Press Box Red: The Story of Lester Rodney,

Long before Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson to a Brooklyn Dodger contract in 1945, Lester Rodney, the newly hired and first sports editor of the Communist Daily Worker, launched the campaign that proved decisive in eventually breaking baseball's color line. But in the hostile anti-Communist climate of those years and for many years after, Rodney's story remained largely unknown. It therefore came as a surprise to many when Arnold Rampersad, in his authoritative 1997 biography of Jackie Robinson, wrote: "In the campaign to end Jim Crow in baseball, the most vigorous efforts came from the Communist press, most notably from Lester Rodney." Now Press Box Red tells the story of that remarkable 11-year campaign and of Rodney's unique career covering sports for the Daily Worker until he left the Communist Party in 1958. Press Box Red is packed with first-hand accounts of Rodney's challenges to the high muck-a-mucks of professional and collegiate sports, and contains frank and frequently humorous encounters with owners, managers, and coaches like Branch Rickey, Larry MacPhail, Bill Veeck, Leo Durocher, Casey Stengel, Nat Holman, Clair Bee and numerous athletes including Robinson, Roy Campanella, Joe DiMaggio, Satchel Paige, Peewee Reese, Joe Louis, Henry Armstrong, and many others. It's a story every fan will love.

Table of Contents:
Foreword Jules Tygiel Acknowledgments 1. The Daily Worker Starts a Sports Section 2. Growing Up in Brooklyn 3. A Communist in the Press Box? 4. "Jim Crow Must Go!" (Part 1): The Daily Worker's Campaign to Break the Color Line in Organized Baseball 5. "Jim Crow Must Go!" (Part 2): And the Walls Came (Slowly) Tumbling Down 6. The Impact of Baseball's Integration 7. The Ballplayers and the Communist 8. Boxing: The Brutal "Sport" and the Class Angle 9. Hoop Dreams and Scandals Postscript Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Irwin Silber is a self-employed writer who lives in the Bay Area of northern California. He is the author or editor of eight previous books, including (with Barbara Dane) The Vietnam Song Book.

Review :
"This book is a crisp reminder that the golden age of baseball and pro-sports in America in general was not nearly as simple as many would like to believe. Perhaps, more importantly, this book is a testimony that sport has always been a matter of deep social significance and that the never-ending battle for social justice can be successfully waged from the most unexpected of spaces." Left History "[Rodney and Silber] dispense wisdom coupled with wit, salient information paired with keen insight. In the process, they confer a human face on an ideological construct: American communism; Rodney's odyssey from a Republican household to CP affiliation to disaffected radical makes for fascinating reading, which the book captures, to borrow a Gershwin phrase, in fascinatin' rhythm." American Communist History "important ...a work that should be read and reread" Nine "This lively book is a welcome addition to the saga of 20th-Century American sports and sportswriting, especially in its telling of the little-known tale of Lester Rodney's role in the integration of baseball." --Robert Lipsyte "Lester Rodney was a Communist. Whether because of that or in spite of that, he was also one of the most independent and courageous sportswriters of his day. Press Box Red is a timely, much-needed reminder of the pivotal role he played in integrating baseball, and, therefore, in the history of this country." --David Margolick "Anyone interested in the New York sports scene in the era of Joe Louis and Joe DiMaggio is likely to derive much pleasure from these pages." --Choice "While the book is first and foremost a history of Rodney's efforts, parts of this book are of particular interest to revolutionary socialists...Press Box Red sheds light on this hidden history." --The Socialist Worker "This book is required reading for anyone who's interested in sports and politics and how the two can intersect." --The International Socialist Review "Besides its engaging account of an engaging man, the book offers a look into one of the odd corners of baseball history--the not-so-remote byway where baseball crossed paths with communism." --Elysian Fields Quarterly "The beauty of Press Box Red is not only the surprising (and surprisingly unknown) story of Lester Rodney, but also the ease with which Irwin Silber meshes his own historical notes and commentary with the voice of Rodney himself. Most of the book appears in the form of oral reminiscences from Rodney, who is every bit as elegant with the spoken word as the written one. It is always tempting for a biographer to place himself and his prose above the subject, but Silber never submits to this temptation, while remaining steadfast in his obvious admiration for the iconoclastic Rodney. Still, Silber offers important structure and background to Rodney's life story." Love My Team "Hearing Lester Rodney speak for himself and viewing facsimiles of the same pages he's discussing is the real strength of the book since these methods allow Silber's readers to reconstruct the consciousness of the Depression and World War II era." American Journalism