In collaboration with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, we’re saluting the pioneers of Negro Leagues Baseball. This collection is about breaking barriers, and highlighting some of the greatest athletes that ever played the game. The story begins under the cruelest circumstances but celebrates and shines light on those that persevered in order to play the game they loved — those that ushered the way toward equality in baseball.

Major League baseball was segregated for nearly 60 years under an unofficial agreement by owners to ban African Americans from playing in the majors. The 20’s finally saw the potential of Black ball players with the realization of Rube Foster’s Negro National League. It was the country’s first organized professional baseball league for Black players and Latino players alike. Teams played at such a high caliber, and folks were so eager to witness this new, exciting brand of baseball, that owners arranged traveling exhibitions against White major leaguers and ball clubs across the globe. It wasn’t long before names like, Satchel Paige, Josh Gibson, and Cool Papa Bell were being uttered in the same breath as Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. Still, the MLB remained segregated until April 10th, 1947, when Jackie Robinson signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers; effectively breaking the color barrier and paving the way for talented Black athletes across the country.

Soon after integration the Negro Leagues dissolved but many talented players would go on to have successful careers in the majors and many of them — i.e. Satchel Paige, Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, and Jackie Robinson — would become some of the most well known names in baseball.