Ted Strong Jr.: The Untold Story of an Original Globetrotter and Negro League All-Star

Jenkins, president of a digital media company, provides an accessible telling of the fascinating life of Ted Strong Jr., who in the 1930s played with the Kansas City Monarchs in baseball's Negro Leagues and then with the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team of the 1940s. His father also played in the Negro Leagues, as did one of his younger brothers. The narrative focuses on the physical attributes that allowed Strong to dominate and touches on the obstacles that kept him from greater heights, including not being selected to join his contemporaries Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige, and Buck O'Neil in integrating major-league baseball. Strong joined the Globetrotters in its infancy and helped create the showmanship known as "shadow-ball" that carries on today. Jenkins gives a wide-angle view instead of using a microscopic lens; he does little to highlight Strong's unsettled personal life or his extraordinary numbers or achievements. Most of the story comes from interviews with members of Strong's family, providing a solid look at a pioneering black athlete. (Oct.)