Baseball’s Conscience Finally Gets His Due: Communist Ties Obscured Walnut Creek Retiree’s Success Fighting Racism in the Sport by Jack Epstein Published: July 10, 2005 As virtually everyone knows, Jackie Robinson, the Negro Leagues star who joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, broke the color ban in baseball.
But few Americans know that it was Walnut Creek resident Lester Rodney — working as reporter, columnist and sports editor for the Daily Worker, the New York Communist Party newspaper — who prepared the ground, repeatedly referring to the ban as ‘un-American’ and ‘the crime of the big leagues.’
Comments
- Tags:
- In the News
Join Now