-
Sam Bankhead
Forty-year-old Homestead Grays star Sam Bankhead enters Organized Baseball as the player-manager of the Farnham Pirates (Class C) of the Provincial League. -
Dave Hoskins
Blacks begin to appear on minor league clubs in the Jim Crow South. The Dallas Eagles of the Texas League sign former Homestead Gray pitcher Dave Hoskins to become the “Jackie Robinson of the Texas League.” -
Henry Aaron
The Cotton States League prohibited brothers Jim and Leander Tugerson, who were under contract with the Hot Springs (AR) Bathers, from playing unless allowed by the home team. At the age of 19, Henry Aaron, playing for Jacksonville, breaks the color barrier in the South Atlantic League, which had teams in Florida, Atlanta, and Georgia, while Bill White integrates the Carolina League. -
Nat Peeples
Nat Peeples breaks the color barrier in the Southern Association but, facing intense hostility, lasts only two weeks. In Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Plessy v. Ferguson, declaring that "separate but equal" public schools are unconstitutional. However, in Major League Baseball, the upscale Chase Hotel in St. Louis informs Jackie Robinson and other black players on the Dodgers that they are welcome to stay there -
Gene Baker
The Pittsburgh Pirates place Gene Baker at the helm of their Batavia franchise, often cited as the first black to manage in the minor leagues -
1955
Rosa Parks refuses to give up her seat to a white man on a Montgomery -
Ozzie Virgil
Jackie Robinson retires from baseball, not having landed the managing job he had desired. In this year Ozzie Virgil becomes the first player in MLB from the Dominican Republic -
Civil RIghts Act
Eisenhower signs the Civil Rights Act of 1957 into law to help protect voter rights. The law allows federal prosecution of those who suppress another’s right to vote. -
Buck Oneil
The Chicago Cubs name Buck O’Neil the first black coach in the major leagues. -
Red Sox
Boston Red Sox become last MLB club to integrate