Elston Howard did not act like radical, but so what?

Elston Howard is portrayed in the movie "61*" about the Yankees' campaign of 1961. The movie title is not a reference to the year, but to the number of home runs hit by Roger Maris. If you're not familiar, the asterisk in the title is not a typo. The asterisk, back when the events were current, was a hint that Maris' homer total was tainted as a record.
Horrors! But true fans knew the truth all along. Maris was "our guy" appealing to our generation, and Billy Crystal made a labor of love movie about it. It would be mean to diminish Babe Ruth of course. But fickle and irrational are the judgments often pronounced by sports fans.
If you think "life isn't fair," then maybe you should step into a time machine and experience pro baseball in the pre-Andy Messersmith case days. Or an even better example, to be a player of color in the Neanderthal bygone times. Hard to believe the U.S. ever crossed that turf.
Imagine stepping in a time machine and experiencing those prejudices again. The great documentary of the VHS tape days, "When It Was a Game," had a narrator dramatically confessing about the lack of race enlightenment in his young days. He lamented with obvious pain how he "didn't notice, didn't complain" at the time of segregated ball. He said the race separation was applied at all levels of big league ball, well into the non-player tiers.
If man can be so blind and ignorant, it's a firebell about how we need to be vigilant about the future, lest we someday have to confess about other huge sins. Climate change? Well, one wonders.
I cite Elston Howard at the start of this post because, unfortunately, I have carried a negative view of the man all my life. I was influenced by the revolutionary baseball book "Ball Four" by Jim Bouton. Now, Bouton was most certainly a crusader for civil rights in a time when a significant portion of the young crowd was full of such unbridled passion on such things. That's defensible, yes.
Howard was not the type to yell "burn baby burn." Now more fully informed, I assess him as a restrained and temperate person who battled through the obvious roadblocks presented to players of color. Did we really used to live that way? People didn't even use the term "players of color." We know the incisive racist terms, but in the middle somewhere was the then-accepted "negro." I grew up when the term had currency. My, we heard the dripping-with-condescension phrase "what about all the good negroes?"
Major League baseball came to lose a lot of the African-American talent, as basketball seemed more inviting to many. Maybe football too. MLB came to rue the day, I'm sure, when African-Americans no longer cozied up to the game as much, because think of the incredible talent: from my youth, the likes of Willie Mays, Hank Aaron and Ernie Banks. My peers and I loved those guys and I swear we didn't feel a hint of racism.
 
Oh, don't say "Minnesota Nice"
I grew up as a fan of the Twins in the team's first decade of existence. Irony with our team, as our owner Calvin Griffith seemed like an unenlightened curmudgeon yet he certainly opened the door for lots of non-white talent. Was it because of Minnesota being more accepting? Not sure because old Calvin probably just sought the best talent available for the dollar! Bowie Kuhn in his autobiography would describe the Griffiths as "church mice" who would have to leave once big bucks really started getting into baseball.
I don't intend to disparage Jim Bouton in this piece - you can't put down a true journalistic pioneer, which the pitcher was, in spades.
Bouton in 1970 reflected the times, i.e. "burn baby burn" seemed palatable to him. Today it would not. But we've come so far.
Problem with Ball Four is that I'm not sure what all to believe. A common opinion of the late Bouton is that he was self-centered to a degree that he might be inclined toward embellishment or exaggeration. Unfortunately I came away from Ball Four with an impression of Elston Howard being rather an Uncle Tom. A much better perception is gained by doing the kind of research that the good ol' Internet affords us today.
Howard may not have been a big risk-taker in terms of presenting himself over the color barrier. But was it timidity - a restrained personality - or just that his task of succeeding in the majors was so daunting, it consumed him all by itself? The ascent of Howard must be interpreted by the factors just mentioned.
So today I am of a mood of unreservedly lionizing this man.
Bouton shared a story in Ball Four that was unflattering toward Howard, and then years later appeared almost to retract it. Strange. Bouton said his fundamental view of Howard had changed. Well, an awful lot changed between the tumultuous anti-war years of the '60s and the more relaxed subsequent years when so many of the good causes had actually won. Maybe it's hindsight to criticize the previous mindset, n'est-ce pas?

No easy path, regardless of deportment

A biographer of Mickey Mantle pointed out that Howard's basic diplomacy, a quality that evidently chafed on Bouton, was a necessity for Howard to make the jump to the majors. The Yankees were looking for certain qualities, and one of them was not rabble-rousing. Based on talent, maybe Vic Power should have been the first black guy in pinstripes. Power was not African-American, he was Puerto Rican, and in his youth did not experience race stigma on his island.
Power was an uninhibited, flamboyant kind of guy who scared off the Yankees' top brass. So unfortunate. Power would come to my Twins in '62 and earn team MVP honors, as my team placed second to New York! Yes, only five games out (but no wild cards yet, sob).
Elston Howard was a guest star for an episode of the old black and white Jimmy Dean variety show. In the Billy Crystal movie "61*," we see Howard standing by the batting cage next to Yogi Berra on season opener day, when BTW the Yankees played the Twins (and lost). The actor playing Yogi does a "Yogi-ism" with the English language. He says "ambidextrial" instead of "ambidextrous" re. Mickey Mantle. Howard says "oh" as courtesy. Thomas Jane as Mantle just smiled. The movie was a totally feel-good biopic. I'd suggest that Maris was not as lovable as seen in the movie - I think he had a somewhat sullen side and was never prepared for true celebrity. But it's all history: Maris hit 61 home runs and "Ellie" Howard had his career season, batting .348.

"Ellie" with Red Sox

Howard in later years helped the Boston Red Sox get past my Twins in the heartbreaking (for me) '67 season. Let's not forget the image of Howard in a Red Sox uniform.
Clete Boyer would claim that a story in "Ball Four" about Howard in a clubhouse meeting was made up, totally untrue. We can't be certain what all to believe.
Bouton was a pioneering writer and Howard was a trailblazing athlete of color. The late Elston deserves nothing less than undying gratitude from all. Bouton and Howard are both now plying their talents on that baseball diamond in the sky. No asterisks to worry about there.
 
Addendum: The Yankees' rejection of Vic Power was their loss. Power made his mark as maybe the best fielding first baseman ever, and how exciting it was to see him play with his special flourish as he would "sweep" his glove as a follow-through to taking a throw. Think of the flash this would have added to the Yanks of the Mantle-Maris era! Bill Skowron was going to be traded anyway. Power was knocking the cover off the ball in Triple-A when he should have been promoted on up.
 
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com

Elston Howard at right, posing with Earl Battey of "my" Minnesota Twins!