Oh Simone Buch

Black Baseball, 1858-1900

This is one of the most important baseball books to be published in a long time, taking a comprehensive look at black participation in the national pastime from 1858 through 1900. It provides team rosters and team histories, player biographies, a list of umpires and games they officiated and information on team managers and team secretaries. Well known organizations like the Washington's Mutuals, Philadelphia Pythians, Chicago Uniques, St. Louis Black Stockings, Cuban Giants and Chicago Unions are documented, as well as lesser known teams like the Wilmington Mutuals, Newton Black Stockings, San Francisco Enterprise, Dallas Black Stockings, Galveston Flyaways, Louisville Brotherhoods and Helena Pastimes. Player biographies trace their connections between teams across the country. Essays frame the biographies, discussing the social and cultural events that shaped black baseball. Waiters and barbers formed the earliest organized clubs and developed local, regional and national circuits. Some players belonged to both white and colored clubs, and some umpires officiated colored, white and interracial matches. High schools nurtured young players and transformed them into powerhouse teams, like Cincinnati's Vigilant Base Ball Club. A special essay covers visual representations of black baseball and the artists who created them, including colored artists of color who were also baseballists.

Makers of Jewish Modernity

A unique reference to leading Jewish figures who helped shape the modern world This superb collection presents more than forty incisive portraits of leading Jewish thinkers, artists, scientists, and other public figures of the last hundred years who, in their own unique ways, engaged with and helped shape the modern world. Makers of Jewish Modernity features entries on political figures such as Walther Rathenau, Rosa Luxemburg, and David Ben-Gurion; philosophers and critics such as Walter Benjamin, Hannah Arendt, Isaiah Berlin, Jacques Derrida, and Judith Butler; and artists such as Mark Rothko. The book provides fresh insights into the lives and careers of novelists like Franz Kafka, Saul Bellow, and Philip Roth; the filmmakers Joel and Ethan Coen; social scientists such as Sigmund Freud; religious leaders and thinkers such as Avraham Kook and Martin Buber; and many others. Written by a diverse group of leading contemporary scholars from around the world, these vibrant and frequently surprising portraits offer a global perspective that highlights the multiplicity of Jewish experience and thought. A reference book like no other, Makers of Jewish Modernity includes an informative general introduction that situates its subjects within the broader context of Jewish modernity as well as a rich selection of photos.

The American Antiquarian and Oriental Journal