Negro Leagues

With all that is known about the MLB in the United States it is important to remember all of the history that has made it the game it is today. Until 1947 Major League Baseball’s owners had a “gentlemen’s agreement” that stated no African American will be allowed to play on any Major League team. There are many great players and coaches from this time that should be in the MLB Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, but because of past racisms these men are hardly known today. To counter the racist Major League Baseball’s “gentlemen’s agreement” a man by the name of Andrew “Rube” Foster created the first successful Negro baseball league (NNL or the National Negro League). The first club was created on February 13, 1920, at YMCA in Kansas City, Missouri in which Foster served as the leagues first president as well as founder. Foster’s role in the creation of the African American baseball has forever given him the name of “The Father of Black Baseball”.

Three years after the creation of the NNL a man by the name of Edward H. Bolden decided to create The Eastern Colored League (ECL) on December 16, 1923. Where the NNL only had teams from the South and the Midwest, the ECL had more teams from the east coast area. The leagues came together in 1924 to create the first Negro World Series.  In 1929 the ECL and the NNL both went under there affect on the African American society had already been affected. Many other African Americans tried to start there own professional leagues but many of them did not last more than one season. With the presence of the Great Depression made it that much more difficult for the leagues to succeed. It was not until 1933 that the NNL reopened for the second time with the American Negro League and lasted as the last Negro league until 1960.