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The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relatively successful leagues beginning in 1920 that are sometimes termed "Negro Major Leagues".
Oscar McKinley Charleston was an American center fielder and manager in Negro league baseball. Over his 43-year baseball career,Charleston played or managed with more than a dozen teams,including the Homestead Grays and the Pittsburgh Crawfords,Negro league baseball's leading teams in the 1930s. He also played nine winter seasons in Cuba and in numerous exhibition games against white major leaguers. He was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1976.
Joshua Gibson was an American baseball catcher primarily in the Negro leagues. In 1972,he became the second Negro league player to be inducted in the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
William Hendrick Foster was an American left-handed pitcher in baseball's Negro leagues in the 1920s and 1930s. He was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1996. Foster was the much-younger half-brother of Rube Foster,a Negro league player,pioneer,and fellow Hall of Famer.
The Negro American League was one of the several Negro leagues created during the time organized American baseball was segregated. The league was established in 1937,and disbanded after its 1962 season.
The first Negro National League (NNL) was one of the several Negro leagues that were established during the period in the United States when organized baseball was segregated. The league was formed in 1920 with former player Rube Foster as its president.
The second Negro National League was one of the several Negro leagues that were established during the period in the United States when organized baseball was segregated. The league was founded in 1933 by businessman Gus Greenlee of Pittsburgh.
The Homestead Grays were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro leagues in the United States.
The Kansas City Monarchs were the longest-running franchise in the history of baseball's Negro leagues. Operating in Kansas City,Missouri,and owned by J. L. Wilkinson,they were charter members of the Negro National League from 1920 to 1930. Wilkinson was the first white owner at the time of the establishment of the team. In 1930,the Monarchs became the first professional baseball team to use a portable lighting system which was transported from game to game in trucks to play games at night,five years before any Major League Baseball team did. The Monarchs won ten league championships before integration,and triumphed in the first Negro World Series in 1924. The Monarchs had only one season in which they did not have a winning record and produced more major league players than any other Negro league franchise. It was disbanded in 1965.
The Newark Eagles were a professional Negro league baseball team which played in the Negro National League from 1936 to 1948. They were owned by Abe and Effa Manley.
Walter Fenner "Buck" Leonard was an American first baseman in Negro league baseball and in the Mexican League. After growing up in North Carolina,he played for the Homestead Grays between 1934 and 1950,batting fourth behind Josh Gibson for many years. The Grays teams of the 1930s and 1940s were considered some of the best teams in Negro league history. Leonard and Gibson are two of only nine players in league history to win multiple batting titles.
Willard Jessie Brown,nicknamed "Home Run" Brown,was an American baseball player who played outfielder in the Negro leagues for the Kansas City Monarchs and in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the St. Louis Browns. For the Monarchs,he led the Negro American League in hits for eight seasons and runs batted in (RBI) seven times during his career. His eight times leading a league in hits is tied with Ty Cobb for most in baseball history while his seven times leading in RBI for a league is tied for second-most in baseball history with Josh Gibson;Gibson and Brown also finished in the top two in batting average in five seasons each,most in Negro league history. He is a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.
Ernest Judson Wilson,nicknamed "Boojum",was an American third baseman,first baseman,and manager in Negro league baseball. He played for the Baltimore Black Sox,the Homestead Grays,and the Philadelphia Stars between 1922 and 1945. Wilson was known for possessing a unique physique,a quick temper,and outstanding hitting skills. One of the Negro leagues' most powerful hitters,his career batting average of .351 ranks him among the top five players.
John Jordan "Buck" O'Neil Jr. was an American first baseman and manager in the Negro American League,mostly with the Kansas City Monarchs. After his playing days,he worked as a scout and became the first African American coach in Major League Baseball. In his later years he became a popular and renowned speaker and interview subject,helping to renew widespread interest in the Negro leagues,and played a major role in establishing the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City,Missouri. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2022 as an executive.
The Chicago American Giants were a Chicago-based Negro league baseball team. From 1910 until the mid-1930s,the American Giants were the most dominant team in black baseball. Owned and managed from 1911 to 1926 by player-manager Andrew "Rube" Foster,they were charter members of Foster's Negro National League. The American Giants won five pennants in that league,along with another pennant in the 1932 Negro Southern League and a second-half championship in Gus Greenlee's Negro National League in 1934.
The Baltimore Elite Giants were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro leagues from 1920 to 1950. The team was established by Thomas T. Wilson,in Nashville,Tennessee as the semi-pro Nashville Standard Giants on March 26,1920. The team was renamed the Elite Giants in 1921,and moved to Baltimore,Maryland in 1938,where the team remained for the duration of their existence. The team and its fans pronounced the word "Elite" as "ee-light".
Alejandro "Alex" Pompez was an American executive in Negro league baseball who owned the Cuban Stars (East) and New York Cubans franchises from 1916 to 1950. His family had emigrated from Cuba,where his father was a lawyer. Outside baseball and numbers,he owned and operated a cigar shop in downtown Manhattan. He later served as a scout and director of international scouting for the Giants franchise in Major League Baseball. He was posthumously inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006.
References
- ↑ Riley, James A. (1994). The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues . New York: Carroll & Graf. ISBN 0-7867-0959-6.
