An Irishman’S Tribute to the Negro Leagues

Book excerpt: An Irishmans Tribute to the Negro Leagues is the first in a trilogy of Irishmans Tributes by Thomas Porky McDonald. In it, the long-ago world of Negro League Baseball is celebrated on factual, fictional, and emotional platforms. Profiles of over fifty former Negro Leaguers pay homage to the wondrous game they played. Two handfuls of Tallman Tales, McDonalds unique short stories, use the days of all-black baseball as a backdrop for some heartfelt characters that desperately seek entrance to a legendary era otherwise lost in time. Interspersed within the profiles and tales is a small collection of McDonalds trademark baseball poetry. This second edition contains additional poems and profiles, in deference to the historic Hall of Fame election of seventeen Negro League greats in 2006, via a special committee formed to try and give just due to as many of the forgotten heroes of the Negro Leagues as possible. The Hall of Fame Gallery at the center of the book contains all thirty-fivr Hall of Fame inductees based mainly on service in the Negro Leagues, from the very first one, Satchel Paige, in 1971, on through to the honored group of 2006, which included such long overdue legends as Biz Mackey, Mule Suttles, Jud Wilson, and Effa Manley, the former Newark Eagles owner who became the first woman ever honored in the plaque room at Cooperstown.