Baseball historian and famous author Phil S. Dixon of Belton, Mo., will highlight an event titled “The Kansas City Monarchs in our home town” Saturday, August 9 at Barnes and Noble at Vanderbilt University. The event, which starts at 7 p.m. and is free and open to the public, will provide an intriguing look back at local Negro League Baseball in Tennessee.
In honoring the Kansas City Monarchs’ 90th anniversary of their first World’s Championship in 1924, Dixon is returning to all 90 cities where they played games to present their unique history.
“This is my first appearance in Nashville and I’m looking forward to sharing the great relationship with the Kansas City Monarchs and the great players that pioneered baseball in the black community,” said Dixon.
He will talk about games the Monarchs played in Nashville against local competition–as well as discuss the history of African-American ball players from the community who participated in the Negro Leagues. Players like Bruce Petway, Tom Wilson and Frank Leland.
For more than thirty years, Dixon has recorded African-American sports topics with a vast array of in-depth skill and historical accuracy. He is widely regarded for his expertise on baseball history. He has authored nine prior baseball books and won the prestigious Casey Award for the Best Baseball Book of 1992. He received a SABR MacMillan Award for his excellence in historical research. Dixon is a co-founder of the Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City and formerly worked in the Public Relations office of the American League Kansas City Royals.
“It’s a tribute tour, a goodwill visit done with sports history. It is a 30-45 minute PowerPoint presentation with historic photographs, entertaining stories and colorful baseball poetry, which is followed by a book signing.
The tour began in January and will continue until 90 cities are reached.
Dixon is also an expert speaker on the topic of Jack Johnson, the first African-American heavyweight-boxing champion. He is completing his tenth book, Tommy Campbell, A boxing Bout with the Mobsters which is his first on boxing; his first inside look into the unethical relationship of boxing and organized crime in the lightweight division during the 1940s and 1950s.
