Curveball (41 page)

2
. Letter from Syd Pollock to Toni Stone, January 19, 1954; letter from Bunny Downs to Toni Stone, January 20, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

3
. Letter from Toni Stone to Syd Pollock, January 26, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

4
. Letter from Toni Stone to T. Y. Baird, February 15, 1954; letter from Toni Stone to T. Y. Baird, February 2, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

5
. Letter from Toni Stone to Bunny Downs, January 26, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

6
. Letter from T. Y. Baird to Toni Stone, March 31, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

7
. Larry Lester, “Only the Stars Come Out at Night,”
Satchel Paige and Company: Essays on the Kansas City Monarchs, Their Greatest Star and the Negro Leagues
, edited by Leslie A. Heaphy (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2007), 113.

8
. Thom Loverro,
The Encyclopedia of Negro League Baseball
(New York: Checkmate Books, 2003), 310.

9
. Lester, 120; Michael Harkness-Roberto and Leslie A. Heaphy, “The Monarchs: A Brief History of the Franchise,”
Satchel Paige and Company: Essays on the Kansas City Monarchs, Their Greatest Star and the Negro Leagues
, edited by Leslie A. Heaphy (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2007), 99–100; Phil Dixon with Patrick J. Hannigan,
The Negro Baseball Leagues: A Photographic History
(Mattituck, NJ: Amereon, Ltd., 1992), 149, 151; Loverro, 310.

10
. Lester, 130.

11
. Tim Rives e-mail to author, August 20, 2009.

12
. I am indebted to Tim Rives’s excellent essay “Tom Baird: A Challenge to the Modern Memory of the Kansas City Monarchs” for his analysis of Baird’s KKK associations. Tim Rives, “Tom Baird: A Challenge to the Modern Memory of the Kansas City Monarchs”
Satchel Paige and Company: Essays on the Kansas City Monarchs, Their Greatest Star and the Negro Leagues,
edited by Leslie A. Heaphy (Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2007), 147, 149–152.

13
. Bob Motley interview with the author, June 21, 2009.

14
. Letter from Syd Pollock to Toni Stone, April 1, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

15
. Buck O’Neil with Steve Wulf and David Conrads,
I Was Right on Time: My Journey from the Negro Leagues to the Majors
(New York: Fireside Books, 1997), 76.

16
. O’Neil, 24, 27, 34, 155; Frank Driggs and Chuck Haddix, “Carrie’s Gone to Kansas City,”
Kansas City Jazz: From Ragtime to Bebop, A History
(Oxford University Press, 2006), 28; Roger Niebohr interview with the author, November 19, 2007.

17
. O’Neil, 76; Lew Freedman,
African American Pioneers of Baseball.
(Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press, 2007), 7.

18
. Bob Motley interview with the author, June 22, 2009.

19
. James Bankes,
The Pittsburgh Crawfords
(Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2001), 53.

20
. Bob Motley with Byron Motley,
Ruling Over Monarchs, Giants & Stars
(Champaign, IL: Sports Publishing, 2007), 109.

21
. Donna DeVore interview with Connie Morgan, approximately 1993. Archives of the Afro-American Historical and Cultural Museum of Philadelphia; Pollock, 252.

22
.
Chicago Defender
, May 1, 1954;
Pittsburgh Courier
, May 4, 1954;
Chicago Defender
, May 8, 1954.

23
. Baltimore
Afro-American
, July 31, 1954.

24
.
Atlanta Daily World
, March 25, 1954.

25
. Wilmer Fields,
My Life in the Negro Leagues: An Autobiography of Wilmer Fields
(Westport, CT: Meckler, 1992), 13, 22.

26
. Bob Motley interview with the author, June 23, 2009; Motley, 142–143;
Kansas City Call
, May 7, 1954;
Atlanta Daily World
, May 7, 1954.

27
.
Kansas City Call
, May 21, 1954.

28
.
Kansas City Call
, May 21, 1954;
Kansas City Call
, May 28, 1954;
Kansas City Call
, June 4, 1954;
Chicago Defender
, June 5, 1954;
Chicago Defender
, June 12, 1954; Charles Sandy, “Blues Stadium,”
The Best of Remember When: 100 Warm Tales of Life As We Knew It
(Kansas City: Kansas City Star Books, 2001), 17.

29
. Michael Carlson, “Buck O’Neil,”
The Guardian
, October 8, 2006.

30
. Toni Stone interview with Kyle McNary, September 1993. McNary private archive.

31
. Paul Dickson,
Baseball’s Greatest Quotations
(New York: Harper Perennial, 1992), 198.

32
. Steve Jacobson,
Carrying Jackie’s Torch: The Players Who Integrated Baseball and America
(Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2007), 69, 71.

33
. Tracy Ringolsby, “Will a Woman Ever Make It to the Major Leagues? Stone Rock Solid in Negro League,”
Rocky Mountain News
, May 11, 1995.

34
. Baltimore
Afro-American
, July 17, 1954.

35
. Toni Stone interview with Kyle McNary, September 1993. McNary private archive.

36
.
Kansas City Call
, May 14, 1954.

37
. Bob Hayes, “To This Ms., Diamond Is Made of Dirt,”
San Francisco Examiner
, May 4, 1976.

38
. Wendell Smith,
Pittsburgh Courier
, August 22, 1953; Larry Lester,
Black Baseball’s National Showcase: The East-West All-Star Game, 1933–1953
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 389.

39
.
Kansas City Call
, March 12, 1954.

40
. Bob Gibson and Phil Pepe, ed.,
From Ghetto to Glory: The Story of Bob Gibson
(Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1968), 21–22.

41
. [Norfolk, Virginia]
Journal and Guide
, July 3, 1954.

42
.
Kansas City Call
, May 21, 1954.

43
. Connie Morgan interview with Donna DeVore, approximately 1993. Archives of the Afro-American Historical and Cultural Museum of Philadelphia.

44
. Toni Stone interview with Larry Lester, January 3, 1991. Lester private archive.

45
.
New York Times
, July 12, 1954;
New York Amsterdam News
, July 17, 1954.

46
.
Kansas City Call
, July 23, 1954.

47
. Toni Stone interview with Larry Lester; Doug Grow’s notes on Toni Stone interview and 1990 visit shared with author December 3, 2007. Grow private archive.

48
. Hayes.

49
. Letter from Toni Stone to Aurelious Alberga, August 11, 1954. Bartlow-Reed private archive.

50
. [Jefferson City, Missouri]
Post-Tribune
, August 5, 1954;
Kansas City Call
, September 18, 1954;
Kansas City Call
, August 7, 1954.

51
. Motley, 113.

52
. O’Neil, 154.

53
. Motley, 111.

54
. Ibid., 2–4.

55
. Larry Lester e-mails to author, August 31, 2009, and November 9. 2009; Ray Doswell e-mail to author, November 15, 2009.

56
. Doc Young, “Toss ’Em Out: Should Girls Play Ball; No, Says Doc,”
Chicago Defender
, August 28, 1954.

57
. Toni Stone interview with Larry Lester, January 3, 1991. Lester private archive.

58
. [Norfolk, Virginia]
Journal and Guide
, October 30, 1954.

59
. Toni Stone interview with Larry Lester; Maria Barlow-Reed interview with the author, March 10, 2008; Pollock, 276.

1
.
Brooklyn Eagle
, August 17, 1949, quoted in Leslie A. Heaphy,
The Negro Leagues, 1869–1960
(Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2002), 225.

2
. Brent Kelley,
Negro Leagues Revisited: Conversations with 66 More Baseball Heroes
(Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2000), 299.

3
. Alan J. Pollock, ed. by James A. Riley,
Barnstorming to Heaven: Syd Pollock and His Great Black Teams
(Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 174.

4
. Jackie Robinson,
I Never Had It Made: An Autobiography
(New York: Ecco/Harper Collins, 1998), 118–119.

5
. Diane DuBay, “If You Think No Woman Has Ever Said It Before, You Haven’t Checked History,”
Minnesota Women’s Press
, February 3–16, 1988, 5.

6
. Ron Thomas, “Baseball’s ‘Intruder’ Loved Game,”
San Francisco Chronicle
, August 23, 1991.

7
. Ernest C. Withers, essay by Daniel Wolfe, ed. by Anthony Decaneas,
Negro League Baseball
(New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc., 2005), 11.

8
. Carolyn Kleiner Butler, “The Old Ballgames,”
Smithsonian
, April 2005; Henry Louis Gates Jr. e-mail to author, October 17, 2007; Martin Luther King Jr.,
Why We Can’t Wait
(New York: Signet, 1964), 25.

9
. Donnie Williams and Wayne Greenhaw,
The Thunder of Angels: The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the People Who Broke the Back of Jim Crow
(Chicago: Lawrence Hill/Chicago Review Press, 2005), 48.

10
. Toni Stone interview with Bill Kruissink, March 27, 1996. National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, Inc., Cooperstown, NY.

11
. Doug Grow, “Baseball Pioneer Never Listened to Naysayers,” Minneapolis–Saint Paul
StarTribune
, January 31, 1997; Maria Bartlow-Reed interview with the author, March 10, 2008. While Toni admitted a vague memory of the event and some details changed with the telling, Stone family members corroborate that the story was typical of her lifelong interaction with and reliance on the church.

12
. Toni Stone interview with Jean Hasting Ardell, April 1992. Ardell interview notes shared with author June 22, 2009.

13
. Toni Stone interview with Jean Hasting Ardell; Maria Bartlow-Reed interview with the author.

14
. Motley, 90.

15
. Bruce Markusen,
Ted Williams: A Biography
(Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press, 2004), 98.

16
. James F. Vail,
The Road to Cooperstown: A Critical History of Baseball’s Hall of Fame Selection Process
(Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, 2001), 245.

17
. Arthur M. Schlesinger,
Robert Kennedy and His Times
(New York: Mariner Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2002), 745.

18
. Robert Peterson,
Only the Ball Was White: A History of Legendary Black Players and All-Black Professional Teams
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1970), preface, 15, 204.

19
. Buck O’Neil with Steve Wulf and David Conrads,
I Was Right on Time: My Journey from the Negro Leagues to the Majors
(New York: Fireside Books, 1997), 197.

20
. Lawrence D. Hogan,
Shades of Glory: The Negro Leagues and the Story of African-American Baseball
(Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2006), 352.

21
. Toni Stone interview with Jean Hastings Ardell, April 1992. Ardell interview notes shared with author June 22, 2009.

22
. Ernie Banks oral history.
Visionaryproject.org/banksernie
; Willie Mays and Lou Sahadi,
Say Hey: The Autobiography of Willie Mays
(New York: Simon & Schuster, 1988), 14.