This lot is closed. Bidding ended on 5/11/2001.
Before Hank Aaron gave chase to the ghost of Babe Ruth, before he hammered his way into the record books for smacking the most home runs (755), and knocking in the most runs (2,297), total bases (6,856) and extra-base hits (1,477), before he finished his career second in at-bats (12,364), tied for second with Babe Ruth in runs (2,174), and third in hits (3,771) and games played (3,298)...before any of that, Hank Aaron was just another scared kid hustling to make it to the big leagues. More daunting still, he was trying to make it as a young black man from the Deep South in a white man's game.In 1952, he quit high school and joined the Indianapolis Clowns of the Negro American League. It was during this time that he began keeping a scrapbook of newspaper clippings and collecting letters from the owner of the Clowns, Syd Pollock, who had to practically beg big league teams to give Aaron a shot. Pollock's letter tell the hard, sometimes heartbreaking story of a game still resistant to racial change five years after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier. They also tell of the personal grit and determination of Hank Aaron. This incomparable collection of historical material is a virtual library of Aaron's early years. Though the clippings are yellowed, it is as if reading them is a trip back in time, and a reminder that full equality in the game came at a hard price for those who had to pay it in order to be included. The bulging scrapbook covers much of Aaron's time spent in the Northern League, when he was Rookie of the Year for the Braves' Eau Claire, Wisconsin team, then when he was one of the first five black players in the South Atlantic League.