Prepare for a visit to AAMLO with these special topic resource guides.
This resource guide is intended to help users locate holdings at AAMLO related to African Americans in sports and African American athletes.
● Selected Library Material at AAMLO
● Selected Archival Collections at AAMLO
Other collections may contain relevant materials. Please contact AAMLO (aamlo@oaklandlibrary.org) with any questions or to schedule an appointment to view materials in person.
Selected Library Materials
Home Field Advantage: Oakland, CA - the City That Changed the Face of Sport by Paul Brekke-Miesner
A People's History of Sports in the United States: 250 Years of Politics, Protest, People, and Play by Dave Zirin
Black Sports Heroes by Morrie Turner
Great Names in Black College Sports by Donald Hunt
Pioneers of Black Sport: the Early Days of the Black Professional Athlete in Baseball, Basketball, Boxing, and Football by Ocania Chalk
Black Baseball 1858-1900: a Comprehensive Record of the Teams, Players, Managers, Owners and Umpires edited by James E. Brunson
The World's Fastest Man the Extraordinary Life of Cyclist Major Taylor, America's First Black Sports Hero by Michael Kranish
Forbidden Fairways: African Americans and the Game of Golf by Calvin H. Sinnette
Blacks at the Net: Black Achievement in the History of Tennis by Sundiata A. Djata
The Great Black Jockeys: the Lives and Times of the Men Who Dominated America's First National Sport by Edward Hotaling
Jump for Joy: Jazz, Basketball, and Black Culture in 1930s America by Gena Caponi-Tabery
A Hard Road to Glory--track & Field the African-American Athlete in Track & Field by Arthur Ashe
The Integration of the Pacific Coast League: Race and Baseball on the West Coast by Amy Essington
They Cleared the Lane: the NBA's Black Pioneers by Ron Thomas
Gridiron Gauntlet: the Story of the Men Who Integrated Pro Football, in Their Own Words by Andy Piascik
The Black Bruins: the Remarkable Lives of UCLA's Jackie Robinson, Woody Strode, Tom Bradley, Kenny Washington, and Ray Bartlett by James W. Johnson
Ali by Jonathan Eig
King of the Court: Bill Russell and the Basketball Revolution by Aram Goudsouzian
The Revolt of the Black Athlete by Harry Edwards
The Way It Is by Curt Flood
Willie Mays: the Life, the Legend by James S. Hirsch
Autobiography of An Unknown Football Player by Proverb Jacobs
Out at Home: the True Story of Glenn Burke, Baseball's First Openly Gay Player by Glenn Burke
The John Carlos Story: the Sports Moment That Changed the World by John Carlos
Golden Age: the Brilliance of the 2018 Champion Golden State Warriors by Thomas Bevilacqua
Selected Archival Collections
West Coast Negro Baseball Association Collection. The West Coast Negro Baseball Association was formed on March 9, 1946 at a meeting of the High Marine Social Club at the Elks Clubhouse in Oakland, California. The baseball league was spearheaded by two Berkeley firemen, Eddie Harris and David P. Portlock, who pitched the idea of forming a Negro baseball league on the West Coast that would use Pacific Coast League parks while teams were away. Abe Saperstein, founder of the Harlem Globetrotters, was elected president of the association with track star Jessie Owens serving as vice-president, and David Portlock as secretary. The league consisted of six teams: San Francisco Sea Lions, Seattle Steelheads, Portland Rosebuds, Oakland Larks, San Diego Tigers, and Los Angeles White Sox. The league's first official game was between the Oakland Larks and the San Diego Tigers on May 12, 1946 at Fresno Midget Auto Racing Park. The league played only one season, disbanding after the final game in July, 1946, though the Oakland Larks baseball team would continue to play as a barnstorming club through 1947. View online
Arthur R. Page Collection. The Arthur R. Page collection includes photographs, baseball programs, and newspaper clippings documenting the baseball and military career of Arthur R. Page, one of the first African American baseball players to play on integrated baseball clubs in the United States Navy. The collection includes 24 photographs of the United State Navy Barbers Point Pointers, a baseball club in the Hawaiian Area Inter Service Baseball League. Most of the photographs are team photographs and Page playing for the Pointers in the late 1940s and early 1950s. There are also two Hawaiian Area Inter Service Baseball League programs, and an assortment of newspapers clippings of box scores of Barbers Point Pointers baseball games.
Marion E. Wildy Papers. The Marion E. Wildy papers consists of photographs, diplomas, yearbooks, programs, speech, and correspondence documenting his education, military service, and family life. Education material includes Wildy’s diplomas and yearbooks attending Sacramento Junior College and the University of California, Berkeley, newspaper clippings documenting his athletic career playing tennis and basketball, and his varsity letter at Oakland Technical High School. Photographs also include a 1941 photograph of Jackie Robinson in Hawaii.
Lionel J. Wilson Collection. Lawyer, judge, and politician Lionel J. Wilson (1915-1998) played semi-professional baseball for four years as a pitcher for the Oakland Larks. In 1943, he left baseball before enrolling in the University of California’s Hastings School of Law following World War II. Governor Edmund G. Brown, Sr. appointed him to the Oakland-Piedmont Municipal Court in 1960 making him the first African American judge in Alameda County. The Lionel J. Collection consists of newspaper clippings, political campaign flyers, biographical sketches, photographs, and programs documenting the political career of Oakland’s first Black mayor, Lionel J. Wilson.
Par-Links Golf Club Scrapbook. On September 12, 1958, fifteen African-American women golfers of the East Bay organized a ladies’ golf club and named it Par-Links Golf Club. Charter members were: Eola Paige (President), LaVada Scott (Vice-President), Arjere Johnson (Secretary), Juanita Wilson (Financial Secretary), Maye Reid (Handicap Chairman), Edna Dotson (Tournament Chaiman), Jane McIntosh (Publicity Chairman), Doris Bruce, Ruth Beckford Chatmon, Velma Davis, Cleodel Johson, Ramona Maples, Doralee Petty, Nadine Willis, and Nell Wilson. The collection consists of one scrapbook documenting the first six years of the club’s existence from 1958-1963.
Ruth Beckford Papers. Includes oral history interviews (conducted in 1971) with California Voice sports writer Bill Hinds discussing his career as a baseball and basketball player and sports columnist. Hinds discusses African American prize fighters in Oakland, Oakland baseball players, prominent African American golfers from Northern and Southern California, African American jockeys, and many other topics. Listen online
African American Museum & Library at Oakland Oral History Collection. Includes an oral history interview (conducted in 2003) with former baseball player Harold Weathy Turley discussing his family history in Paso Robles, California and his experiences as a baseball player on integrated baseball teams in California in the 1930s. View online
Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education Oral History Collection. Includes an oral history interview (conducted in 2003) with sports writer Claude Lewis, a journalist at Newsweek Magazine and a key organizer of Black journalists on the East Coast.
Proverb Jacobs Papers. Proverb Jacobs (1935-2016), professional football player from 1958-1964 and Laney College Athletics Director, was born Proverb Jacobs Jr. in Marksville, Louisiana, on May 25, 1935. The Proverb Jacobs Papers include newspaper clippings, souvenir programs, correspondence, curriculum vitae, handwritten notes, pamphlets, photographs, ephemera, and assorted material documenting Jacob's football and teaching career.The papers also include genealogical research and material collected and produced during the writing of Jacobs' 2014 self-published autobiography, Autobiography of an Unknown Football Player.
Reginald Pearman Photograph Collection. Photojournalist Reginald A. Pearman worked as a staff photographer for the Oakland Tribune, Washington Post, and the Associated Press and over his career was a regular contributor to Time Magazine, National Geographic, and the New York Times. The Reginald Pearman photograph collection includes photographic prints and negatives taken by Pearman of various sporting scenes.
African American Museum & Library at Oakland Vertical File Collection. Selected items include:
- Newspaper and magazine clippings on Black Americans in sports and Negro League teams including the Pierce Giants
- Biographical sketches on Sammie Haynes and others
- Game programs including the Los Angeles Mustangs versus Oakland Giants (1943)
- Materials documenting the 1996 African American Museum and Library at Oakland symposium and program 'Legend of sports' featuring players from the Negro Leagues
The Combination Magazine Collection. The Combination (1963-1978?) was an African American magazine published monthly in Oakland, California by editor and publisher Brackeen McCarty, between 1964-1978. The magazine includes photographs, short articles, and local advertisements on African American social organizations, entertainment, sports and fashion events in Northern California. View online
African American Museum & Library at Oakland Photograph Collection. Selected items include portraits and team photographs featuring:
- Portraits of members of the Golden West Baseball Team
- Jockeys Alonzo "Lonnie" Clayton, Willie Sims, and others
- California Eagles
- Pierce Giants
- Archie Williams
- Oakland Raiders
- San Francisco 49ers
Oakland Post Photograph Collection. The Oakland Post Photograph Collection consists of 11,000 photographs appearing in the Oakland Post newspaper between 1963-2005. Photographs include assorted portraits of African American athletes and notable sporting events.
Additional Information
Search the library using the catalog.
Consult AAMLO's finding aids in the Online Archive of California.
We are working to create new resource guides. Have an idea for a new guide? Contact us at aamlo@oaklandlibrary.org.
