During the school week of February 22-26 2010, UMass Boston had an exhibit right outside of the cafeteria about Negro League Baseball with a good size focus on easily its biggest star, Satchel Paige. With February being Black History Month, this was more than a ideal activity to have the students, staff, and faculty take part in.Paige pitched 20 years in the Negro league compiling 120 wins. Very impressive considering how loaded the Negro League was with talent. Among some of the features in the exhibit were eight lockers full of photographs and jerseys from some of the teams in the Negro League, such as the Kansas City Monarchs and the Detroit Stars. What was mind-blowing and stunning to see was a game glove used by Paige, which he also signed. As for the history of the Negro Baseball League, this lost league can be traced all the way back to the 1880s. As is a known fact, the reason the Negro League was even started was because Major League Baseball, as well as all the teams in the Minor Leagues, did not accept black people. Because of that, they were not allowed to play. The first ever  Negro League game was held on September 28,1860 in New Jersey at Elysian Fields between tWeeksville of New York and Colored Union. At this point in time, it was only black amateurs playing against each other. Blacks playing baseball was not considered to be professional until the 1870s. At this point that the first known black player was Bud Fowler, who played for a team based out of Chelsea, Massachusetts.The history of blacks in baseball is such an epic, detailed, educating, and interesting story that this could easily be made into a ten page paper. Let the record show that only the most important events will be discussed.The first black professional team was formed in 1885 and was known as the Babylon Black Panthers. The team was made of waiters and porters from a hotel in Babylon, New York. A white businessman, from  Trenton, New Jersey, sponsored the team and renamed them the Cuban Giants so more white fans would show up and watch them play. It was shortly after the huge success of the Cuban Giants that the first Negro League was started in Jacksonville, Florida. This league was called the Southern League and had ten teams, from a couple states including Georgia, and Louisiana. The first game took place on June 7 between the Memphis Eclipse and the New Orleans Unions in New Orleans. However, this league only lasted one year due to the huge debt that came from running the league.However, with the large success of the Cuban Giants up in Jersey, a second Negro league was created in 1887. The name of this league was the National Colored Baseball League. However, this time, the league had six teams ranging as far south as Maryland and as far north as Boston.  Right before the season started, two more teams were added, but were not so lucky and never suited up. Again, shortly into the season, a month to be exact, the Boston Resolutes retired. As if that wasn’t bad enough, six more teams folded a week later, and yet again, the league called it quits.So far, the attempt to start a Negro league  was a Rey Ordonez like 0-2 and it would be a full thirty-seven years before an organized, structured and lasting league came into existence.  Imagine that. Getting the players to play and the cities to have the teams was easy too. For some reason, the owners of the teams and all the expense associated with a team appeared to be too much. Alas, there was an ultimate breakthrough. In the month of February 1920, the Negro National League was created. The genius responsible for this creation was the National Association of Colored Professional Baseball Clubs. The Negro League had many famous players from all the leagues over close to a century of Negro associated baseball leagues, inclusing such stars as Cool Papa Bell and The Black Babe Ruth, catcher Josh Gibson, who never sasw the majors.  However, many were lucky enough to make it to The Show once the color barrier was broken. Some of the players included Monte Irvin, Satchel Paige, Hank Aaron, Ernie Banks, Roy Campanella, Willie Mays, and probably the most famous alum, Jackie Robinson.The players mentioned above went through a lot during their time in the Negro Leagues. It was their hard work, dedication to baseball, and the ability to look past what people had to say to them or about them that made them legendary. The Negro League history is something that any baseball fan should strongly consider reading up on.