ABSTRACT
One Sunday morning late in March 1947, I walked into the living room of our apartment at 187 Ten Eyck Walk, Williamsburg, Brooklyn. As usual, my Greek-Jewish immigrant father was reading the New York Times. I wanted to ask permission-a rarity today-to do something with my friends that afternoon. Before I could pose the question, he said, "The Dodgers are going to have a Negro first baseman this year." Smugly, I looked at him with that "Yes, so what?" attitude I had developed in my tenth year of life in Brooklyn. My father, in a thick Levantine accent, raised his voice in the stentorian manner of Pericles in Athens, "He is going to be the first nonwhite to play in the major leagues!" Knowing that the Howie SchultzEddie Stevens combo had performed admirably in 1946 made me stubbornly indifferent to his oracular tone. In an effort to communicate in my lingo, I retorted, "Can he hit?" Though trigger-tempered at times, my father was infinitely patient with me. "Think," he countered. "Please stop and think. This is a giant step [one of our favorite games] toward ending inequality in the United States. It is what we were fighting for in World War II. Justice!"
