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  • Tribune-Star/Joseph C. Garza The background of integration: Adrian Burgos, professor of history at the University of Illinois, discusses how Latino ballplayers were integrated into major league baseball during his presentation Monday on the Indiana State University campus.

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April 17, 2012

‘We’re still trying to achieve’ the dream

Historian recounts baseball’s ‘color line’

Arthur Foulkes The Tribune-Star

TERRE HAUTE — Seven decades ago, Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier and became the first African-American to play major league baseball.

But the “color line” had been moving even before Robinson signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers, said Adrian Burgos, a professor of history at the University of Illinois, who spoke at Indiana State University Monday evening.

Robinson carried the difficult burden of being the first “unambiguously” black man in major league baseball in America, Burgos told about 90 ISU students, faculty, staff and guests at the Cunningham Memorial Library.

“That was on his shoulders,” Burgos said.

However, before Robinson debuted for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, several men played baseball in both the Negro leagues and in the white major leagues.

These players were “black” Latinos from Cuba or elsewhere who were fair-skinned enough to pass for “white” in the major leagues, he said.

In all, 53 Latinos played in the major leagues between 1902 and 1947, Burgos said. During that same time, more than 240 Latinos played in the Negro leagues. And many played in both, he said.

“In the United States, it was about who was light-skinned enough” to play in the major leagues, Burgos said.

Burgos, author of the 2007 book on Latinos in baseball, “Playing America’s Game,” has just published another book, “Cuban Star: How One Negro-League Owner Changed the Face of Baseball,” on Alex Pompez, a black Latino who managed in the Negro leagues and eventually worked for the New York Giants.

Pompez helped the Giants integrate black players into America’s segregated society, Burgos said, and was a “cultural ambassador” who could speak both Spanish and English, making the Giants a team more attractive to Latino ballplayers. He also helped cultivate a “pipeline” of talent from the Dominican Republic, Burgos noted.

Pompez also helped the Giants sign Willie Mays, Burgos said.

Today, 70 years after Robinson finally blew apart the color barrier, there are still relatively few black managers and coaches in the major leagues, Burgos said. Indeed, Robinson had hoped to manage in professional baseball after retiring from the game. He never got that chance, Burgos said.

Robinson did not lack the skills and knowledge to manage a baseball team, Burgos said. He lacked the opportunity because the color of his skin. That legacy remains in major league baseball today, he said.

“I would say we’re still trying to achieve Jackie Robinson’s dream,” Burgos said.



Arthur Foulkes can be reached at (812) 231-4232 or arthur.foulkes@tribstar.com.

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