For my paper, I am writing on the creation of the Negro Leagues, and how the separate Black sporting league represented the agency and self-determination of the New Negro. Additionally, another major aspect of the New Negro phenomenon was present in the integration of professional baseball, famously initiated by Jackie Robinson in 1948. In his bold attempt to compete alongside white athletes, Robinson, and those who followed, faced discrimination and resistance from white players, managers, stadium workers and fans who were simply not open to the idea of a mixed Major League Baseball.
Black sportswriter, one of the few of his time, Sam Lacy describes the scene when the Brooklyn Dodgers were visiting Texas for a game in Robinson's second season in 1949. The Dodgers two Black players, Robinson and catcher Roy Campanella, were told to use the team's locker room facilities while the white players were told to dress at the hotel, which came as a surprise to everyone. However, once Robinson and Campanella arrived to the locker room, they found it was unfinished and a total disaster; covered with mud and dirt, and entirely devoid of windows.
Later, the two were subject of intense insults and dirt name-calling from angry fans. the public address man, known as "Tiny" referred to the two ballplayers not by their names, but simply as "the niggers." Lacy notes that the official scorekeeper spent more time heckling patrons in the colored section than he did paying attention to the game itself.
Despite these obstacles, Lacy writes that he witnessed lines in the colored ticket section "two blocks long and four, five and six deep," braving ankle deep mud and facilities "neither fit for man nor beast," not to mention incessant heckling from angry whites. AFter the game, hundreds of Black stood outside the locker room patiently awaiting autographs from two Robinson and Campenella.
The scene painted by Lacy, one where African-Americans rallied around two brace men who withstood immense abuse in order to break down the color barrier in baseball, is truly representative of the power of the New Negro. Despite their best attempts, racist, angry white fans and employees were unable to break the spirits of Robinson, Campanella and other Black ballplayers, not to mention the countless fans who found inspiration through men like these.
