Up First from NPR - The Sunday Story: Roy Wood Jr. on the Road to Rickwood

Episode Date: June 16, 2024

What does a comedian know about baseball? And what can America's oldest baseball field tell us about the civil rights movement?Rickwood Field in Birmingham, Alabama is America's oldest ballpark. It's older than Wrigley Field and Fenway park. But its history is full of contradictions. In its heyday, Rickwood was home to both the Birmingham Barons and the Birmingham Black Barons, one of the most talented teams in the Negro Leagues. The field hosted a women's suffrage event, but the stadium's owner also allowed a KKK rally to take place there.Comedian Roy Wood Jr. hosts a new podcast called Road to Rickwood from WWNO & WRKF, which takes a closer look at the field's history as a microcosm of the civil rights movement itself. Wood Jr. grew up in Birmingham playing baseball at Rickwood. In the podcast, he speaks to historians, civic leaders, major league baseball executives, former Negro Leaguers, and members of Alabama's first integrated sports team. For himself and those he interviewed, baseball was an oasis. It was also a space where racism shaped the lives of some of the nation's best baseball players.In today's episode of The Sunday Story, Wood Jr. sits down with host Ayesha Rascoe to talk baseball, Birmingham, and race in America.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

I'm Aisha Roscoe, and this is the Sunday Story. So, I grew up in the South, Durham, North Carolina. To be exact, people have heard this probably a million times before. But in Durham, North Carolina, everybody is obsessed with college basketball. I mean, like, it's serious. You know, families are split up over this, and everyone picks a side. And, you know, in school, you can't escape it. Everywhere you go, people are talking about Duke and UNC.

North Carolina to Duke. But not me. I'm not a basketball person. I'm not a sports person. I don't play. I don't watch. I'm not competitive. I find competition very stressful.

I prefer like talking and reading and to be in my imagination, like fantasy. But I understand the love and the passion. And I know what it means to have a sport really define a town. Comedian Roy Wood Jr. is also from the South, from Birmingham, Alabama. Of course, Birmingham is often thought of as the hotbed for the civil rights movement. But for Roy, his childhood was all about baseball. And it's no coincidence because Birmingham is home to the oldest ballpark in the country, Rickwood Field. It's older than Wrigley Field and Fenway Park. 30% of all Hall of Famers have played on this field at some point in their career.

But Rickwood's a place with a lot of contradictions. While the ballpark was home to the Birmingham Black Barons, one of the most talented teams in the Negro Leagues, these Black players were never allowed in the locker rooms. The ballpark once hosted a women's suffrage rally, but the stadium's owner also allowed a Klan rally to take place there. Those are just a few of the stories Roy tells in his new podcast about Rick Woodfield, Birmingham, baseball, and race in America. He speaks with

historians, civic leaders, Major League Baseball executives, former Negro Leaguers, and members of Alabama's first integrated sports team, all in an effort to understand how this field was not only a venue for America's pastime, but for the civil rights movement itself. The series is called Road to Rickwood, from NPR member stations WWNO in New Orleans and WRKF in Baton Rouge. Roy Wood Jr. joins me now. Welcome to the podcast. Can I just say how eloquent and beautifully you succinctly summarized and submitted. That's me using all my NPR words. NPR. Thank you for that. Thank you for having me on the program. Well, thank you.

I'm glad we gave a good, you know, synopsis of it. That's what we were trying to do. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's a fun ride through history told through a singular place. Yes, exactly. Even if you don't like baseball, if you like history, it's still very fascinating. It just is. It really is. So many things I had no idea about.

And I like that you said that it's about history through a place because so much of this podcast really is about Birmingham. And I know that you like to draw a distinction between Birmingham and other places in Alabama. Like you'll be like, that person is not from Birmingham, to be clear. You like to make that distinction. Because y'all like to, whenever something crazy come out of the state of Alabama, y'all just go, oh, it's all Alabama. I'm like, hang on. We got some people fighting for what's right and doing the right thing down here. And we need to make sure that every city gets their own distinct critic.

When something weird is happening, don't you round that up to Birmingham. The same way Atlanta be talking about, that ain't us, that's Georgia. The same way. It's the same way. What makes you proud of being from Birmingham. I am proud to be a part of a generation of people from the South that I believe that are working on the belief of what the South could be and not resting on the reputation of what it was. And I think that's the biggest difference is that a lot of people look at Alabama, a lot of people look at Birmingham at what it was and what it used to be and have no scope of

confidence or any belief that it can be anything other than that. When I know, because I've met these people and I've run the streets with these people for, you know, 30, 40 years of my life, I know who's down there and I know what they stand for and I know what they're fighting for. So anytime I have an opportunity to, you know, champion that, I do so. Because the thing that's interesting about the podcast is that it's not just about what baseball meant in a tumultuous time, in a tumultuous city that was ground zero for a lot of the racism and segregation, but it also in later episodes,

because it's just a four,'s just a four part series. In the fourth episode, we look forward to the future and like what baseball could be, what it means to be a black American and love a sport that has dwindling numbers. Yeah. And I definitely want to get into that. Obviously, black people have played such a huge role in America's pastime. Right. You know, you'll hear about Jackie Robinson and stuff like that. have played such a huge role in America's pastime, right? You know, you'll hear about Jackie Robinson and stuff like that, but you don't necessarily hear about Rickwood Stadium and the role that it played.

Why don't we know about Rickwood? Well, because it's just one of those things that's left on the cutting room floor. And I think finally we're in a space between podcasting and streaming and younger directors and producers being able to come forward and really mine through history and get into things that are a little bit more granular. Okay, yes, we have Jackie Robinson. Yes, we had Willie Mays. Willie Mays is from a suburb of Birmingham. Willie Mays only becomes Willie Mays because of a number of Black men who played for the Black Barons who helped to kind of nurture and usher

him in. And that's the thing that is lost in a lot of the conversations about the Negro Leagues is how many of these men who did not make it. And so the idea of these people and these stories being told at depth and in detail, I think it's way past due time. And I have to give credit only because I spoke with a lot of these retired Negro leaguers like Bill Greeson and Al Holt. They all play for the Black Barons. They still live in Birmingham paying taxes in Jefferson County. Part of why we did this is because Major League Baseball is having a regular season game at Rick Woodfield, and they're going to honor Willie Mays and a number of living Negro Leaguers at that game on June 20th. Major League Baseball earlier this year made the decision to combine Negro League statistics with professional statistics so that there is some degree of recognition of what they contributed counting towards their time in the Major Leagues.

And more importantly, they're paying pensions to all living Negro leaguers, now with no stipulations. Before it had to be a minimum of four years played. Now it's across the board. If you ever put on a Monarchs uniform or a Hillside or a Barron's or an Atlanta Crackers, any of these, you get a pension. And so I think that we're finally getting to a place in our society where we're willing to sit back and tell some of these stories.

In the podcast, two of the people you sat down with were former Black Barons players, Bill Greeson and Al Holt. And they told you about what it was like traveling to play games. Well, I went to St. Louis, man, segregation was at its highest at that time. They didn't want to be seen with the black because they call you in love. When you hit town, they had boarding houses where you could go stay at, but say you didn't have no money, you couldn't go in those folks' house. Travel was hard. It was hard, man. It was hard. You slept on the bus.

You ate on the bus. Bathed on the bus. Ready. Boy, we stayed in some terrible hotel. And I remember a couple of places we spent the night outside because of the critters on the inside. I think what I really hope that people walk away with with this podcast is that this isn't some sad racism stories. It's about a time where racism was around, but it's about how this baseball field somehow was a separate oasis from all of that for blacks and whites and what the

success of both of those teams meant for the city of Birmingham at a time when it was so divided. You're listening to the Sunday Story. We'll be right back. Now, our change will honor 100 years of the Royal Canadian Air Force and their dedicated service to communities at home and abroad. From the skies to our change, this $2 commemorative circulation coin marks their storied past and promising future. Find the limited edition Royal Canadian Air Force $2 coin today. We're back with the Sunday story. So to recap, Rickwood Field opened in 1910. It's been around almost as long as Major League Baseball.

But long before Jackie Robinson broke the color line and the MLB was desegregated, Black people were already playing baseball professionally in their own leagues, including at Rickwood, which hosted both the Birmingham Barons and the Birmingham Black Barons. Negro League successes have long gone unrecognized in baseball history, but the recognition is finally arriving. This year, on June 20th, the MLB will be hosting a special game at Rickwood Field to honor the achievements of Negro League players. It will actually count as a regular season game for Major League Baseball. It's between the St. Louis Cardinals and the San Francisco Giants. Roy, I really connected with what you said earlier about how these are not just sad racism stories.

Yes, there's racism. Yes, there's trauma. But there's also so much more because people during that time, they're still living, loving, making babies, having fun, finding joy, even in the midst of all that. It was never just segregation and Jim Crow and that was it. Like, people had full lives during this time, right? Yeah. And I think in talking with some of the retired Negro Leaguers, the one thing that was very prevalent was that as much as a lot of present day Americans have for knowing what those gentlemen went through and what they endured and the racism and the prejudice and the Black-only section and not being able to sleep in a hotel on the road and, you know, two week bus trips and you're sleeping upright on a bus. This is way before lie flat seats and tour buses with the

little twin beds in the back. They loved their time playing the game they love. And I think for a lot of those men, that baseball field was the one place where they were able to escape the traumas of that era. And so they look back on that time with a lot of reverence, a lot of appreciation, and a lot of fondness. Now, that doesn't mean that they are okay with what happened and how things went down. Al Holt told me straight up, and this is a former Birmingham Black Baron, he told me straight up, he knew he was never getting called up to the pros from the Negro Leagues when integration started because he knew he didn't have the temperament for it. And the temperament is that you had to be able to be like Jackie Robinson, take the abuse and not lash out and not get angry publicly. And confirm what they already think about your race.

Yeah. Do you have the emotional metal to deal with being called the N-word relentlessly? Yeah. And the death threats. Can you deal with that? And Al Holt, you know, to his credit and a lot of other players of that era just straight up said, I'm a good player, but I know I can't deal with that. I'm going to punch one of them folks in the stands and then I'm going to be in jail.

And then ain't nobody black going to be in here again for another 40 years. Well, and in jail or worse. Yeah. But were there moments when you were talking to those Negro Leaguers, I would have to imagine that there were surprises. Like, what was the most surprising thing from those conversations? The one thing that made me laugh was how excited, and this is consistent across all of the Negro Leaguers that I spoke with. And for this podcast, we spoke with about eight. The one thing that was consistent in all of the Negro Leaguers that i spoke with was how excited they would be if they had a teammate who was really light-skinned and who could pass for white

that was that was uh a great thing that was that person could like get something yes yes so if it was a restaurant that didn't serve black people they would send in the light-skinned boy, and he would just order for 30 people, and then come back to the van, come back to the tour bus with 30 meals, and I can't remember who told the story, man, but they told me a story about a light-skinned teammate who went in, and he passed for white, and he ordered the food, he paid for the food, he's sitting there waiting. It was so hot in the restaurant. He took his hat off to brush the sweat from his brow. Oh, no. And they saw that nappy ass hair.

Oh, no. They said, boy, you better get out of here, boy. And they kept the money and the team didn't eat that night. Oh, my God. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, my goodness. I i mean at its core that's a story about racism but it's funny that's just a funny thing to visualize period point blank

i that i would have never thought of that my goodness i feel like rickwood um for me listening to the podcast it's such a metaphor for race in America because even in the stands of Rickwood, like they were segregated, but then you have like people who are basically on top of each other. A lot of people who think about segregation, they think of separation,

like keeping black and white people apart. And I remember I went to Selma for a reporting trip and going down the main street, the person who I was with who marched on Bloody Sunday was telling me like how each of the buildings had a side entrance. And that was the law because you had to have an entrance that Black people go through because they couldn't go through the front entrance. So even in the architecture, it was like we had to have some racism in the architecture. It's so visceral, but it's really about, you talked to that historian who said, it wasn't about keeping people apart.

It was about being close, but one group has to feel superior at all times. It's just very interesting in how the excitement around baseball really helped to drive some degree of unity. And it was one of the few things that slowly got, like when we talk about the first integrated sports team in the state of Alabama, I mean, you know, that's not an easy thing to get by, you know, in a super segregated South at the time. So I really feel like it was it was a very, very beautiful time on the field. It was a very, very beautiful time during a very ugly time.

You're listening to the Sunday Story. Today, I'm talking with Roy Wood Jr., host of the new podcast, Road to Rickwood. Roy, you get into how baseball was a big deal for everyone, but especially for Black people in Birmingham. It was really significant. And I knew it was a big deal because you said that when people were going to the Black Barons games, that people would leave church early to get to the game in their Sunday best. And I'm like, it had to be important for them to leave church early. Yeah. The pastors would start the sermon early out of respect to the start time of the games. Yeah.

Also, people have to remember, this is a time, football wasn't always reigning supreme. Yeah. At that time, baseball was as popular, if not the most popular sport in the country. So yeah, it would be no different than if the Green Bay Packers are playing in a playoff game at 1 p.m. on a Sunday, you go to church in Green Bay, you better wrap it up by 1230, pastor, because we going to get a good seat. And also, don't forget, Black people came dressed to the nines for Black Barons games. So this wasn't just some penny-inny event. This was like Essence Fest every Sunday. And when for these games, the white people had to go to the segregated section, they had to go.

Yes, it was flip. They had to go to the basically the colored section. It's your turn to sit over there and enjoy the game. Which is so, I mean, it has its own logic, but it's also like so crazy in its own way. But you have to remember the Negro Leagues, you know, these players were next level talents. Like they weren't just coming because they were black. They were coming because they were good. We're talking Satchel Paige. We're talking, you know, like all of these amazing players who came to town.

A Negro League baseball game in Birmingham on a Sunday afternoon was as big as any sporting event you can name today. Where are we at now? As you said earlier, with the relationship between Black people and baseball, it's not what it was. No, it's not. And on the podcast, in one of the later episodes, I talked with Tony Reagans, who's like one of the execs at MLB, who's in charge of promoting and growing the game with the youth, not just domestically, but globally. And we talked a little bit about it. And, you know, a large part of black American dwindling in baseball is because baseball is starting to become a pricey sport to play. Number one. Number two, it's not a game where you can just play it by yourself or two or three people. You need nine

for a full team. But, you know, the idea of just playing around the neighborhood, it's not as commonplace anymore. And even if you are playing around the neighborhood, sooner or later, you have to play other kids that take it seriously. And that means playing white kids out in the suburbs and playing travel ball all summer long. You're dealing with a single mom. She ain't got the money for all them hotels and all that equipment and all those registration fees that travel ball charges. And even if you got a two parent home, you got to hope that they can take the income hit. By and large, the dwindling of Black Americans in baseball is due in part to a major economic wealth gap that just keeps Black people from being able to play the sport at a level of frequency that is required now to actually be drafted. And then on

top of that, most baseball teams in college don't have enough scholarships to offer. If the roster is 25 to 30 people, the baseball team only has 15 scholarships to give out. Football has 70 for a 90-person roster. So, you know, Major League Baseball has programs in place that are helping to grow the game at the youth level. But once you get into middle school through high school, it's kind of out of MLB's hands. Well, I got to ask you, though, because I know a little bit of your story. You played baseball. Even when you went to college, you said you chose it based on you went to FAMU. Yeah.

But you thought you would be able to get on a team. I was mistaken. I was gravely mistaken. But talk to me about what baseball meant to you growing up. It was an oasis. It was an escape from everything. You know, I think at its best, sports should always be that for everyone. And to me, you know, nothing else mattered when I was on a baseball field. I'm not thinking about anything.

Nothing else is happening in the world. And there's a peace of mind that that sport has always given me. You know, I loved it. I've always loved the game. But much like everyone else, I didn't play year-round. I played baseball organized for three months a year in high school every year. That's not enough if you want to go to college. I never had anybody in the neighborhood that was, you know, pulling us to the side and going, here's what you need to do.

So, you know, I got to college and realized, oh, y'all lost all them games just because other teams are good. Not because y'all suck. My bad. Let me go and go to Golden Corral and get this job right quick. I'll get out your way real quick. My bad. Here's your glove back. But the love remains. The love remains. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. But you did play at Rickwood, right? What was that like? So you play in high school? You played at Rickwood? Our home games were all at Rickwood. We practiced at Rickwood. And I don't even think you really think about it as a kid.

It wasn't until I got older that I was like, wow, this really was an honor to be able to stand in this sacred space every single week, freezing our butts off. But it was still an honor. And not only did we get to play at Rickwood, we played after they had done their renovations to make the park look retro. You know, Rickwood was pretty run down in the early nineties and, you know, Hollywood came knocking and needed a place to shoot some baseball movies that looked like the 1920s. And that, ironically, that is exactly what Rickwood needed to kind of be revitalized and to remember the history of what it was. It's probably one of the greatest facelifts in the history of professional sports stadiums.

Do you have a favorite memory of playing in Rick Wood? What is it like there? What is there? Are there smells? Are there sounds? It's the grass. It's the breeze. The tree line past the outfield.

You cannot see any of Birmingham when you walk into that stadium. And to me, that's the beauty of it is that it's literally an escape. And then the moment you get back out in the park and light, it's the church's chicken one block away. So it's definitely in the hood. But the church's chicken is good, though. And then they got the honey, the biscuits with the honey on them.

I'm just saying, it seems like another world. And the moment you step out of it, you're just right back in a regular-ass neighborhood. You bet, yeah. It's a church's chicken, it's an AutoZone, it's a Captain D's, it's a Shell gas station. Like, all within a foul, it could all get hit by a foul ball from that park. And so what was your experience like going back to Rickwood to do this project?

I went back to Rickwood and looked at the field as a whole, and they had taken down the original fence Major League Baseball had in an effort to relay some sod and some dirt and all of that. And in taking down the old fence, we saw the original outfield wall for Rickwood, which is almost, you know, 80, 90 feet behind the wall that they built for the movie sets in the 90s. You know, the average professional stadium is 400 feet straight away to center field. The original concrete wall from the 1900s, it was 500 feet straight away to center field, 480. So it was much further to like get a home run or something like that.

Correct. 400 feet down the line is insane, but that was the norm during that era. By comparison, today, 300 feet, 330 feet down the line is the average in a major league stadium. It may not seem like a lot on paper, but that is a huge difference. To hit a ball 400 feet down the line would be the equivalent of somebody dunking on a 15-foot rim. Like dunking, like if you move the basketball rim to the top of the backboard, now how many people can dunk? Not many. Not as many. Not many. What do you feel like you learned from doing this podcast?

What did you take away from it? I've learned that you cannot hold the grudge longer than the person who was aggrieved. You know, the one consistent thing I found in all of the Negro leaders that I talked to was a sense of love and reverence for that time. They're not angry. They're not bitter. They lived it. They've experienced it. It wasn't all roses. The path that they've chosen is the path that they chose. You know, I think we have to be at peace when other people are at peace, you know, so I can't be angry on their behalf anymore. The importance of letting go of things, no matter how wrong, to really thrive, you have to let go of what happened to you. I understand that you still are involved in baseball in Birmingham now that you donated equipment to maybe to your high school baseball team.

Yeah, we got with Metta and some VR headsets for some virtual batting practice and such. Yeah. So what is it like pouring into the baseball scene in your hometown, the young Roy Wood juniors of tomorrow? You know, the way I try to equate my relationship with Birmingham now is that, you know, I find people who, you know, got money to give or something to give to the city and I take it down there and I, you know, I deliver the groceries. It's up to the locals to cook the meal for the kids. I can't be there and be hands-on, but if there's a resource you need, then let me see if I can make a call or two to get that resource to your disposal. And if

we can do that, then, you know, we keep moving. Well, thank you so much, Roy, for being here, telling these stories and for the support that you give to all of these communities. So grateful to have you here telling your story. Well, thank you. I appreciate you. That's Roy Wood Jr., comedian and host of the new podcast, Road to Rickwood, from WWNO and WRKF in Louisiana.

You can listen to the first three episodes of the series at www.no.org forward slash road to Rickwood or wherever you get your podcasts. The fourth and final episode drops on Tuesday. This episode was produced by Justine Yan with help from Hazel Feldstein. It was edited by Jenny Schmidt. Gilly Moon mastered the episode. Thanks to Alana Schreiber, the executive producer of Road to Rickwood. The Sunday Story team includes Abby Wendell and Andrew Mambo.

Our supervising producer is Liana Simstrom, and Irene Noguchi is our executive producer. I'm Ayesha Roscoe. Up First is back tomorrow with all the news you need to start your week. Until then, have a great rest of your weekend.