December 2009

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Branch Rickey is one of the immortals of baseball, one of the most influential people the game has ever known.  On this episode of Cover the Bases, we are pleased to present historian and biographer, Lee Lowenfish, author of Branch Rickey: Baseball’s Ferocious Gentleman.  The book is the winner of a coveted Seymour Medal award from SABR.

Lee Lowenfish is a native of New York City who has a masters and doctoral degrees in American History from the University of Wisconsin in Madison. He grew up a Giants fans and only rooted for the Dodgers when they played the Yankees in the World Series.  However, he was compelled to write a definitive biography of the man most identified with the Brooklyn Dodgers, with an eye towards his historical pursuits in the area of race relations in the U.S.

Lee wrote a book about labor relations in Major League Baseball called The Imperfect Diamond: A History of Baseball’s Labor Wars (third edition due in April 2010) in which Branch Rickey was a foil, a staunch supporter of the reserve clause that tied players to ballclubs indefinitely.  Throughout all of Lee’s efforts, he felt a calling  to write a book that includes a view of Rickey’s upbringing as a poor farm boy, forming his moral and charitable character that ultimately integrates baseball.

Rickey was not only instrumental in advancing race relations by integrating the Major Leagues with racial minorities, but also helped to support the war effort and women’s rights by working along side P.K. Wrigley in the formation of The Girl’s All American Professional Baseball League, previously covered in a previous episode of Cover the Bases with baseball book author Sue Macy.

Lee recounts that Rickey even made attempts to recruit and evaluate Japanese citizens who were detained in internment camps during the Second World War as well.  It should be pointed out that Rickey did not advance these principals as just for the sake of the cause, but rather he was focused entirely on finding the “best man for the job”.

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