Enoch Pratt Free Library Podcast

Neil Lanctot teaches modern American history at the University of Delaware. Recipient of the Seymour Medal from the Society for American Baseball Research, he is the author of Negro League Baseball: The Rise and Ruin of a Black Institution. His new book, Campy: The Two Lives of Roy Campanella, is the first biography of the Dodger great in decades and the most authoritative ever published. Campanella played eight years in the Negro Leagues with the Washington (later Baltimore) Elite Giants. When he joined the Brooklyn Dodgers, he became the first African-American catcher in the 20th century in the major leagues. Campy was a mainstay of the great Dodger teams of the late 1940s and 1950s and was a three-time MVP. Following an automobile accident in 1958 which left him paralyzed below the neck, Roy Campanella became another sort of pioneer, learning new physical therapy techniques and becoming an inspiration to other athletes and physically handicapped people.Award-winning historian Rob Ruck teaches at the Univer