Mexicans Playing Baseball in an Indiana Steel Town: Baseball, Identity and the Old Timers of Indiana Harbor, Indiana, 1920– 1942 by John Fraire (review)

Reviewed by: Mexicans Playing Baseball in an Indiana Steel Town: Baseball, Identity and the Old Timers of Indiana Harbor, Indiana, 1920– 1942 by John Fraire Jorge Iber Mexicans Playing Baseball in an Indiana Steel Town: Baseball, Identity and the Old Timers of Indiana Harbor, Indiana, 1920– 1942 By John Fraire (Monee, Ill.: Self-published, 2022. Pp. 133. Paperbound, 15. 95. ) While employing rigorous theoretical models to provide nuanced analysis of historical topics, historians also seek to bolster understanding by telling engaging stories. Sometimes, scholars who write about recent history are fortunate that they do not need to travel to distant archives to find sources to support such studies. Even more privileged are researchers who can utilize their family's history to shed an ever-increasing amount of light upon their research. In the case of John Fraire's book, Mexicans Playing Baseball in an Indiana Steel Town, we encounter a perfect example of this syzygy, as the story of the Fraire family exemplifies the search for a better life, the struggles to fit into a multi-ethnic community, and the utilization of sport as a mechanism to claim social space in the Midwest during the first half of the twentieth century. Working with family members and collectors of local history, Fraire crafts an excellent work. The book is not only scholarly but also provides a loving tribute to his parents and those who helped to build the Mexican American community in the industrial town of Indiana Harbor. On the academic side of the ledger, he ties his work to research by Ignacio Garcia and William Beezley. With this solid underpinning of scholarship on Mexican and Mexican American participation in sport, Fraire then moves on to tell the uplifting story of how his clan made it to Indiana Harbor, worked difficult jobs, and served their country in World War II. He relates how baseball helped them to maintain their identity; build community throughout the Midwest; and, as a "dynamic expression of both of these developing identities, " helped them "become a new and integral part of the industrial working class and part of U. S. society" (pp. 10, 31). Fraire then goes on to detail what teams such as the Gallos and the Gallinas meant to the individual players, as well as to the broader Spanishsurnamed population of the region. Additionally, he presents readers with how these teams were represented in local and mainstream newspapers. These publications represented individuals of Mexican descent more positively than was common in the media. Even more significantly, and lovingly, the author spends a substantial time discussing the pathbreaking efforts of his mother, who played sports in a local high school at a time when few Mexican Americans even attended secondary institutions. Fraire's work encapsulates how this community and family worked diligently to seek a better life and fit End Page 172 into the industrial heartland of the United States. This work is a perfect example of how scholars can utilize sport as an instrument to examine the lives of Spanish speakers in various regions of the nation. It is a positive that Fraire managed to publish this work on his own, but certainly such a scholarly project merited the attention of a university press. Why does this not carry such an imprimatur? Jorge Iber Texas Tech University Copyright © 2024 Trustees of Indiana University