Thursday was Jackie Robinson's 100th birthday, and the MLB legend was rightfully honored for being the first black man to break the color barrier in MLB. Robinson broke baseball's color barrier in the postwar years when he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. But did you know Moses Fleetwood Walker was the first African-American to play professional baseball 63 years before Robinson?
In this week's episode of Mo Rocca's podcast, "Mobituaries," Rocca shares the story of Walker, one of the forgotten forerunners of the civil rights movement, who joined the Toledo Blue Stockings in 1883 and helped pave the way for Robinson decades later. Walker joined the Blue Stockings as a catcher in 1883, and a year later the team joined the major league-sanctioned American Association in 1884, widely considered the top-flight league in the United States. Walker's time in pro baseball was short. He played just 27 games for the Blue Stockings, batting .263/.325/.316. However, he is more recognized for the indelible mark that he left on the game simply by virtue of playing it
Happy 100th Birthday, Jackie Robinson. In the brand new episode of #MOBITUARIES we go to Toledo to tell the story of the African-American man who played pro baseball 63 years earlier. He’s just one of our “Forgotten Forerunners”. https://t.co/aX26fzBM2U pic.twitter.com/e9FQbGpqq5
— Mo Rocca (@MoRocca) January 31, 2019
Rocca also tells the story of Elizabeth Jennings -- another woman who defied authority by refusing to get off of a segregated Manhattan streetcar -- and Lois Weber, an American woman who dominated Hollywood in the early 1900s.
To hear all of these fascinating stories in their entirety, listen to the full "Mobituaries" podcast. New episodes are available on Thursdays. You can download the full pod at Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Megaphone, Stitcher, or Spotify.
