4/24/08

Baseball creates legends both big and small

by Dennis Gibson

Even if you’re not a huge fan of baseball, you should know about Jackie Robinson. Yes, he’s the guy who broke the color barrier in Major League Baseball. Obviously a brave and skilled man with guts and the drive to succeed.

You’ve heard the story about how Brooklyn Dodger President Branch Rickey convinced Jackie to play for his Dodgers in 1947. Rickey was also a brave man for making such a bold move but he knew the time had come for the rules of segregation, in baseball at least, to be broken. Rickey knew what he had and he went about working Robinson’s talent into a team that might not accept him.

Rickey knew, however, that a conversation with shortstop and team captain PeeWee Reese would help break the stagnant force of prejudice on the Dodgers and in all of baseball. Reese did his job and most teammates embraced Jackie. Robinson’s inspired play showed immediately why Rickey had signed him. Jackie played second base, right next to Reese. It was an all-star combo from the start.

Robinson grew up as a poor kid in a large, single parent family. He learned to make his own way in life.  That included accomplishing something that had never been done before and not many times since. He lettered in four sports at UCLA--football, baseball, basketball and track. It was obvious at an early age that he was very gifted as an athlete. He was also a proud and determined man who refused to give in to the hypocrisy of segregation.

J. Herman Cooper was another black American who played baseball for the love of the game. I never heard of him until the 1980s when I met this scholarly, short, smiling man in his 100% wool suit on a hot day in the California High Desert. I drove into the town of California City preparing to take a job as a sports editor for the weekly paper. As a part of my orientation, I decided to tour the town and get the lay of the land. There wasn’t a lot to see in those days, but I did run into this magnificent park with two baseball diamonds and a softball diamond.

The fields were immaculate and one of the diamonds had lights and a refreshment stand. This was where the kids played baseball and there was a lot of family support for the Little League program.

As I drove away, I noticed a sign that said something like “Welcome to the J. Herman Cooper baseball complex.” Who was J. Herman Cooper, I asked myself? I had never heard of him. But it wasn’t long before I met this most courageous and compassionate 70-year-old man.

Herman, as everyone called him, grew up in the south of Alabama in a dirt shack with a bunch of siblings. It was obvious that he was a bright child and schooling, what there was of it, was easy for him. He loved to play baseball and that was his salvation from the hardships life provided for him. He managed to get through high school and into college. He worked hard and studied hard and finally received a college degree. 

He tried his hand in the Negro leagues and had some success, playing a year with the Kansas City Monarchs, then considered the best team in Negro baseball. Teams in the Negro Leagues carried two pitchers, a utility player and a second catcher. Herman was the second catcher. He played behind Josh Gibson, the legendary player who set so many Negro League records. On one occasion Herman was behind the plate, catching the great Satchel Paige.

After a couple of years, he decided he had to find something else to support his family. He went back to Alabama and took a job as the superintendent of the school district. Sounds pretty impressive until you learn he was the only employee of the district. He taught all the grades in a one-room schoolhouse. He was also the bus driver and the janitor.

He never complained. He did his job and taught the kids to play baseball. He managed to get his daughter into college and she graduated with a degree in education. She applied for and got hired as an elementary teacher in California City. She was able, along with her husband, to raise enough money to bring her parents to California City and the rest is history.

On arrival, Herman was used to the heat of the high desert and quickly settled into life in the town. He became a substitute teacher in the school system and taught the kids how to play baseball. The town was so enamored with this diminutive little man, who always wore his wool suit because he thought all gentlemen should. He carried his “old” catcher’s mitt whenever he went to the complex named in his honor. Each year as Little League started in California City, Herman would walk behind home plate in his wool suit with his black glove that was so small and round it looked like he was catching with a round chocolate cake. He’d squat down in his catcher’s stance and receive the first pitch of the new season from the mayor of the town.

I spent many an evening at the ballpark covering Little League games but I always sought out my friend Herman when he was there. He would attend as many games each season as his health would allow, always sitting behind home plate in his suit and tie while he caressed his glove with a baseball carefully placed in what would now be the glove’s web.

I could sit for hours in the presence of this humble man listening to his lessons on life, and how he once played baseball with Josh Gibson and Satchel Paige. He was a man of history who made sure his own family’s future was even better.