The Negro National League Celebrates Its 105th Birthday

The Negro League Baseball Museum celebrates Black excellence in baseball.

On Feb 13, 1920, Andrew “Rube” Foster called a meeting of Black baseball team owners in Kansas City, MO, to discuss the plight of Black baseball players. Jim Crow laws prohibited the men from playing in professional American leagues, so the team owners established the Negro National League.

Under Foster’s leadership, the league started with eight teams, including the Chicago Giants, the Detroit Stars, the Kansas City Monarchs, and the Cuban Stars.

Integration in baseball led to the Negro National League’s dissolution in the mid 1950s. But its legacy lives on through the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum (NLBM) in Kansas City.

Established in 1990, the museum houses artifacts that celebrate the history and the legacy of giants such as Buck O’Neil, Cool Papa Bell, and Josh Gibson.

“It’s not a sad, somber story but a celebration of the human spirit’s power to persevere and prevail,” NLBM President Bob Kendrick said in an interview with First National Bank. “The Negro Leagues are rooted in the simple principle of creating one’s league in the face of exclusion from the Major Leagues, embodying the American spirit in a way unlike any other in our history,” Kendrick said.

A year after Rube Foster died in 1930, the league disbanded, citing financial strain, but in 1933, Gus Greenlee formed and established a new Negro National League. At the height of its popularity, the league played a pivotal role in African-American culture.

The Negro National League saw some of the most skilled players in the history of the game. Jackie Robinson played with the Kansas City Monarchs before becoming the first African American to play major league baseball when he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.

The NLBM is located at 1616 East 18th St in Kansas City. It is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday from noon to 5 p.m.

Non-local baseball fans can visit the museum’s virtual exhibition.