Podcast Review: Take Her Out to the Ballgame

The podcast I reviewed was from The Wisdom Project podcast on Soundcloud: Take Her Out to the Ballgame: Effa Manley and Negro League Baseball, 2016

https://soundcloud.com/the-wisdom-project/005-take-her-out-to-the-ballgame-effa-manley-and-negro-league-baseball

Topic: Effa Manley and the Negro League

This is podcast is an oral history interview with Effa Manley, the first African American woman to own a professional baseball team. She co-owned the Newark Eagles  from the Negro League with her husband Abe Manley. In this episode Effa Manley recounts the importance of Jackie Robinson and the integration of Major League Baseball on the Negro League and how they built up a successful business but, in the end, when the organization dissolved, they lost their players to the Major League Network and they didn’t pay them or even say thank you, as Effa notes.

                                                    Effa Manley, Photo from Wikipedia

How is the oral history/interview being used in the podcast, and how does it support the argument and historical narrative?

Oral history is so effective connecting us to stories you don’t hear much about in the mainstream. This oral history looks back at the historical record and it connects individual stories to the historical records and stories of people you don’t read about in textbooks, says Doug Boyd. This story includes learning about Jackie Robinson, a story about mainstream desegregation. In 1946 and 47, he became the first African American baseball player in the major leagues, due to having played in the Negro League. This oral history is a great way to see it from a behind the scenes lens at running a baseball team in the 1930’s.

Plaque for Effa Manley at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY. Manley was an executive in the Negro Leagues in the 1930s and 1940s and as of October 2021 was the only woman in the Hall of Fame, Creative Commons

What kind of music is being used (if any) and how does it complement the story?

The music is background music only in the beginning and the end and it’s very mellow music by Doug Boyd. In my opinion, this music didn’t complement the story. I would’ve selected something more upbeat and played it throughout the interview.

How is the podcast presented?

The podcast is presented as a dialogue with the interview layered in between his dialogue.

Do you think the podcast is a good form of presentation of the particular historical topic? Are there any pieces of information that are missing and that you would have liked to learn about? How do you like the podcast overall?

The podcast is a great presentation of this topic. I’m a big baseball fan and I was not familiar with Effa Manley so this was fascinating and very interesting to hear about. I particularly loved when Effa discussed how the Newark Eagles would go play winter baseball in Puerto Rico and how they accepted them with open arms. She mentioned they won the pennant and beat all the teams in Puerto Rico and because of that, her best players got work there (as well as Cuba).

I would’ve liked to have learned more about Effa’s day-to-day responsibilities and how involved she was with other team as well. I would’ve liked to learn more about her involvement of trading the players, player salaries, etc., more about the Negro league in general and her interactions with any of the more well known players similar to Jackie Robinson and her interactions with them.