“Bigotry is Bad for Business”: The Desegregation of Spring Training Camps in the Minnesota Twins Organization, 1960-1964

Abstract

The 1960s saw the beginning of the most difficult yet most progressive time for the civil rights movement. In 1960, young African-Americans and college students from across the country started a new movement amidst the civil rights movement; that of a non-violent movement. These new activists pushed the civil rights movement into overdrive, resulting in some of the most violent and shocking race events that the United States had ever seen. This new movement cast a large shadow over another rights issue in America: that of the integration of spring training camps in professional baseball. The issues that black players faced in spring training were quite similar to those blacks faced in society across America. In order for America to fully integrate, baseball’s spring training camps needed to be integrated as well. If it could not do that, then America would have to face a harsh reality: that its past-time would be forever tainted by discrimination and bigotry towards its own citizens.