Previous KC guest gives us an update on the John Donaldson network. BIG NEWS!
Welcome to the kindness Chronicles, where we hope to inject the world with a dose of the Minnesota. Nice. That it desperately needs. Uh, here once again with, uh, trustee companions, Kevin gorg. Hello, Kevin. Hello, Johnny. Uh, Steve brown. Good day. Now we are with our old pal, Pete Gorton, baseball historian, extraordinaire. Pete was on, um, a couple, uh, I don't know, a year ago or maybe a little bit more with us in studio game. Yeah. November of last year. Yeah. You gave us some great information about what you're doing, What's been going on. Well, thanks for having me back, you guys. I do appreciate it. It's an ongoing effort that we work on, um, for John Donaldson and John Donaldson's legacy. Uh, just last Friday we found his 420. I'm sorry, four fifth win. Um, he has two. He's known to have 5,021 strikeouts. Which Pete? Pete, A year ago. November was a long time ago. Real quick, can we just go back for the people that didn't listen to, I mean, I mean, there were thousands that listened to it, but for those Yeah, I know probably your most popular ever It was. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'll give you a quick, I'll give you a quick rundown. Who, who are you? What the hell are you doing? What have you doing? My name Pete Gorton and, and, um, I'm a Negro League baseball historian. Um, and I used to go to college with Steve Brown back decades ago, Uhhuh. That was interesting. But ever. Then I've been working on a, uh, research project, which is about a guy named John Wesley Donaldson, and he was a left-handed. Um, he was African-American man and he pitched from 1908 to 1941 now. Oh, wow. And we just found another game that he played in 1941, uh, which extends his career for yet another season. So about 33 seasons. He played, um, on what's called a Barny tour, which means he's constantly traveling around, uh, between, again, 19 eight and 1940. So most of it is, uh, train traffic, some early cars. Uh, he a little bit of bus traffic, but, but bar Barnstorm, and he played with different teams. He was like an individual. Uh, he was like a phenomenon, right? He would just go play with different teams. He was like an individual player, right? He was a pitcher. That's right. He was, um, he was, for much of his career, he had loyalty to a couple different organizations, um, paid him so well, but he was known. To be one of the first guys who were kinda like a hired gun. Yeah, yeah. Uh, anybody who wanted to increase their attendance at their games, um, would hire John Donald and thousands and thousands of people would show up to watch. Um, was a known major League baseball player prior to. Major league baseball was segregated, uh, where black players had to play somewhere else, anywhere else, but in all white major leagues. So John Donaldson was subject to these rules, um, of segregation rule, and he played in over, therefore he played in over 765 different cities in the United States. Holy cow. Um, That's a lot and that's way up from the last time I talked to you guys. We reed that and counted more of the cities and it's 765. I'm not good at math, but that's a big number. You just, just try John and go to 765 different cities and then you tell me how long that's gonna take you because I have no idea it took John do. Somewhere around 35 years, uh, to travel and play baseball games in all those different towns, uh, that's quite a remarkable feat. If the color barrier doesn't exist in major league baseball, John Donaldson plays in maybe 12 cities. Because there were only 12 major league cities at that time. Uh, and so it's real, or 12 to 15, right? So it's not 765, it's more like 20 or 15 different cities. So that's, uh, cause of segregation. John Donald had to travel around to all these different places. And what he did subsequently was he proved that a black headlining starting pitcher, Could, uh, make money as a, as a headlining, barnstorming baseball player. No one had been able to prove that beforehand, who was an African-American person. He was a of, and he was something that, uh, we need to know more about today. And so that's why I appreciate you guys. Me. Yeah. I remember, um, I think it was, was it last year? Like he got some real momentum in the Hall of Fame? Conversations, is that That's correct. He was on the, uh, early game with the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Yep. Uh, and he was eight players. The final, and that was right around last, in order to get into the National Baseball Hall of Fame, he received eight votes and he needed 12. Um, in December of. For Enshrinement into Cooperstown. They, uh, have subsequently said that they're gonna try again in five to put more Negro League baseball players in. And so John's, uh, opportunity really to, uh, gain induction the Cooperstown Hall Baseball Hall of Fame, still available to him. And there's a path that has him in the baseball. What, what I, so, um, I had the, the book for the love of the Game, I think is, is that what the name of the book was? Yeah. I don't know. Um, yeah, there's a, a, a chapter in there. I think. Pete, you wrote the chapter, didn't you? Yeah. Yeah, I remember doing that. Yeah. you remember doing that, but my, my mother no, I'm just kidding. Of course. My mother, um, um, yeah, my mother knowing that I was a big baseball fan, had bought me that book, and it was just coincidental that That's right. I'm like, oh my God, Pete Gorton. I, I, I know that guy. You just talk to that guy. He just talked to that guy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know that dude, reading that story, how is it that he didn't get 12 votes? Who are the people, I mean, were they just not educated? Um, well that's what we do, John, as we try and, uh, you know, we're trying to educate people at every possible opportunity. Uh, this is an old story. Um, this is a story that people think they're familiar with, uh, because they have some experience and under maybe have seen the movie 42 about Jackie Robinson. Mm-hmm. or understand what segregation in the color barrier. Uh, but John Donaldson's really the exception to that. He is, um, completely segregated from playing at the highest levels of baseball. Uh, but he's beloved respected and is a hero to not only black people or black children of that time, but people all over the United States. Sure. Love John Donald. And that's a different. That's a juxtaposition to what is typically thought of when you think about African-American people at that time period. This is way, this is five to 30 years before Jackie Robinson. Wow. So did he play And before the Josh Gibsons of the world. He does, he plays with, uh, against, with and against Josh Gibson in the 1930s. Um, and, and with and against Satchel Page because he plays, uh, against almost everybody who's a hall of Famer, did he ever throw a baseball at, uh, not at, uh, with, uh, Ty Cob In the Box, or Babe Ruth in the Box. there is one known game, uh, it wasn't really popular for Major League stars at the time to be known to have playing barnstorming games with, uh, with black ball players. Okay. Uh, that was something that was frowned upon from the highest levels down. Oh, kidding. Um, cause they just wanted to keep it separate and society. That to be separate. Uh, and so the opportunities for him to play against guys like, uh, babe Ruth and, you know, names that everybody recognizes from that time period were very, but he, we do have one known game where the Kansas City Monarch John, known founding starting are where he does play against Babe Ruth. When Babe Ruth's traveling stars are come, are, are traveling across the. Uh, they stopped to play the Kansas City Monarchs once cause they heard about all these great black baseball players. And Babe Ruth just said, as long as we get a huge crowd, I don't care who we're playing against. And they did play against each other. So Babe Ruth was well aware of who the Great John Donaldson is. Uh, it's just a collective conscious and memory. Uh, Subsequently people have forgotten. And our society has done a tremendous job of helping us to forget who guys like John Donald were. Cause they wanna tell us at every turn that he's not important. He has lack significance. He played in very small town. He could not have been a great baseball player. If he would've been, he would've been playing at a major league level. There's no evidence to suggest, and we're talking somewhere around, uh, games that we, for this guy that's a. There's no evidence to suggest that he's not operating at a major league level for somewhere around 35 years. Uh, and that's an incredibly crucial part about this. But there was no way for him to be able to just, you know, walk down the street I'm gonna into and say, let's go play game. Would, there's, would've laughed and said, there's no way I'm playing. And that's just the way segregated society was Very frustrating. And that type of attitude was pervasive? Yeah. It happened in every industry. It happened in education. Yeah. It happened in every facet of life was separate and, and not equal. Yeah. It was. African Americans and keep the, um, people of color away from the traditionally white, uh, industries and, uh, businesses. Cause we wanna keep itseparate. And that's the way the color barrier lasted for 80 years. Um, was the, uh, The insistence and the really deep seated, uh, route of Jim Crow and what America was like at that time. Oh boy. Not, not good. So there is some really, really not like today for sure. Really cool news. Yes. We, we, we have, we have, uh, some really information, interesting information you came up with. Uh, you have some really great, exciting things to tell us about the John Donaldson network. Tell us what that is. Yeah. And that's why I hope I appreciate you guys having me on just yesterday. Yeah. Um, or, or, or John, I'm gonna quiz you. Ok. So you're ready? Yeah. I know we have a little bit fun on this show, so I wanna quiz you it. Do you know what a PlayStation is? I've, I'm familiar with one, but I can tell you I've never played a video game. What? No. You know, it's like a ABB up arrow, diamond. No, I, I, I'm familiar with the technology. And I'm familiar with like games specifically, you know, like I know about Madden and I know about mlb, the show, but uh, yeah, I knows a PlayStation. I'm not a game guy either. So just to admit that. Yeah, I'm not the game. You're not. But I know, it's so funny because I started talking about this yesterday. Sony PlayStation, makers of mlb, the show 2023, uh, announced that John Donaldson was going to be among the Negro League. It's the first group of neer league players that they're going to include in the game. That is goosebumps. I can't believe that that is so good. And that's an incredible thing because older dudes like ourselves. Um, Aren't really sure about video games and aren't really sure about that technology. We know it's gonna hang around since we had, uh, what did we have, uh, pong, Nintendo, and uh, uh, was that Pong, you know, the Nintendo 64 Pong is what you were growing up on? John I was, and me too. Atari. Atari, yeah. Atari. Yeah. Okay. You were lucky then. Geez. You're really, you're really special. Oh, we were very. Yeah. Very wealthy to get the entire game pack. Um, and, and, and, and, and you were the most popular kid in the neighborhood. I talked. I never had any of that stuff. I never had. Cause you went over to your buddy's house. I was afraid to space that I just didn't have hand-eye coordination. Pp you have to be flabbergasted by this news. This has to be pointing right to you. To to, to have helped make something like this happen. This is an amazing thing kids can now watch. it's, he's gonna be able to, he's a character in the game, right? He's one of the characters. Yeah. He's one of the people, one of the profiles. How do you feel about that, Pete? Well, I can tell you that we're very excited about it. Um, I'm personally very excited about it. I'm a guy, right? If you're gonna trying AMAs 2,500 games, right? I got somewhere around 30,000 pieces of paper that had John do's. I mean, so I'm collecting lots and lots and lots of data and information. Yeah. Um, what this does, uh, here, that has been historical record. Yeah. Right. I, it happened in, happened in, happened on back then the PlayStation in the, um, and the mlb, the show game are really the genesis of his fake. Um, and that's a really important thing to me because I know what his real career was. Yeah. Uh, and you're gonna get a whole nother layer, uh, and a whole segment of society who loves to play video games that are going to start talking to John about his fake video game numbers. And cause that's on their screen and they tend to AMAs, uh, and continue to keep track of them well, uh, just the way we had historically, except all of these are gonna be fictional games. So I, I have a question about John as a pitcher. Was he a, was he a power pitcher? Did he throw slop? What was, what was his game? Who would we compare him to today? He was a lefty. Right? Well, Yeah, he, he was, uh, you know, and you, you sort of, uh, your career evolves, right? Especially, he was a left-handed pitcher. He was six feet tall, which was super tall at that time. Mm-hmm. um, I mean like a giant. And they called him a giant, um, because people grow much larger. John Donald was, um, I mean, some of us grew larger than others. Yeah. You're here, Steve, come on. Yeah. Easy. But the, uh, uh, and so he was, uh, a lefthanded pitcher. Uh, he had five pitches. Uh, he started early in his career as a dominant pass ball pitcher. And they said things like when he threw the ball, it looked like a. Like a piece float throwing at the plate or the size of a golf ball, not the size of a baseball. Cause it's moving extraordinarily fast. Um, and so he hundreds if not thousands of strikeouts on his fast ball, but he was, uh, innovator of the, of the sport itself. He, uh, was one of the first known people to throw, it's called a slider. It looks like a fastball, but that's the very end. It tails off or it. Um, and that's a part of John Donaldson's legacy. He knew how to through throw five different major league quality pitches, and he's doing that in small town Minnesota, um, in Iowa and all these 765 places that he went to. Um, And everybody recognized that he didn't belong there. Wow. He was just there because of the color barrier and everybody knew that. Uh, and so thousands of people would come to watch him who couldn't and wouldn't have access to major leaks. And so you mean it would be the same thing? Is it Byron from the Twins was all of a sudden playing on. Senior mens league rights, you just go, this guy doesn't belong here. It's one of these things not like the other. Well, exactly. And, and ball players understand and know that, and so we know who's playing, um, uh, who they are, uh, what their skills are. We underst if ball players know who the best player on the. At all. Uh, and that's just something ball players know, but John was that guy. So Pete, so he's subject to all these, uh, terrible, uh, Jim Crow laws and all of these, uh, things that are thrust upon him and he somehow makes it out the other side and becomes the first black scholar in Major League baseball history from Chicago White Sox in 19 nine. Um, he goes on to have this astonishing career to. To the tune of he has more wins, 4 25 and more strikeouts, 5,220. Than any black pitcher in the history of baseball. Wow. And this is because we found every single one of those, and when I say that, I talk about the Donaldson Network. And the Donaldson network is a group of over researchers and individuals who have contributed to this. I said I had somewhere around 30,000 pieces of paper in my basement. I didn't find all those myself. I would ask people to help me find these things. And this is what made John brought John Donaldson back and now the mlb the show is bringing him back. Okay. Really to life now. And I need, I need to interrupt you. So, okay. Pete, you're clearly you and your network, but you only had some passion. Yeah. He have a lot of passion, but you clearly, the, the expert on John Donaldson, now they're, they've got a game. With him as a character. Were you? Yes. Were you, did you talk to someone about this? Were you, uh, did you help in any way with this? Oh, absolutely. You're gonna also notice that once it comes out, which is on March 28th, it's available for pre-order right now at PlayStation. Okay. Um, you can order that if you want to. Uh, But yeah, we gave, you'll notice that John Donaldson's reputation and John Donaldson's, uh, character within the game has the best pictures ok. Has the most clear pictures. We'll have all the things that we need. They essentially had, uh, access to all of our files. Okay. I showed'em a couple, uh, hundred different pictures. They picked out 20 or so, and those are now included in the game. Cool. So, wow, this photograph that you put on, uh, LinkedIn, That's not a Yeah, that's not a photograph of him. That's a No, it's a graphic. No, that's the, yeah, that's the rendition from the, uh, PlayStation San Diego people. They, that's how cool. They're God. It looks like a photograph. Yeah. That's what looks like Clearly. You haven't played the show to No, I don't. I don't play. That's, you should see how they look now. It's amazing. That's unbelievable. Yeah, so, so it is unbelievable. It isn't the, um, you know, rather clunky Coleco vision. Guys, you used to have I never had any of'em. Right? They looked kinda white. I was not privileged like you, Pete Yeah, yeah. No, I wasn't either. My parish wouldn't let us have it either. We had to go over to my friend Eric's house who had a, uh, he had an Nintendo, my friend John Nintendo. Anyway, all right, so, so, so we probably ruined his life. So is this what he looked like? Is this, what, is this what John Donaldson looked like? Yes, absolutely. Oh my God, this is so cool. You're bringing it back. Okay, so did they reach out to you? Well, that's the point. How did this hap Pete, you gotta tell us how this happened. Like how did you become, I, I know how you've become a histor, you've been doing this for many, many years. You're passionate about this guy and this game, obviously, but, and you've met the family, you've been to his hometown, you've done all kinds of things. How did, yeah. What's the crux of this? How did this. PlayStation. Yeah. Well, segregation. No, no, no. Um, PlayStation, how did the, the game become, how the PlayStation happen? It come to fruition. Well, here, listen, but I mean, on a larger scale, you guys, cause of segregation, we don't have a common knowledge of who the guy is. Right. You know who is, you might even know who Cool Papa Bell. Or Josh Gibson. Yeah. Or anybody who was segregated and put into the Negro League. Right. You might know some of them. And about 47 or so, 50 or so, those folks have been inducted National Baseball Hall fame. So they have achieved certain levels of, uh, people who know them. Right. But cause John Donald traveled around so much, his legacy was in small towns all across this. And so what the Donaldson network was able to do, we started in, uh, about the year 2000. Uh, so 20 some odd years ago, uh, we started filling in everywhere he went, Uhhuh, for a 40 year period. How did he get on PlayStation? Pete, we know all this, Pete, you told us. We love that, but we, we wanna know how the game. I know how the game happened. No, we don't wanna know how the game happened. How did he get on the game? Yeah, that's what I'm saying. How did, how did John Thomas, well, he got it. He got on the game because he has the most wins and the most strikeouts of any pitcher in the history of the game. And, and who, how did, just because of the John Donaldson network is how they became aware of this? Yes. Cause we found, we proved that John Donaldson was great. Thank where the baseball hall fame has passed on his name for going on 50 consecutive years. Um, a little bit longer than that. He is now known, and so these opportunities are becoming available to us because we have been able to, uh, Factually fill in his career. And that's, uh, truth. So cool. We're able to tell the truth about who he was and what he did, and people say that's really amazing reason it's. No one took the time to sit down for 20 years and figure all this out. And that's what we were able to do. And so he makes it to mlb the show 2023 cause he's the largest omission from the baseball hall he's deserving of. In terms that's really cool players. This has gotta have an impact on, on those four. My job is to teach you who he was clearly, um, was to teach you who he was and teach a whole nother generation of people who are. Clearly not you guys. um, teach them about who he was. And this is entree for people to know more about some of the greatest American baseball players in the history of the sport. Does, does John Donaldson, did he have heirs, did he have children? He had no children. Okay. Um, he had, uh, his wife, Eleanor had, uh, I think she had six brothers and sisters. He had a bunch of nieces and nephews. Okay. So there are, he never had any children, Donaldson family heirs that are still out there. We talked about that. Yeah. There are Donald family members who are out there. Yeah. Okay. John Donaldson because he died in 19 70, 50 years ago. There isn't any direct descendants of him. Well, I look forward to, uh, the, the, which probably hurt his ability to be able to have a legacy, right? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. It almost sounds like you're sort of, uh, you're, you're the, the, the adopted, uh, great, great grandson that he never had. That's right. You can Well, that's fantastic. I never thought of it that way, but yeah, yeah, yeah. You're, you're the, well, you're the guy that's, that's you and your network. So one quick last. Are there any like famous sports writers or noteworthy people that are part of the network? I know that there's a Bob Costas quote that I saw about, uh, John Donaldson. Are there people like Bob Costas that are part of the network? Absolutely there are, there are, um, uh, like Peter Gamons, lot of zipper journalists who have wrote stories about him. Okay, cool. Because they can't believe they don't know that. Right. Um, and, and Bob Cost is one of, um, Bob Cost said a really nice quote about him, about how his legacy will have another chance at the Hall of Fame someday. I wonder if, and that's right Patrick and. Patrick Racing knows who he is. Okay. So there's no way he doesn't know that. Okay. Um, we've had articles in his newspaper. Okay. Uh, not his newspaper, but the newspaper he writes for. Okay. Um, and that's important. They know who he is. They also know about the effort that we've been working on. But this mlb, the show thing takes it to a whole nother level. No kidding. We can talk about the, somewhere around 3,500 Negro League baseball players if there were, wow. Um, this is one of John Johnson is one. um, people who are represented in this new video game. So he's top eight. Wow. And that's really important for people to know. He's with Satchel Page and Jackie Robinson and, uh, um, Hank Thompson and some great, great African American buck O'Neal, some great. Um, and he belongs there. Uh, it's not just me saying it anymore. Yeah, it's a lot of people saying it. And the more that we tell other people about this, um, the more excited that they get about it and the more they're willing to tell other people about it. Cause it's really a void that people, it, it stu it stuns people. I've, I've talked to people. I've been a baseball coach for 80 years. 60 years, right? I mean, long time. I've never heard of this guy. Yeah. How can he be significant if I'd never heard of him? Well, there's a lot of reasons for that, so, but John Donald's legacy is something that we work on every day and I, and I appreciate you guys having me around to be able to talk about that and give you updates on Pete, your, your passion is inspiring and, and I think this, it cut, you're on our program because you are representation of. Uh, you're going, you're being an active, it's beyond kindness. I mean, you're, you're going beyond, above and beyond. This is something you're passionate about, but you're delivering something amazing for the Donaldson family. Yeah. Keeping this guy alive for baseball players, for, you know, for the, the idea of segregation for the whole culture. Yeah. I mean, it's very important and I just love it. It's so cool. I just, my friends at the, my friends at the Negro League Baseball Museum in Kansas City, like to say that this. African-American history, this is American history. Absolutely. And that's right. And we gotta go there because Absolutely. We, John Robinson played in 132 cities in Minnesota alone. Um, this guy's in our backyard. Yeah. He played in your town and he played in everybody's town. Um, this is an important part of our history as well. Uh, cause what John Dowson had to do, uh, he brought himself and figure and, and, and, uh, integrated baseball everywhere he went. And that's something we shall aspire to do. So the, the last question I have for you, Pete, is how do you fall asleep at night? Because I would imagine, is it Red Bull? Is it high Octane Coffee? What? Is the magic behind your enthusiasm? Because when I, when uh, when Steve said We gotta have Pete Gorton back on, I said, that'll be the easiest interview that we do, Just ask a question. Sit back, go do your dishes, come back. Is he still going? Yep. There's Pete. No, seriously still going? It's go to this left the soaking Well, thank you. Thank you for that I that you can back to your dishes. No doubt about that. Yes, but it's important. I've had cup of coffee. My, well, you're doing something I never, um, important. I am excited about this and I'm passionate about this clearly. Cause I work. Um, but there's a, uh, there's an importance to John Donald's career that we have here for not recognized and we need to recognize it. Yeah. We need to start recognizing other people for who they're and what they do for us, um, and for other people as well. And that's what this show is about. Yep. I love it. I think it's really important. That, um, what is happening with John Donaldson's legacy can happen with hundreds of other guys too. We just happen to have the biggest one of them all, and that wasn't something that we went into our research trying to prove. We just proved it. And people within the research community and the neg community, um, have the same, uh, you know, we've really set the bar high so that they have a way to look at how to do a first. Research effort. Yeah. That's what we're doing. And it has so many implications all the way around. And how can you get on MLB show, uh, persevere, You have to keep going and you have to have people who are willing to support you and are willing to say, when you're on your worst day, keep trying, keep working. And I certainly have had those people, and so every opportunity that I get to. I try to do because I'm trying to tell as many people that it's the one person you meet, get your coffee in the morning, that you encourage can change the world, and we need to talk like this. We need. Recognize people who can change our perspectives on things and recognize those people, um, as doing work that's going to be beneficial to everyone. And that's what I'm passionate about. That's what I wanna help people understand is this is an op. We can feel bad about what our grandparents did to African American people, um, throughout time. Um, we can feel bad about that and. Um, but it should not stop us from learning about that. Um, we should not get it to a place where it's just so comfortable. I can put it into a box and that's all I need to know about that. Um, we still have the responsibility to think about this differently in terms of today's value. Um, we also need to be crystal clear as to what the values were when those guys were out walking around. Cause we need to learn from our history. Not let guys like John Dawson just, just fade away into the sunshine. Gotta be celebrated. This guy is a massive player. Yeah. Well, we like to have people on the air on with us that, uh, make other people feel like they matter. Yep. And by virtue of the work that you've done, you uh, definitely have demonstrated that John Donaldson is somebody that matters and that we should pay attention. So, and now you, you've. Through a game. Yeah. You've gotten it on mlb, this show. Can't wait to check it out though. That's so cool. Congratulations. Yeah. It could be interesting to see the, it's gonna be interesting to see how that, uh, the video game worked out because in today's world, people record their games. As if they were live and happening in front of us at a, at target field. And so there's all this re-looking and, um, reuse the players and replay and, and recordings of those. Watch what I did last night or Yep. Uh, you know, these types of things. It's a different deal than, um, your Atari game that you just hit reset on. Yeah. When you finally lost in. Um, this is much more interactive. Yep. This is much more, um, more conquest to it. It's gonna be beautiful. Don't wait to see it. You had in your Atari. Well, this was the best five minute, uh, uh, update that we've ever done. Um, no. All kidding aside, Pete, it was great talking to you. Congratulations. Great talk. I wanna end see what's, I wanna see what's happening next. Is it a major motion picture coming up next and, you know, we'd like to check. We're work on lots of things, Steve. Yeah, I know you do. We're working on all those types of things. We're working on trying to tell John Donaldson's story to as many people who will listen. That's a good, you got a good stepping stone. Now that picture film is a. Yeah, I can't wait to hear more. We'll check in with you again, Pete. Have a great one. And off we go. Mooch, Chacho. Okay. It was great to be on with you guys again, thanks for your, um, unwavering support of John Donald. We appreciate it. Thanks, Pete. Thanks Pete. See you later.