I typed Hank Aaron’s name onto a spread sheet last week. I am about to start working on a documentary that would look at the impact of black style on major league baseball and Hamming Hank was the second interview I wanted to do. Though best known for his long career with the Braves and Brewers in both Milwaukee and Atlanta, Aaron had begun his career in the Negro Leagues with the Indianapolis Clowns in 1952 when he was just a teenager. Like his amazing generation of peers (Willie Mays, Ernie Banks, Monte Ervin, Roy Campanella), Aaron came out of segregated baseball and would normalize black athletic excellence for white fans of the national past time. After Jackie Robinson opened the doors with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, it would be Aaron, Mays, Banks and many others who would play on teams across this nation and become hometown heroes during the height of civil rights movement. While none of these ball players would be as outspoken as Muhammad Ali, their presence in Chicago, San Francisco, Cincinnati and other major cities put the lie to any notions of black inferiority, while Dr. King and others marched for equality under the law.
Aaron’s breaking of Babe Ruth’s 714 home run record (with a blast off black Dodgers’ pitcher Al Downing) in 1973, triggered a national discussion on racism as hate mail and death threats came at #44 as he moved closer to Ruth’s then almost mystical mark. That a black man on a team playing in the deep South smashed the record was as culturally important as it was beautiful. Aaron would go on to to be a fixture in Atlanta, running a number of successful businesses and founding a charity that helped generations of young people pursue higher education. Not as flashy as his fellow Alabama native Mays in the field or on the base paths, Aaron was steady, relentless, and unflappable, a clutch performer who still holds the MLB records for most runs batted in, total bases, extra bas hits and all star appearences. He was a king on the field and a gentleman off it. #ripHankAaron.