johnson]

We can see that, you know, if the statistics say that Homestead Grays played 80 games, and these are the statistics, we don't know which 80 games they decided were the elite games because that wasn't always clear. And we don't know. So we don't know which games make that up and what box scores go with those 80 games.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Some Negro leaguers played in multiple leagues in a single year. Plus, the Negro League seasons were Shorter. So they played fewer games than the majors. And remember barnstorming? There was a lot of that going on. And there were the foreign games. My granddad, like many Negro leaguers, played in Cuba during the winter months. The stats for these games, even if we had them, would be nearly impossible to count. But shouldn't they count for something? Some played their best in those games. Despite the hurdles, Kevin has still managed to track down something very special. Do you have any examples of box scores I can see?

[Kevin Johnson]

Oh, yes, I do, I do. Matter of fact, it involves Turkey Stearns.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Okay, now we're talking. Now we're talking.

[Kevin Johnson]

So this is actually an article from the Chicago Defender in July of 1929. So we see the first game, which was a 20 to 6 win for Detroit. It mentions Stearns maced a homer over the right field fence.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Let's go, grandpa, let's go. That's what I'm talking about.

[Kevin Johnson]

Yeah, and we go down to the Sunday game here and we're going to see Turkey Stearns again. Stearns ramming out his second homer of the game and his third of the day. So he in the double header, he hit one in the first game, he hit two in the second game after hitting one the day before. So through three games he's already up to four home runs.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

The article also mentions that my granddad played great defense. I was always told he was a great all around player, so I love getting more confirmation of that. For this series of games against Chicago, which was a rival team for Detroit, My granddad went 11 for 18, hit four home runs and had 15 RBIs. Since there's no footage of him playing, I often close my eyes to see him running those bases. I think about how free he likely felt out there on the field. No fear, no danger, no separation. He was able to be his authentic self on the field and that's what helped him thrive. You won't see that on a scorecard. And while stats can't measure those intangibles, they're still an important part of a player's legacy. The Negro Leagues were almost lost. Oral history is important, but for something to live on in baseball, stats are crucial. History has a whole chapter on Jackie, but barely a page. For my granddad and players like him, the stats give us the opportunity to add some pages to the history book. These stats help preserve the accomplishments of Negro League players. But with the findings come more issues. Because once you know these players are out there with these great histories, how do you recognize them?

[Jackie Robinson]

We got seven or eight ball players that should be in the hall of Fame that played in the Negro Leagues. And I thought, well, what an interesting moment this is. He was always denied the chance to play on this field, but sure enough he was able to watch games here and now here he is holding a bat and he started asking for information and he said, I need this from your family and I need a little biography of your mom and your sister and da da da da da. I said, oh my God, this man is serious.

[Vanessa Ivey Rose]

Reclaimed the Forgotten League is an original production of ABC Audio, hosted by me, Vanessa Ivey Rose. This episode was written by Lakia Brown. The series was produced by Madeline Wood, Cameron Chertavian, IRU Ekpenobe, Camille Peterson and Amira Williams. Our senior producers on this project were Susie Liu and Lakia Brown. Music and scoring by Evan Viola. A big shout out to our ABC Audio team. Liz Alessi, Josh Cohan, Ariel Chester, Sasha Aslanian, Marwa Mawaki, Audrey Mostek and Aaron Farrer. Special thanks to Chris Donovan, Rick Klein, Eric Fayel, Anthony Fanek, Mara Bush and of course my mom, Joyce Stearns Thompson and my aunt, Rosalind Stearns Brown. Laura Mayer is our executive producer.

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