The Pittsburgh Crawfords


Book Description

The Pittsburgh Crawfords were one of the Negro League's best and most exciting teams. At the heart of the line-up were five men who would go on to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame: Satchel Paige, one of the greatest pitchers in baseball history; Josh Gibson, a hitting catcher who rivaled Babe Ruth; Cool Papa Bell, one of the game's fastest runners; Oscar Charleston, perhaps one of the all-around best players; and Judy Johnson, a skilled third baseman. This work takes a close look at the lives and careers of these men and others who played for the Crawfords, all of whom together built one of the greatest teams ever to play the game. Also included are comparisons between the Crawfords and the 1927 "Murderer's Row" New York Yankees, the Negro National League standings (1933-1938), and statistics about the players and team records.




The Pittsburgh Crawfords


Book Description







Sandlot Seasons


Book Description

A new preface updates this richly detailed look at the major role sport played in shaping Pittsburgh's black community from the Roaring Twenties through the Korean War. Rob Ruck reveals how sandlot, amateur, and professional athletics helped black Pittsburgh realize its potential for self-organization, expression, and creativity.







Oscar Charleston


Book Description

The biography of Oscar Charleston, a Negro Leagues legend and one of baseball’s greatest and most unjustifiably overlooked players.




The Bona Fide Legend of Cool Papa Bell


Book Description

The ï¬?rst full biography of the star Negro Leaguer and Hall of Famer James “Cool Papa” Bell (1903–1991) was a legend in black baseball, a lightning fast switch hitter elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1974. Bell’s speed was extraordinary; as Satchel Paige famously quipped, he was so fast he could flip a light switch and be in bed before the room got dark. In The Bona Fide Legend of Cool Papa Bell, experienced baseball writer and historian Lonnie Wheeler recounts the life of this extraordinary player, a key member of some of the greatest Negro League teams in history. Born to sharecroppers in Mississippi, Bell was part of the Great Migration, and in St. Louis, baseball saved Bell from a life working in slaughterhouses. Wheeler charts Bell’s ups and downs in life and in baseball, in the United States, the Dominican Republic, and Mexico, where he went to escape American racism and MLB’s color line. Rich in context and suffused in myth, this is a treat for fans of baseball history.




Cool Papa Bell


Book Description

Presents a biography of Cool Papa Bell and chronicles the history of African American participation in organized baseball, the formation of the Negro leagues, and racial politics in America.




Black Baseball's National Showcase


Book Description

A lively illustrated introduction to the Negro League equivalent of the All-Star Game discusses the history of the games, as well as the colorful cast of promoters, gamblers, and hucksters who made it happen. Original.




Black Baseball in Pittsburgh


Book Description

When the Negro National League was formed in Kansas City in 1920, a new chapter in America's sports history had begun. Black Baseball in Pittsburgh chronicles the history of the Negro League in the Steel City from the Homestead Grays in the 1910s to the great Pittsburgh Crawfords teams of the 1930s and through the 1950s. Here, you will meet legends such as "Smokey" Joe Williams, the famed "Thunder Twins," Josh Gibson, the Steel City's Slugger Supreme, and Buck Leonard, the King of Negro League first basemen.