Four players from the 1948 Barons eventually played in the major leagues. Jehosie Heard played briefly with the Baltimore Orioles, and Bill Greason played with the St. Louis Cardinals. Artie Wilson and Willie Mays played with the New York Giants. In 1979, Willie Mays was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Few people remember the old Negro Leagues, or the days of segregated seating at the stadiums. Baseball has grown to be a huge business with players making salaries early ballplayers could scarcely imagine. There are only a few of the old Negro League players still alive to tell the stories of their glory days and to remind us of how things used to be. Today, no one is barred from the major leagues because of the color of their skin. Anyone who can consistently hit a ball thrown at nearly one hundred miles an hour, or who can throw it at that speed, or who can run down the hard-hit ball that threatens to win a game, can compete for a chance in professional baseball. The game is better for it.
Although there was a brief period of time in the late 1800s when blacks were allowed to play in baseball’s major leagues, racial unrest in America soon led to a ban on interracial activities. The Negro Leagues resulted from that tragic time in America’s history. The Negro League teams faced awful hardships along the way but changed the face and spirit of baseball as they played against other league teams or in pickup games on any field they could find. They challenged the country and one another to step up to the plate. Here, a poster announces a Negro League game.
Perhaps the most obvious racism came in the form of enforced segregation. From drinking fountains (top) to waiting rooms (bottom), players in the Negro Leagues would never forget that they were still considered second-class citizens. Discrimination made traveling a real trial for the teams, who spent many meals and many nights aboard their buses.
The legendary Rickwood Field was the site used by the Birmingham Black Barons. Every other Sunday, when the “white” Barons were out of town, people would line up for a game to see the stars of the league in action. Rickwood Field was not integrated until 1964 and the above image is one of the earliest showing both blacks and whites attending a game in 1969.
The Negro League teams traveled to all of their games on buses like this one belonging to the Pittsburgh Crawfords.
The Negro League games brought crowds of black fans to the stands. Pride in having teams and players of their own color was important to the unity of the black community. In fact, many of the black teams drew more people than the white teams of the time.
In addition to their seventy-six regular season league games, the 1948 Birmingham Black Barons played nonleague games against college, industrial, and pickup teams. Some days they played as many as three games.
Ed Steele, Piper Davis, and Art Wilson (left to right) were players on the 1948 Birmingham Black Barons.
Pitcher Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige’s showmanship and skill made him one of the most celebrated Negro League players.
Willie Mays was one of the players from the 1948 Black Barons who went on to great success in the major leagues with the New York Giants. In 1979, he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Although Negro League players were not usually recognized by the major leagues, their accomplishments matched those of some of the most talented white players. Indeed, a Josh Gibson hit might as well have been a Babe Ruth hit, as black teams often played the same venues as their white counterparts.
Perhaps the most famous and beloved player to emerge from the Negro Leagues was Jackie Robinson. His signing with the Brooklyn Dodgers made history. However, while it broke the color barrier in baseball and opened the door for Robinson’s peers, it also marked the beginning of the end for the Negro Leagues.
Jackie Robinson stealing home plate during the fifth inning of Brooklyn Dodgers versus Boston Red Sox game at Ebbets Field in New York on August 22, 1948.
This 1945 photo, taken at Griffith Stadium in Washington, D.C., shows Walter Fenner “Buck” Leonard of the Homestead Grays trying to beat out a throw to Leonard Pearson of the Newark Eagles.
Modern map of the continental United States, showing the location of Birmingham, Alabama.
Walter Dean Myers saw his first baseball game at the old Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York. A Brooklyn Dodgers fan even before the arrival of Jackie Robinson, and a really sore loser, he spent many hours in ardent prayer on behalf of his beloved Bums. When the Dodgers moved to Los Angeles he shifted his loyalty to the New York Yankees.
Walter played sandlot baseball in Harlem and the Bronx as a teenager. In his prime he was an outstanding outfielder but, sadly, couldn’t hit for two cents.
Walter Dean Myers is an award-winning writer of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry for young people. Some of his many books include The Journal of Joshua Loper, A Black Cowboy; Somewhere in the Darkness; Fallen Angels, winner of the Coretta Scott King Award; Sunrise Over Fallujah, a New York Times Notable Book; Harlem Summer; Malcolm X: By Any Means Necessary, a Coretta Scott King Honor Book and ALA Notable Children’s Book; Lockdown, a National Book Award Finalist; The Glory Field, an ALA Best Book for Young Adults and a Notable Children’s Trade Book in the Field of Social Studies; Slam!; Monster; Dope Sick; and the Cruisers series.
Mr. Myers has received two Newbery Honors and five Coretta Scott King Awards. He is also the winner of the first Michael L. Printz Award as well as the first recipient of Kent State University’s Virginia Hamilton Literary Award. In 2008, he won the May Hill Arbuthnot Lecture Award. He has also received two awards for the body of his work: the Margaret A. Edwards Award for Outstanding Literature for Young Adults and the ALAN Award. In addition, he is the 2012–2013 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature. Mr. Myers lives in Jersey City, New Jersey.
The author would like to thank David Brewer, Director, Friends of Rickwood, for his help in preparing this manuscript.
Grateful acknowledgment is made for permission to use the following:
Cover art by Mike Heath | Magnus Creative.
Announcement, National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York.
Segregated drinking fountain in the South, Bettman/Corbis.
Segregated bus station in the South, the Granger Collection.
Southern League All-Stars game at Rickwood Field, courtesy of the Friends of Rickwood.
Pittsburg Crawfords’ team bus, National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York.
Fans at a Homestead Grays game, ibid.
1948 Birmingham Black Barons team picture, ibid.
Ed Steele, Piper Davis, and Art Wilson, ibid.
Leroy Robert “Satchel” Paige, 1942, ibid.
Willie Mays, 1950, ibid.
Josh Gibson, ibid.
Jackie Robinson, AP Photo.
Jackie Robinson stealing home, ibid.
Walter Fenner “Buck” Leonard, National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, New York.
Map by Heather Saunders.
While the events described and some of the characters in this book may be based on actual historical events and real people, Biddy Owens is a fictional character, created by the author, and his journal and its epilogue are works of fiction.
Copyright © 2001 by Walter Dean Myers
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e-ISBN 978-0-545-53051-4
This edition first printing, January 2013
The display type was set in Wells Grotesque Medium.
Cover design by Steve Scott
This edition photo research by Amla Sanghvi
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The Journal of Biddy Owens, the Negro Leagues, Birmingham, Alabama, 1948 Page 9