Satchel Paige Striking out Jim Crow
For it’s 1, 2, 3 strikes you’re out at the old ball game! Baseball is America’s great past time. I don’t think there’s one person in this country that doesn’t enjoy 9 innings at the ballpark with a hotdog in their hands. When we cheer for our teams, we cheer for people from all different races, countries, and backgrounds.
But that wasn’t the case not so long ago. Until Jackie Robinson broke the color line with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, baseball was segregated like the rest of the United States. Jim Crow laws ruled our country. That meant one league for the Black players and the major leagues for White players.
But before Jackie Robinson, there was another exceptional ball player that was making heads turn. He was Leroy “Satchel” Paige. Satchel Paige was a phenomenal pitcher in the Negro League.
Satchel Paige Striking out Jim Crow is a graphic novel by James Sturm and Rick Tommaso. The story is told through the eyes of Emmet Wilson, a baseball player that has one game against Paige before a career ending injury. Wilson tells of life as a sharecropper working for some very cruel white men. In parallel, the novel tells of the accomplishments of Satchel Paige, and of the segregation he still faced as a national star.
Satchel Paige Striking out Jim Crow begins with a short introduction by Gerald Early that gives a good summary of Satchel Paige and segregation in baseball. At the end of the book, there is more history explaining different parts of the graphic novel. At the end readers find out more about sharecroppers, different teams and players, lynching, and Paige’s different rituals.
Overall this book is a valuable read. I think students in middle school and high school would benefit from reading Satchel Paige. It would be an excellent addition to a Civil Rights unit. So often students only learn about a few key players in history. With Satchel Paige, students will begin to realize that it’s not just one or two people that change history, it’s everyone taking small steps for freedom and equality that changes history.
2 comments:
I like that this novel focuses on Satchel Paige rather than someone like Jackie Robinson. I agree that it highlights how it takes the efforts of many people to bring about change, not just the few we are normally taught about. This novel would be a great integration as part of a civil rights unit. I also really like that it is a graphic novel because it gives students a different experience than reading historical text.
It looks like there are quite a few historical graphic novels that were reviewed! I kinda like it; I was not very "in" with graphic novels prior to this class. Especially when they deal with history, I think it makes some complex details a lot easier to understand and relate to with the pictures to aid in the story.
This sounds like another book I would enjoy reading; great review!
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