Just writing to say the blood will be on your hands.
Dear sir,
We the undersigned do hereby warn you not to put up Walker the Negro catcher the days you play in Richmond, as we could mention the names of seventy-five determined men who have sworn to mob Walker if he comes on the grounds in a suit. We hope you will listen to our words of warning, so there will be no trouble, and if you do not, there certainly will be. We only write this to prevent much bloodshed, as you alone can prevent.
From an anonymous letter to the Toledo Blue Stockings. A Blue Stockings pitcher once said of Moses Fleetwood Walker, the first African American to play in the major leagues, he “was the best catcher I ever worked with, but I disliked a Negro and whenever I had to pitch to him, I used to pitch anything I wanted without looking at his signals.”
St. Augustine and other early Christians challenged the Roman idea of charity by invoking the ultimate... More
