Trifold on Reading Streets Satchel Paige Story
Hollywood film director Ron Shelton had long yearned to read a definitive biography on Leroy "Satchel" Paige—one that didn't merely recycle sometime information from an encyclopedia, only a thorough and accurate work that includes new details about the life of the legendary Negro Leagues baseball game star.
Then, one day, the Oscar nominee of "Bull Durham" fame read University of Miami history professor Donald Spivey'southward work, "If You Were Simply White: The Life of Leroy 'Satchel' Paige" and gave the researcher a telephone call.
"He expressed his delight with the book and that he had been waiting for years for a work worthy of Paige'southward legacy," Spivey recalled.
Now, the historian's exhaustive nonfiction work is headed for Hollywood. Apple tree Studios has secured the rights to the book for drama evolution with an eye toward a series that will explore the epic story of Negro Leagues Baseball using the life of Paige as a properties. "This is heady," beamed Spivey, a Distinguished Professor in the College of Arts and Sciences.
Paige was a premier star of the Negro Leagues for more than two decades and arguably one of the greatest pitchers of all time. He was every bit much creative person as he was athlete, barnstorming across the nation and showcasing his pitching prowess in exploits that are now legendary. Sometimes, for example, he would have his infielders sit downwardly behind him and so strike out the side, sending a message that Black baseball players, who were forbidden from playing in the Major Leagues, were just as talented as their white counterparts. In 1948, at the age of 42, he fabricated his Major League debut with the Cleveland Indians.
Spivey spent 12 years researching and writing the book, interviewing numerous Negro League greats and visiting cities such equally Birmingham, Pittsburgh, and Chicago, where Paige played. His research also took him abroad to Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, and Mexico, where Paige likewise pitched.
"I originally idea that to practice a definitive biography of Satchel Paige would have me two years, three tops. I was wrong, really wrong," Spivey said. "To get the history correct, the historian needs to be intimately familiar with the events, problems, and places. I one time joked with Satchel Paige's son that I started to dislike his father over the years because his travels forced me to read then many more histories and to travel everywhere."
Even as Spivey connected to piece of work on the book, another biography on Paige published in 2006 ahead of his. "I was non finished then, and I was totally committed to doing more than than but rehashing familiar stories," Spivey explained. "I was committed to developing a full and accurate portrait, to getting the story right. It was too important to me every bit an African American, a historian, and a sport scholar. I took the time and got it correct."
And that's one of the reasons Spivey feels his book was selected by Apple Studios, which is co-producing the serial with Due west Hollywood, California-based Kapital Entertainment. Shelton, who also directed "White Men Can't Jump" and whose daughter, Valentina, is a senior in the University of Miami'due south Frost School of Music, and NBA Hall of Famer Earvin "Magic" Johnson are executive producers. The project is also being supported by Mandalay Entertainment's Peter Guber, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, and Major League Baseball.
Spivey volition serve equally a consultant but will not take veto authority. "If something is not a documentary, you will always have a challenge getting it to paint an accurate portrait. And this is why I am delighted to take Magic Johnson and Ron Shelton at the helm," said Spivey, noting that the two are knowledgeable about Paige and Negro Leagues baseball and beholden of the research Spivey put into his book.
"My hope is that this series volition aid all to capeesh the obstacles and triumphs of these Negro Leaguers and to better understand the legacy of systemic racism that plagues the United states and the world," said the historian, who as well serves every bit special advisor to President Julio Frenk on racial justice. Spivey credits the University's "superb leadership" for helping the "forward momentum" of the project.
The story of the Negro Leagues is more than than just baseball. It'due south too about the struggle for ceremonious rights that occurred simultaneously during those times, Spivey said.
"Too often, the Negro Leaguers accept been seen equally only ballplayers," he lamented. "They were Black in America, and they knew information technology. Players similar Paige; Buck O'Neil; and the cracking dancer, entertainer, and blackness team owner Neb "Bojangles" Robinson supported the anti-lynching cause, Black youth development, and the civil rights move."
Spivey said he intends to encourage the producers to convey those facts in the series.
Information technology is long overdue, according to Spivey. "These bully Negro Leagues ballplayers were relegated to the shadows because of the horrid color-line that existed in America," he said. "Superbly talented, superior players in every position, they were, however, of the wrong color."
Blackness athletes were non immune to compete in the Majors until 1947, when Jackie Robinson bankrupt the colour barrier, stepping onto Ebbets Field to kickoff at first base of operations for the and then-Brooklyn Dodgers. But Robinson—who played in the Majors for 10 years, helping the Dodgers win the 1955 Earth Series—was just ane of a multitude of Negro Leaguers who, if given the chance, would have not only started merely also exceled in the Majors, Spivey noted.
"Satchel Paige was one of them," he pointed out. "He got his moment in 1948 when he was signed by Cleveland at the age of 42, well past his prime but notwithstanding able to polish."
Spivey noted something else that has been long overdue: integrating the statistics of Negro Leaguers into the record books.
Baseball-Reference, a website that compiles baseball statistics for every player in Major League Baseball history, is integrating data from the Negro Leagues era of 1920-1948 into its record books. And MLB, which elevated the Negro Leagues to major-league status, is doing the same, correcting a longtime oversight.
Simply stats alone "will never come close to undoing the monumental wrong washed to and then many over so many years," Spivey said. "Allow us hope that the series will."
Source: https://news.miami.edu/stories/2021/07/historians-book-about-satchel-paige-headed-to-hollywood.html
0 Response to "Trifold on Reading Streets Satchel Paige Story"
Post a Comment