Bill_Blair_(Negro_Leagues_pitcher)

Bill Blair (1940s pitcher)

Bill Blair (1940s pitcher)

American baseball player


William Blair (October 17, 1921 – April 20, 2014) was a Negro league pitcher.[1]

Quick Facts Teams ...

Blair graduated Booker T. Washington High School in Dallas and briefly attended Prairie View A&M University. He began his baseball career at the age of 16, playing for a barnstorming team in Mineola, Texas, and went on to join the United States Army, where he became the youngest African American to serve as a first sergeant in the Army during World War II.

He pitched from 1946 to 1951, for teams including the Indianapolis Clowns, Cincinnati Crescents, and was a player-manager for the Dallas Black Giants. He played against players such as Cool Papa Bell, Satchel Paige, and Hilton Smith. After retiring from baseball, he became a fixture in the community, running a local newspaper, the Elite News, and organizing golf tournaments and parades. He died in Campbell, Texas in 2014.[2]

William Blair Park in South Dallas, formerly Rochester Park, was named after him.


References

  1. "Negro Leagues Baseball eMuseum: Personal Profiles: William Blair". Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2015-04-21.



Share this article:

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Bill_Blair_(Negro_Leagues_pitcher), and is written by contributors. Text is available under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.