We are the Ship: The Story of Negro League Baseball - Kadir Nelson

We are the Ship: The story of Negro League Baseball by Kadir Nelson (words and paintings) is a wonderful informational book diagramming the evolution of the Negro League of Baseball and including a powerful foreword by Hank Aaron (one of the greatest and most well-known baseball players of all time). Each "chapter" is written as an inning, so the book is divided into the first inning, second inning, and so on, up until the ninth inning and then "extra innings" added at the end of the book. Each inning (or chapter) begins with a quote from a well-known baseball player or owner of a team. Each of them is a powerful quote, and I wanted to include them - 

First Inning - "I ain't ever had a job. I just always played baseball." - Satchel Paige

Second Inning - "We played tricky baseball." - Cool Papa Bell

Third Inning - "It was a rough life - ride, ride, ride, and ride." - HIlton Smith

Fourth Inning - "Baseball really is an expensive thing to operate." - Ella Manley

Fifth Inning - "The greatest untapped reservoir of raw material in the history of our game is the black race." - Branch Rickey

Sixth Inning - "The crowds were big and the fans red-hot." - "Schoolboy" Johnny Taylor

Seventh Inning - "When we played head-to-head it was nip-and-tuck. They won some and we won some." - Gene Benson

Eighth Inning - "If you were anybody, you were at the East-West Game." - Buck O'Neil

Ninth Inning - "There was never a man in the game who could put mind and muscle together quicker and with better judgment than [Jackie Robinson]." - Branch Rickey 

Extra Innings - "If we get you boys, we're going to get the best ones. It's going to break up your league." - Clark Griffith

The most beautiful part of this book is the paintings that dot nearly every page. I was incredibly impressed by Kadir Nelson and his illustration skills. His painting are all beautifully realistic while not being photographs. I had to do multiple doubletakes throughout reading to fully examine each and every picture to make sure that it wasn't an actual detailed photograph, just like the picture to the left. From far away, it looks like an actual photograph of the Pittsburgh Crawfords. 

The detail in the bibliography and research done for this book was also extensive and impressive, but I guess with a foreword from Hank Aaron, what can you expect? There is not only an author's note, but a bibliography with 13 sources, a filmography with 2 sources, and extensive endnotes broken down inning-by-inning. This book made me realize that I may have improperly categorized You Forgot Your Skirt, Amelia Bloomer! as an informational book because of a lack of citations. Books like this deserve to win the awards they win, to be highly recommended, and to serve as both sources of reference and enjoyment for our students.