[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 127 (Tuesday, September 16, 2003)]
[House]
[Pages H8231-H8234]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
{time} 1430
CELEBRATING THE LIFE AND ACHIEVEMENTS OF LAWRENCE EUGENE ``LARRY'' DOBY
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and agree to
the concurrent resolution (H. Con. Res. 235) celebrating the life and
achievements of Lawrence Eugene ``Larry'' Doby.
The Clerk read as follows:
H. Con. Res. 235
Whereas on December 12, 1923, Larry Doby was born in
Camden, South Carolina and moved to Paterson, New Jersey in
1938, where he became a standout 4 sport athlete at Paterson
Eastside High School;
Whereas Larry Doby attended Long Island University on a
basketball scholarship before enlisting in the United States
Navy;
Whereas in 1943, Larry Doby was the first African American
to play professional basketball for the Paterson Panthers, a
member of the American Basketball League;
Whereas after playing baseball in the Negro League for the
Newark Eagles, Larry Doby's contract was purchased by Bill
Veeck of Major League Baseball's Cleveland Indians, a member
of the American League, on July 3, 1947;
Whereas on July 5, 1947, Larry Doby became the first
African American to play professional baseball in the
American League;
Whereas Larry Doby played in the American League for 13
years, appearing in 1,533 games and batting .283, with 253
home runs and 969 runs batted in;
Whereas in 1948, Larry Doby was the first African American
to win a World Series and the first African American to hit a
home run in the World Series;
Whereas Larry Doby was voted to play in 7 All Star games
and led the American League in home runs for two seasons;
Whereas in 1978, Larry Doby became the manager of the
Chicago White Sox, only the second African American manager
of a Major League team;
Whereas Larry Doby was the Director of Community Relations
for the National Basketball Association's New Jersey Nets,
where he was deeply involved in a number of inner-city youth
programs;
[[Page H8232]]
Whereas Larry Doby resided, was active in the community,
and raised his family in Montclair, New Jersey;
Whereas Larry Doby received honorary doctorate degrees from
Princeton University, Long Island University and Fairfield
University; and
Whereas Larry Doby was elected to the National Baseball
Hall of Fame in 1998: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate
concurring), That the House of Representative--
(1) expresses profound sorrow on the death of Lawrence
Eugene ``Larry'' Doby, and extends condolences to his family;
(2) expresses its deep appreciation to Larry Doby and his
family for the impact that he made in pioneering civil rights
by breaking down racial barriers in baseball and in America;
and
(3) commends Larry Doby as a courageous leader, a role
model, and a paradigm of the American Dream.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Simpson). Pursuant to the rule, the
gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) and the gentleman from
Illinois (Mr. Davis) each will control 20 minutes.
The Chair recognizes the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn).
General Leave
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members
may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their
remarks on H. Con. Res. 235.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the
gentlewoman from Tennessee?
There was no objection.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, House Concurrent Resolution 235, introduced by my
distinguished colleague, the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell),
celebrates the life and achievements of Lawrence Eugene ``Larry'' Doby.
Mr. Speaker, I am proud that the House is considering this
legislation that honors an American hero we just do not know as much as
we should about. We all know the story of Jackie Robinson, who
courageously abolished the color barrier in major league baseball by
first playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. What many may not have
learned is that 3 months later, in July of 1947, Larry Doby became the
first black player in the American League when he suited up for the
Cleveland Indians.
As the first black player in American League history, the pressures
and prejudices Doby experienced were heartbreaking. His Hall of Fame
Indians teammate, Bob Feller, described Doby as a sensitive man and
added, the way many fans and other players treated him was very tough.
Doby spoke with Jackie Robinson frequently during his early major
league playing days. He recounted to the L.A. Times in 1974 that by
talking about the issues he and Robinson faced, that ``Maybe we kept
each other from giving up.'' Since Doby was a gentleman, he once said,
``I couldn't react to prejudicial situations from a physical
standpoint. My reaction was to hit the ball as far as I could.'' And he
did that, channeling that energy to greatness.
Indeed, not only did Doby bravely change minds with his mere presence
on the field, he also turned heads with his outstanding play. He won a
World Series title with the Cleveland Indians in his first full year in
1948. During the season, he hit an average 301 with 16 home runs, and
he led the club with a .318 average during the 1948 World Series. He
finished his historic career with 253 home runs and 970 runs batted in.
In 1998, Larry Doby was deservedly inducted into the baseball Hall of
Fame.
Mr. Speaker, America sadly lost Larry Doby in June at the age of 79.
On behalf of this entire House, I offer my sincere condolences of all
Members to the friends and the family of Larry Doby.
America has long had a deep obsession with sports, and there is
little doubt that the common goals of athletics have had a profound
impact on race relations in this country.
In 1947, Larry Doby inducted himself to the all-white baseball world
as a courageous man with an awe-inspiring lefthanded swing. His bravery
unquestionably opened the door of opportunity to many players from so
many backgrounds, all the way to this present day. But beyond the
baseball field, Larry Doby helped to prove that a person's skin color
has nothing to do with his or her abilities at a time when America
needed to learn that lesson.
For all these reasons, Mr. Speaker, I hope this resolution is seen as
a fitting tribute to a man that all of us still owe a debt of
gratitude. I urge all Members to support the adoption of House
Concurrent Resolution 235, and I congratulate the gentleman from New
Jersey for his work on this measure.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join with the gentlewoman from Tennessee
in consideration of H. Con. Res. 235, celebrating the life and
achievements of Lawrence Eugene ``Larry'' Doby.
Mr. Speaker, Larry Doby, who broke the color barrier in the American
League in 1947, 3 months after Jackie Robinson became the first black
in modern major league baseball, died on Wednesday, June 18 in
Montclair, New Jersey. He was 79 years old.
Born on December 13, 1923 in Camden, South Carolina, Larry Doby was
also the first player to jump straight from the Negro leagues to the
majors. He was signed by the Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck. He
later integrated Japanese baseball in 1962 and went on to become the
sport's second black manager and one of its first black executives.
However, it was in his role as the second black player in baseball
that Larry Doby had his most significant impact on professional
athletics. Larry Doby was an all-State athlete in football, basketball,
and baseball in high school. He then continued his athletic career at
Long Island University. When Bill Veeck, who was determined to
integrate his team, sought to sign a black player, Larry Doby was his
obvious choice. He had led the Negro National League with a batting
average of .458 and 13 home runs.
Like Jackie Robinson, Doby faced extraordinary pressures that first
season, including open hostility from teammates and opposing players.
Larry Doby and Jackie Robinson formed a close relationship through
their lifetimes. Doby's debut opened the way for three more blacks to
enter the majors within a month, and made it clear that baseball was on
a permanent course toward integration. His presence as a player for the
Indians also contributed to the more general cause of civil rights for
blacks when Washington's exclusive Hotel Statler, formerly whites-only,
permitted Larry Doby to room with his team.
In 1948, he batted an impressive .301 with 14 home runs and 65 runs
batted in. He led the Indians to a victory over the Boston Braves in
the World Series, becoming the first black to play on a World Series
championship team. He later led the American League in home runs in
1952 and again in 1954. When he retired after 13 seasons with the
Indians, White Sox, and Detroit Tigers, he had a formidable career
batting average of .285 and 253 lifetime home runs. For his
achievements, he was elected to baseball's Hall of Fame in 1998.
Doby became the Indian's manager in 1978 and later became a special
assistant to Dr. Gene Budig, the President of the American League.
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, when blacks were welcome on the
baseball field and in the stands but not in the front office, Larry
Doby continued to push for expanded opportunities for people of color.
Lawrence Eugene Doby was a great American and his life and
achievements make him worthy of this recognition today. I would like to
commend the sponsor of this resolution, the gentleman from New Jersey
(Mr. Pascrell), and I urge swift passage.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, at this point I reserve the balance of
my time.
Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, it is my pleasure to yield such
time as he may consume to the sponsor of this resolution, the gentleman
from Paterson, New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell).
Mr. PASCRELL. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the gentleman from
Illinois. I want to thank also the gentlewoman from Tennessee. Both of
my colleagues I think struck appropriate words about a great American,
a great American.
[[Page H8233]]
This resolution, this concurrent resolution honors the life and
achievements of Lawrence Eugene ``Larry'' Doby. He left this Earth just
a few months ago. His wife died a few years ago. They were inseparable
individuals. I know one can read about the history of Larry Doby and
one can hear about it and see it in film, but there is something that
is spoken today that one will not find in those documentations.
Mr. Speaker, in our commercial world of endorsements, free agents,
$6.50 a beer at a ball game, and Astroturf, I want to pause today to
praise the great stature of a man who played baseball when baseball was
baseball. He was more than a civil rights leader. He was more than a
Hall of Fame baseball player. He was a Hall of Fame human being. To
him, to Larry Doby, community was critical. No man was living on an
island.
I am so proud to be a resident, a lifelong resident of Paterson, New
Jersey, and I always say one ``T'', because that is where Larry made
his fame, at East Side High School. He was a star in four sports, and
he achieved. He attended Long Island University, went into the Navy,
served this country, served this country, and came out and played minor
league baseball for a while on teams where you had to be all one color.
So he made the movement and was asked to come aboard the Cleveland
Indians, just after Jackie Robinson, 3 months prior, became a part of
the Brooklyn Dodgers. And many fans never saw him play because
obviously there was not inter-league play at that particular time. And
we know what happened with Jackie Robinson when he went to the Brooklyn
Dodgers: They even changed the camp where they trained, got it away
from people so there would be no problems. And we know that Larry Doby,
when he came into the American League, some of his own teammates
isolated him, ignored him.
He was grateful to the owner of the Cleveland Indians, Bill Veeck.
Mr. Speaker, there always has to be somebody who is willing to make the
change. There always has to be somebody that runs point and who is
willing to say, this is the right thing. This is the thing we need to
do. We should have done it a long time ago. It should not have had to
be done. This should be a natural process of growing up in the greatest
of all democracies.
{time} 1445
It was not. So this young man who came out of Camden, South Carolina,
came to Paterson with his family when he was 15 years of age, found
himself at the center of a tremendous amount of attention, and he
deserved it. But to the end he remained modest, and he was a gracious,
true gentleman, unlike some of the bravado that we hear in sports today
when we hold up Nike sneakers. This is a man of a different age but a
man for all ages. Beyond the record that he broke, beyond the sports
world, Larry Doby was a good person, beautiful family, a great career.
Responsive to the community he lived in, Paterson and then Montclair,
New Jersey, where he passed. And Helen who passed 2 years ago, every
time you saw Larry Doby you saw everyone. Every time you saw Helen, you
saw Larry Doby. Our thoughts are with Larry's surviving children,
Larry, Jr., Leslie Feggan, Kimberly Martin, Susan Robinson, and
Christina Fearington. And I had the privilege, as many of us did back
in 1998 on this floor to have a post office, the main post office in
our county, named after Larry Doby.
Just a few months before he passed from this Earth we all stood at
Eastside Park and commemorated, and it was like a 15-year old young man
who had just come to Paterson, we commemorated a baseball field with
the stands and everything, Larry Doby Field. And Larry insisted that we
would lock the field when it was not being used because he wanted it to
remain a baseball field, and it has. People go there with respect. A
great statue, a great statue right in front of this great ballpark.
I want to thank the Speaker. I want to thank the ranking member. I
want to thank the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn).
Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may
consume.
Mr. Speaker, I appreciate so much the remarks that have been made
about Larry Doby and his career. We recognize the importance of Larry
Doby. As the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell) was saying,
Jackie Robinson and Shoeless Joe Jackson, and we talk about the
importance of having heroes, and these were men who were heroes, and
how important that we honor Larry Doby. So I commend my colleague from
New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell) for introducing the resolution.
Mr. Speaker, I have no further speakers, and I yield back the balance
of my time.
Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Brown), where Larry Doby played much of his
ball.
Mr. BROWN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Illinois
(Mr. Davis) and the gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn), and I
thank particularly the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell) for his
sponsorship on this piece of legislation.
I stand also to honor Larry Doby. I saw Larry Doby after his career
in Cleveland for the White Sox had finished. My dad took me as a 6-
year-old kid to see Larry Doby, and I saw him play then and met him
later for a moment when he threw out the first pitch of the House
baseball game.
Larry Doby in some sense was as courageous or even more courageous
than Jackie Robinson. I asked a group of people as I was walking
through an office earlier today what they knew about Larry Doby. These
people were in their twenties and thirties. They knew almost nothing of
him. Several people had heard of him. They knew he was a baseball
player. They knew very little else.
Larry Doby was the second African American player to play major
league baseball, the first in the American League. As I said, in some
sense he was as courageous, maybe even more courageous than Jackie
Robinson. In his words, and he said with certainly no bitterness but
just as an observation, Larry Doby said, The only difference between
us, Jackie Robinson and himself, was that Jackie Robinson got all the
publicity. You did not hear much about what I was going through because
the media did not want to repeat the same story, the same story they
had written not long before.
He said, ``I could not react to prejudicial situations from a
physical standpoint. My reaction was to hit the ball as far as I
could.''
He had the same kinds of anger and bitterness and racist catcalls and
violent behavior all aimed at him as Jackie Robinson did, and he was
every bit the hero that Jackie Robinson was.
As the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Pascrell) and the gentleman
from Illinois (Mr. Davis) pointed out, he also changed not just
baseball history, but he helped as a pioneer in pulling this country
together, a pioneer in beginning to start to erase the racial prejudice
in this country. He did it in a variety of ways. He did it as a
baseball player in the way he played. He also did it with the strength
in which he played. He also did it as a manager, and also in his
professional and personal life back in Paterson. But he also did it in
a way that is interesting.
In the spring of 1947, Bill Veeck, the Indians' general manger,
understanding that Larry Doby was going to be playing, moved spring
training camp to Arizona, away from the South, understanding that it
would make things a little bit more even tempered, if you will, for
Larry Doby to deal with.
So then the Brooklyn Dodgers moved their training camp from Florida
to Havana, Cuba, again to deal with some of those problems, and the New
York Giants moved their training camp from Florida to Arizona, and that
is the advent of spring training being held in different areas around
the country.
He was a pioneer. He changed not just the baseball world, he changed
society. All of us should be proud of what Larry Doby did.
In my City of Cleveland where he played his best, most important
baseball, he played in two World Series, made a difference in the last
time the Indians won the World Series in 1949, but more importantly,
what he did later with his life in Paterson, New Jersey, throughout the
baseball world, and what he contributed to this country.
Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank everybody
who
[[Page H8234]]
participated in this debate. Larry Doby was indeed a great athlete but
an even greater American.
Ms. JACKSON-LEE of Texas. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor Larry
Doby, the first African American to play professional baseball in the
American League. It is important that Congress acknowledge and
appreciate the accomplishments of someone who has broken the color
barrier and added diversity to an otherwise segregated sport.
Larry Doby was an extraordinary individual and a sports legend that
broke through barriers by becoming the second African American to play
professional baseball, but the first in the American League.
We are all well aware of Jackie Robinson, the first African American
to play professional baseball. He is a hero that we teach our children
about. His efforts for integration and the struggle for racial equality
provide lessons that we strive never to forget. Similarly, Larry Doby
endured a struggle that was no less heroic or difficult. He too should
remain in our memory and his story told to our children.
Born in Camden, S.C., Larry Doby lost his father when he was just 8
years old. His family moved to Paterson, New Jersey, when he was in his
teens. Larry Doby attended Long Island University on a basketball
scholarship before enlisting in the United States Navy.
In 1947, Larry Doby began his illustrious career with the Cleveland
Indians. Teammates recalled Mr. Doby as a man of quiet dignity who
never said an unkind word, even about those hostile to his joining the
Indians.
Larry Doby played in the American League for 13 years. He appeared in
1,533 games and batting .283, with 253 home runs and 969 runs batted
in. He was the first African American to win a World Series and the
first African American to hit a home run in the World Series. In 1998,
Larry Doby was elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
Apart from baseball, Larry Doby showed his integrity by being deeply
committed to his community. He deserves recognition not only for his
contribution to America's pastime, but also for his courageous
leadership and the inspiration he gave to millions of Americans as he
fought racism and served as an example of the American Dream.
In expression of his commitment, Larry served as the Director of
Community Relations for the NBA's New Jersey Nets. The position gave
Mr. Doby the opportunity to use his character and stature to influence
youth in many of New Jersey's inner cities.
Sadly, Larry Doby died on June 18, 2003 in Montclair, N.J. Let us
come together and express profound sorrow over the death of Larry Doby.
On behalf of the 18th congressional district of Texas, I extend my
condolences to his family and express my deep appreciation for the
impact Larry Doby made in the fight for racial equality. For that
reason, Mr. Speaker, I support H. Con. Res. 235 to celebrate the life
and achievements of Larry Doby.
Mr. DAVIS of Illinois. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my
time.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the
gentlewoman from Tennessee (Mrs. Blackburn) that the House suspend the
rules and agree to the concurrent resolution, H. Con. Res. 235.
The question was taken; and (two-thirds having voted in favor
thereof) the rules were suspended and the concurrent resolution was
agreed to.
A motion to reconsider was laid on the table.
____________________