Celebrating African America's contribution to our great national pastime, this comprehensive, lively history combines vivid narrative, visual impact, and a unique statistical component, to recreate the excitement and passion of the Negro Leagues. Packed with stories, biographical essays, scores of archival photographs and other evocative artifacts, it is an important contribution to sports history and a wonderful tribute to the players and teams who wrote a unique chapter in the annals of baseball and American culture. National Geographic is proud to present this compelling volume, compiled by a who's who of authorities on the subject. Drawing on years of research, Shades of Glory traces the history of black baseball from the 19th century to the first great teams, such as the Cuban Giants, and on to the era of the vibrant barnstorming teams from the East Coast, Chicago, and Cuba. The unparalleled Rube Foster started the first Negro League in 1920, with such dominant teams as the Chicago American Giants and the Kansas City Monarchs. Pittsburgh soon produced two of the greatest teams of all time, the Homestead Grays and the Pittsburgh Crawfords, featuring such stars as Satchel Paige, John Gibson, Cool Papa Bell, and many more. Their superb brand of baseball rivaled the best of the major leagues until the historic signing of Jackie Robinson by the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. Shades of Glory chronicles a bygone era of black baseball and the stars who were shadowed by racial prejudice, but now shine forth in all their sparkling brilliance. *Starred Review* Histories of baseball's Negro Leagues abound, beginning with Robert Peterson's 1970 classic, Only the Ball Was White, but few offer the scope of this volume, which explores the entire spectrum of African American baseball. In July 2000, major-league baseball granted $250,000 to the Hall of Fame for a comprehensive history of African American involvement in the game from 1860 to 1960. The result, a cooperative work by teams of historians and baseball experts, was an 800-page manuscript entitled Out of the Shadows. This book is a distillation of that work. Hogan himself was a part of the research team and is an expert on the Negro Leagues. There are a number of player profiles and photos from the 1920s, '30s, and '40s as well as an examination of the entrepreneurial business climate that kept the leagues going even as it exploited the players. It's interesting to note that, of the hundreds of all-star games played in the off-season between teams of the top black players versus the best of the major leagues', the black teams won more than 60 percent of the time. Along with on-the-field reportage, Hogan also provides valuable historical context, placing the Negro Leagues in the socioeconomic fabric of the time. This is an important, informative, and entertaining contribution to sports history. Wes Lukowsky Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved Lawrence D. Hogan is a senior professor of history at Union County College in New Jersey. He is an expert on the history of black baseball and his touring exhibit on the subject has traveled nationwide. Jules Tygiel, a history professor at San Francisco State University, is the author of Baseball's Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and His Legacy, and Past Time: Baseball as History, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum was founded in 1939 and has become an American institution. Dedicated to chronicling and preserving baseball history and honoring the sport's foremost figures, it annually attracts more than 350,000 visitors to its home in Cooperstown, New York.