BlackPerspective.net
Discussing the Diaspora as seen through an internal Black lens
Negro League Monarchs Honored By Kansas City Royals
June 24th, 2008
I’m not a big baseball fan but I fall it enough, and I’m definitely a history buff; so I know Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro League name means; and that for the Royals to honor the legacy is a big deal.
The Monarchs roster held some of the games greatest players in the early to mid part of the decade; during baseballs heyday before segregation was lifted, including the two most historically famous Negro League legends Satchel Paige andJackie Robison
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Royals honor Negro Leagues
Club dons Kansas City Monarchs jerseys in remembrance
From MLB.com
KANSAS CITY — Different look, different feel.
As they checked out their cap sizes and prepared to don the retro uniforms of the Kansas City Monarchs on Sunday morning, the Royals couldn’t help reflecting on what it must have been like in the Negro Leagues decades earlier.
“The players of today owe a lot to the guys who once wore these uniforms,” shortstop Tony Pena said. “We honor them today and it’s very meaningful to be able to do that.”
On the annual Salute to the Negro Leagues Day at Kauffman Stadium, the Royals wore the white uniforms with red stripes of the Monarchs, featuring big “KC” letters on the front. The Giants wore the uniforms of the 1927 Royal Giants, an All-Star exhibition team that traveled west to play teams in Southern and Northern California, then the South Pacific and Japan in early 1927.
The afternoon of nostalgia had Pena contemplating a trip to the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City when the schedule permits.
“I’m going to try and go during the All-Star break,” Pena said.
I was at the Undergroud in Downtown Atlanta a couple of years ago and there were a couple of former Negro league players with a table set up selling jerseys and other Negro League merchandise. I didn’t even know who the guy was, but I bought one of their cards just to support, and have a little piece of that history.
The Negro League Baseball Players Association gives a synopsis of the Monarchs:
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Mansas City Monarchs
Play: 37 seasons, 1920-30, 1937-62 (league years only)
The longest running franchise in Negro League history is the Monarchs from Kansas City, Missouri. They were charter members of the Negro National League in 1920.
Winners of more than a dozen league championships, the Monarch name became the Negro League’s answer to the New York Yankees. They won their first World Series title in 1924, defeating the Hilldale Giants, from Philadelphia, in a thrilling ten-game series. Some of black baseball’s best players wore the Monarch uniform; Cool Papa Bell, Turkey Stearnes, Newt Allen, Jesse Williams, Bonnie Serrell, Wilber Rogan, and a fellow they called Skip, Buck O’Neil.
The Monarchs sent the most players into Major League Baseball after the color barrier was broken. Some players from this elite group were Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige, Ernie Banks, Elston Howard, Hank Thompson and Willard “Home Run” Brown. The Monarchs were black baseball’s glamour franchise.
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Yobachi Boswell is creator and publisher of BlackPerspecitve.net. I’m a writer, activist and political watcher based in Nashville, Tennessee. I’ve also been know to do some spoken word and MCing in my day.
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