Negro Leagues Baseball new logo, exhibit raises awareness of leaders, innovators

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - It’s hard to imagine modern baseball without night games, and safety equipment for both catchers and batters – all three exist in the Major Leagues, minor leagues, and even youth baseball.

It’d be easy to confuse these innovations as just a natural development of the game, and that is partially true – the Negro League Baseball League brought them into existence.

The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum will be featuring innovators and leaders in a new exhibit that will be coming to 18th and Vine in late May.

Night baseball, played under stadium lights, was invented after Kansas City Monarch Owner J.L Wilkinson got a $50,000 bank loan to purchase portable generator light towers in 1930.

“How popular was night baseball? He made his investment back in year one,” Negro Leagues Baseball Museum President Bob Kendrick said Wednesday.

That success in innovation was realized further by Major League Baseball five years later. For the average baseball fan they may not have realized the idea came from the Negro Leagues and the Kansas City Monarchs.

“The moral of the story is this, if you don’t control the pen, you don’t control the story, thus your story is never written with the accuracy or relevancy that it should be,” Kendrick said. “This great museum, The Negro League Baseball Museum is about taking control of the pen and finally telling the story the way it should have been told, years ago.”

READ MORE: New logo unveiled recognizes leadership, innovation of Negro Leagues

Other innovations to the game from the Negro League include shin guards for catchers. They were wooden. The yet-to-be-revealed exhibit will focus on John “Bud” Fowler – who used them to protect his shins from prejudiced opponents who wanted to use their shoe spikes on him.

Another innovation, batting helmets, will tell the story of Willie Wells. Doctors instructed him not to play after he was knocked unconscious with a pitch. Instead he donned a modified construction hard hat at the plate, and went on to be a consistent .300 hitter for the remainder of the decade.

Aside from innovation, the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum supports the idea of a manager from the Negro League to be inducted into the Hall of Fame.

Kendrick specifically identified Victor “Vic” Harris with the Homestead Grays, as someone that should be reconsidered. He received less than 5 votes this year.

“When the great Vic Harris, who led those legendary Homestead Grays to multiple championships, was up for induction this year and garnered very little support, I think that’s when it really hit me that we needed to do something to help raise the profile of those great managers from the Negro Leagues,” Kendrick said.

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