The Soul of Baseball (16 page)

“Well, of course, you know he died before I could help get him into the Hall of Fame. And I remember, at the funeral, I told Hilton, I said, ‘I’m still going to get you into the Hall of Fame someday.’ It was almost twenty years later, and it was the last year of the old veterans committee, and one of the other guys said, ‘Buck, you’re always talking about Hilton Smith. How good was he?’ And I told them he was like a Bobby Feller. He was like a Greg Maddux. Yeah. And they voted him into the Hall of Fame.”

Buck stood up. He had caught his breath. He started to walk again.

“I came back to Kansas City after that, and I went out to see Hilton Smith’s gravestone. I said, ‘Hilton, you’re a Hall of Famer.’”

 

I wish he had lived

To see that day.

He was a little sad

At the end of his life,

Just a little.

Thought he had been forgotten.

I wish he had lived

To hear them say,

“You were great.

You were one of the greatest ever.”

But I’m sure he heard it.

 

“I really wish he had lived,” Buck said. “I miss him. He was my friend.”

“You know, his son says he never got back any of those letters,” I said to Buck.

“Maybe he wrote the letters but never mailed them,” Buck said. He seemed to consider that for a moment. Then he picked up his pace a little, the gate was in sight, and I asked what Hilton Smith would have said after watching Buck struggle to climb the stairs.

“He would have said ‘Are you crazy? You’re an old man,’” Buck said. “But when I reached the top, he would have said ‘Well, I see you made it again.’”

T
here are few absolute truths in the world, but this is one: Pilots are at their most chipper on early-morning flights. This morning, the Southwest pilot decided to play his harmonica over the plane’s speakers before takeoff. This has the odd effect of annoying half the people on the plane (“Fly the plane, Bob Dylan,” a guy in a window seat mumbled) while enchanting the other half. Buck O’Neil was not in either camp. He was in deep sleep.

He was asleep before most people got on the plane. Buck was a good plane sleeper. For one thing, he was always the first person on the plane. Most of the time, he was bullheaded about his age—climbing those escalator stairs was a typical Buck decision. A woman in the Houston airport once offered him a wheelchair, and she tasted Buck O’Neil’s wrath. “I don’t need no wheelchair!” he shouted. When getting on planes, though, Buck flaunted his age like a teenager with a new driver’s license. “I’m almost ninety-four years old,” he announced, triumph singing in his voice. “I deserve to get on the plane first.”

Once on the plane, Buck would take out the in-flight magazine and place it on his lap as if he intended to read it. Then he leaned his head forward. That was it. He was out. People would walk by and say, “Hi, Buck!” or “That’s Buck O’Neil,” but his head never bobbed. Buck often talked about sleeping fitfully in beds. On planes, though, he could sleep through the sound of a hundred harmonicas.

I
N
A
TLANTA, EVERY
other street is named Peachtree. Directions sounded like an Abbott and Costello skit. Follow Peachtree Drive until you get to Peachtree Lane, go south on Peachtree Court and you will run straight into the Avenue of Peachtree. From there, you’ll want to get on Peachtree…

Our driver was lost. Buck was supposed to speak at Daniel H. Stanton Elementary School, and we had traversed enough Peachtrees to reach Martin Luther King Boulevard. “What was the name of this street before Martin was killed?” Buck asked. The driver did not know. It was becoming clear based on the growing number of U-turns that the driver did not know much at all about Atlanta geography. It turned out he did not want Martin Luther King Boulevard, he wanted Martin Street, and then it turned out he went to the wrong Martin Street, and all the while Buck remembered playing baseball in Atlanta. “The white team was called the Atlanta Crackers,” he said. “And so the Negro Leagues team was called the Atlanta Black Crackers. You ever heard of a black cracker?”

He remembered playing ball in Ponce de Leon Park, where the Black Crackers played. It was like any other baseball stadium except for one thing: A large magnolia tree towered in center field. The tree stood 460 feet from home plate. The Atlanta legend is that only Babe Ruth and Eddie Mathews ever hit baseballs over that tree at Ponce de Leon Park.

“You know, if you were an outfielder, that tree was your friend,” Buck said. “You would play in front of the tree, and when a ball went over your head you hoped it hit the tree. If it hit the tree, you might hold the hitter to a triple. But if it went by the tree, it was a home run all the way.”

I said: “Don’t you think it’s weird that there was a tree in the outfield?”

“Now that you mention it,” Buck said, “I guess it was weird. I never thought about it.”

They tore down the stadium at Ponce de Leon Park. The magnolia tree still stood in Atlanta.

B
UCK WAS LATE
to the school, of course, and the program had already begun by the time the car pulled up. Buck walked into the library, and there were a couple of Negro Leagues players sitting on metal folding chairs. Teachers stood with their backs to the walls. And the children were on the floor. The principal reminded them over and over that they were supposed to be sitting crisscross-applesauce. Some were. Others stretched out. Some faced the wrong way and some whispered to each other. Some yawned as Buck O’Neil walked in. How many libraries just like this one had Buck walked into through the years? How many children had he seen? He acted like it was the first time. He sat down in a metal chair and waited for his introduction.

“We are very lucky today,” the principal said. “This is Mr. Buck O’Neil.”

“Hi, Buck!” the children said.

“Do you kids know how to sing?” Buck asked as he stood up. A few muttered “Yes.”

“I don’t think you heard me,” Buck said. “Do you kids know how to sing?”

The “Yes” was louder now.

“Do you kids really know how to sing?”

The “Yes” was shouted now.

“All right, then. Let’s see if you can really sing. I need your help. Everybody hold hands.” There was giggling, pushing, whining, but Buck sorted through all of that. After a few moments all the kids and teachers held hands. And he began singing.

 

The greatest thing

In all my life

Is loving you.

 

The kids sang softly at first, following Buck on each phrase. This was part of a gospel song called “The Greatest Thing,” written by Mark Pendergrass in 1977. The song has other verses, but Buck had been using just this one for so long, it had become a part of him. It was his song. He has sung it at dinners and club meetings and charity functions all over. He always had people join hands.

 

The greatest thing

In all my life

Is loving you.

 

Buck held his hand out to one of the teachers as he sang “loving you,” and she blushed, sparking giggles among the kids. The children were singing a little louder now, with a little more joy in their voices.

 

The greatest thing

In all my life

Is loving you.

 

The kids sang loud now, realizing that this song wasn’t going anywhere else. These were the only ten words, and all ten could be understood by three-year-olds. There was something hypnotic about Buck, the way he waved his arms like a conductor, the way he picked up eye contact, the way he pointed at the children not singing with enough feeling. The simple words took on more meaning.

 

The greatest thing

In all my life

Is lov-ing you.

 

They sang with him until the end. The children were wide awake. They cheered Buck and themselves, and Buck shouted out, “You can sing! What do you know? I’ve never heard such singing in all my life.” The kids cheered themselves again. Buck smiled at Red Moore and James Lee, the two Negro Leagues players who were sitting behind him, and he said, “A little music wakes up the soul, doesn’t it?”

B
UCK BEGAN HIS
talk. “I’m from the South, children,” he said. “I was born so far south that if I had taken one step backward, I would have been a foreigner.”

The children giggled again, and he told them about that hot day he worked in the celery fields in Florida. He told them about the day when he discovered black children in Sarasota could not attend high school. Some of the kids listened. And some drifted. The simple reality: No one can keep the attention of elementary-school kids forever, especially when talking about a past they cannot imagine and injustices they have trouble believing.

“Listen, children,” he said. “I remember they built Sarasota High School, and I went around singing ‘I’m going to Sarasota High School! I’m going to Sarasota High School!’ And one day my grandmother says to me, ‘Son, you’re not going to Sarasota High School.’

“And I said, ‘Why not, Grandma?’

“She said: ‘Sarasota High School is for white children.’ I started to cry, and she said, ‘Don’t cry, John. I won’t live to see it, but someday black children and white children will all go to Sarasota High School.’ And wouldn’t you know it? A few years ago, they called me back to Sarasota High School to give me my diploma.”

The teachers smiled and cheered. The children, many of them, stretched and yawned again.

B
UCK TOLD A
few more stories and ended by telling the kids: “Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do something. You can do anything and you can be anything you want in this world, children. Remember that.”

Applause. The principal asked if anyone had questions. The kids waved their hands wildly. Some of the wildest arm-wavers could not think of a question when called upon. One asked Red Moore, “What was the hardest part of playing in the Negro Leagues?” Red Moore was a first baseman in the late 1930s. He played defense with style. He would catch throws behind his back during infield practice. “You listen to him, children, because this is Red Moore and he could really play,” Buck said. “He could really pick it. That’s what we say in baseball. He could pick it.” Buck looked over at Red Moore, who nodded and smiled. Red was almost eighty-nine years old.

Moore said that he remembered restaurants would not let him eat. He said that was the hardest part. They were hungry. James Lee nodded. “We ate luncheon meat on the buses,” Lee told the kids. “We ate crackers on the buses. Sometimes we didn’t eat at all. It was hard. We were treated like we were…less than men.”

He said the last words softly, as if he regretted saying them even while speaking them. Buck looked out at the kids, many of whom were still waving their arms, hoping to be called upon. He stood up. And he said, “I can see the way you look. Oh yeah. You listened to that and you think that the Negro Leagues was inferior. The Negro Leagues was not inferior.”

He stomped his foot. The kids stopped waving their arms. Buck’s eyes looked bloodshot.

“Don’t feel sorry for us,” he said, now so softly that only the children in the front row could hear. “We had a great time.”

T
HE PRINCIPAL SAID
there was time for one more question and a little boy in the front row wearing an army fatigue shirt asked Buck why it was that blacks and whites hated each other. Buck looked deep into the boy’s eyes. Buck called him “son.”

 

Son, there never was a time

Everybody hated everybody.

Never so.

Always good white folk.

Always good black folk.

Remember, son.

Don’t let hate fill your heart.

Always more good people

Than bad

In this world.

 

T
HE CAR CIRCLED
back and crisscrossed Atlanta Peachtrees, until we somehow reached Turner Field, the ballpark where the Atlanta Braves played. In front were giant numbers with baseballs on them. These were the uniform numbers the Atlanta Braves had retired. Buck did love uniform numbers. He tried to guess the player behind each number.

21: “Well, let’s see here, that’s gotta be Warren Spahn.”

Right.

“Great pitcher. Great man. Warren Spahn. Threw the screwball. Pitchers don’t throw screwballs anymore—it’s too hard on the arm. Everybody’s worried about getting hurt. That’s the money. Players are better now than they were in my day. They’re bigger and stronger and faster. But we would do anything to get you out. There was no money. We played to win.”

41: “I don’t know, who is that?”

Eddie Mathews.

“Oh, sure, great hitter. Lots of power. He hit a ball over the tree at Ponce de Leon Park.”

44: “Oh, well, that’s Hank Aaron, of course. I remember the first time I saw Henry Aaron. He was playing shortstop for the Indianapolis Clowns. He looked like a little kid. He couldn’t have weighed a hundred and fifty pounds. I asked their manager, Piggy Barnes, ‘Who’s the kid?’ He just smiled and said, ‘You’ll see.’

“So this kid comes up, and I tell our pitcher to throw his best fastball. The kid bangs a ball off the right-field wall. Kid comes up again, and I tell our next pitcher to throw
his
best fastball, and the kid hits it off the center-field wall. I tell our last pitcher to throw him a curve, and he hits it off the left-field wall. All the time, Piggy Barnes is in the dugout just smiling.

“So after the game, I go see Piggy, and he’s telling me about this kid Aaron, how good he’s going to be, and this time I started smiling. He said, ‘What are
you
smiling about?’ I said, ‘Piggy, when you guys come to Kansas City later this year, Henry Aaron won’t be on your team.’ Sure enough, he was signed by the Milwaukee Braves days later.”

35: “I don’t know that number.”

“It’s Phil Niekro.”

“Oh, of course, of course. Threw the knuckleball. Outstanding pitcher.”

3: “That must be Dale Murphy. He’s an outstanding man.”

42: “And, of course, that’s Jackie Robinson. I was so proud when baseball retired his number for every team. That’s the way it should be. Jackie Robinson belongs to the world.”

B
UCK WAS TAKEN
to a conference room where he and a half dozen Negro Leagues players sat until the game began. The Atlanta Braves were having a special Negro Leagues celebration. More Major League teams were dedicating days to honor those who played from the Negro Leagues, and they all invited Buck to participate. He loved being around his old friends.