History on the Web / L’Histoire sur la toile

Abstract

Sports headlines over the past few years remind us of the ways that race and sports intersect in both the past and the present. Willie O’Ree’s induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame, NFL player protests, and ethnic slurs hurled at First Nations hockey players, among others, all suggest that sports can offer insights into racial injustice in society, as well as the fight against it. Over the past three years, I have been part of a university-community group that has developed a website and public history project to help students explore these issues. In June, 2017, we launched “Breaking the Colour Barrier: Wilfred “Boomer” Harding and the Chatham Coloured All-Stars” (http://cdigs.uwindsor.ca/ BreakingColourBarrier/). In 1934, the All-Stars were the first amateur Black baseball team to win a provincial championship in the predominantly white Ontario Baseball Association. Like many athletes from historically-marginalized communities, the players regularly faced racial and economic barriers playing ball in 1930s southern Ontario. While their descendants and community members have remembered and commemorated the team’s achievements and hardships, the All-Stars’ story has received little attention outside Chatham.