Now set in stone
MONTGOMERY, Ala. — James "Sap" Ivory's legacy will finally be set in stone.
The late Birmingham Barons first baseman will soon become the 20th former Negro Leagues player to receive a headstone as part a project started six years ago by an Illinois physician who wanted to make sure they didn't lie forgotten in unadorned anonymity.
The Negro Leagues Grave Marker Project seeks out former Negro League players buried without headstones and uses donations to buy them one.
"They played in anonymity," said Dr. Jeremy Krock, an anesthesiologist from Peoria, Ill. "Now, we don't want them to spend eternity in anonymity.
"I hope people will see the grave and realize that man is important. He played Negro League baseball. Maybe it will cause somebody to go out and see what the Negro Leagues is all about."
Some of the graves lie unmarked for decades. Negro League pitcher and manager William "Big Bill" Gatewood finally got a grave marker in Alsip, Ill., in June nearly 50 years after his death.
Ivory's family will have a much shorter wait following his death from a stroke on Oct. 22, 2008. His gravestone is still being fashioned, but his widow, Wessie Ivory, was to be honored last weekend as part of the annual Jerry Malloy Negro League Conference in Birmingham.
The project now aims to put headstones identifying the players as veterans of the Negro Leagues in the city where the conference is held each year. Krock and his volunteers are trying to raise money for a growing waiting list that includes more than a dozen players buried without grave markers, including Hall of Famers Pete Hill and Solomon White.
The headstone would be meaningful to her husband, Wessie Ivory said. Also to their three children and seven grandchildren.
"He'd realize that people do care," she said. "It means a lot."
Ivory played for the Birmingham Black Barons — Satchel Paige's former team — from 1958-60, when the Negro American League shut down. The closest he came to the majors was a tryout with the San Francisco Giants in 1957.
He finished his career in 1963 playing in Mexico, Wessie Ivory said. She said the family had planned to put in a headstone later this year, but now they will be spared the expense.
A former machinist, Ivory is buried at Elmwood Cemetery, about a mile and a half from the home where Wessie Ivory still lives. The headstone will let Elmwood visitors know of his baseball career, and serve as a reminder of the anonymity of most Negro League players.
"It's important because it gives them final recognition," said Larry Lester, a Negro League historian who lives in Kansas City, Mo.
Lester said having headstones made and installing them typically costs $600 to $800, depending on the cemetery. Most of the donations have come from the some 750 members of the Society for American Baseball Research, with about $9,000 having been raised since 2004, he said.
"This was a time where players didn't make very much money," said Dwayne Isgrig, who works for a St. Louis insurance company and helped with the Gatewood headstone. "They didn't have a pension system in place. Some of them died in poverty and their family didn't have the money to lay a grave marker.
"It brings some dignity in death so that these individuals are recognized for their contributions to the game of baseball," he added.
