[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 3]
[House]
[Page 3247]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




               HONORING THE ACHIEVEMENTS OF MINNIE MINOSO

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Tennessee (Mr. Cohen) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. COHEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to honor a great baseball player 
and a baseball player who befriended me and was a great human being who 
passed away on Sunday, Saturnino Orestes Arrieta Armas, Minnie Minoso, 
the Cuban Comet, Mr. White Sox.
  Minnie Minoso was born in 1925 on November 29 in Cuba. He played 
baseball in Cuba, had the opportunity to come to America and play in 
the Negro Leagues for, being a Black Cuban, he wasn't allowed to play 
in the Major Leagues.
  He played 3 years with the New York Cubans, and then, Bill Veeck, who 
was one of the leaders, I guess, the American League's Branch Rickey, 
gave him an opportunity to play baseball in the Major Leagues. After 
playing in the Minors in San Diego, he came up with the Cleveland 
Indians, but was quickly traded to the Chicago White Sox, where he 
started his career in 1951, and became known as Mr. White Sox.
  He was a great White Sox baseball player, one of the greatest players 
of the 1950s, and a great emissary of Latin American baseballers. He 
was the first Black Latin American baseball player, he was the first 
Black White Sox player, and the second African American in the American 
League after Larry Doby.
  Minnie Minoso had a great career. He did everything in baseball. He 
hit for average, he hit for power, he had speed, he was a great 
fielder, a great competitor, and he was a great human being.
  In 1955, I was recovering from polio and I lived in Memphis, 
Tennessee. I went to an exhibition baseball game at Russwood Park, 
where the White Sox were playing the Cardinals. I had a White Sox cap, 
kind of like this one--this is a Minnie Minoso cap--and a White Sox T-
shirt, and I was on crutches, getting autographs.
  A player came and gave me a baseball, and I thanked him and I went to 
my dad and told my dad about it. We went down to thank the player. He 
was White, a pitcher named Tom Poholsky. He said: Don't thank me. Thank 
that player over there.
  That was number 9 for the White Sox, Minnie Minoso. In the entire 
baseball field of 50 players or more, one cared about a young boy with 
polio who was a White Sox fan and wanted to do something for him.
  But in segregated Memphis, a Black player didn't feel comfortable 
doing that, and he did it through a White player. It taught me, at a 
very early age, about the horrors of discrimination and prejudice and 
racism.
  Minnie became my friend. I visited him in Chicago and went into the 
White Sox locker room. He gave me his bat. When he came to Memphis, I 
visited him at the Lorraine Motel, which is where the Black players 
stayed, while the White players were at the Peabody.
  The Lorraine is where Dr. King was killed and now is a great civil 
rights museum in Memphis. This was another lesson in discrimination for 
me that taught me well and has taught me, to this day, to be vigilant 
against all forms of racism and discrimination.
  I followed Minnie my whole life. He was like part of my family. When 
we moved to Los Angeles, we went and visited him at Chavez Ravine. He 
came up to my dad and he said: Doc, how is the kid's leg? How is he 
doing?
  He always was concerned. He was a great human being and a great 
baseball player.
  He was denied one of his life's goals of being voted into the 
Baseball Hall of Fame. I tried to help him with that.
  Baseball made a mistake. They should have put Minnie in the Hall of 
Fame for being a great emissary of baseball and the first Latin 
American Black player, the first Latin American player, really, in the 
Big Leagues.
  He died Sunday. Visitation is Friday at Holy Family Church in 
Chicago. The funeral is Saturday.
  I will miss Minnie Minoso. He is a lesson in why sport are bigger 
than runs, hits, and errors. It is about human beings and humanity and 
young kids.
  Thank you, Minnie.

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