Reflections on Hank Aaron

I had watched Hank Aaron (Figure 1) evolve into a Major League Baseball star when I was a young boy growing up in Wisconsin. He was on the defending World Series champion Milwaukee Braves when I was invited to a tryout in 1958. I was told by the team’s Hall of Fame coach Paul “Big Poison” Waner, after only one swing, that I didn’t move my belly button fast enough to be a Major League hitter, so I moved on toward medical school. I never imagined at that time that Hank would become a home run champion or that our lives would intersect years later when I became a team physician for the Atlanta Braves.

Figure 1.

Hank Aaron with the Milwaukee Braves.

He was the third of eight children, a big baby said to weigh 12¼ lb at birth, born during Babe Ruth’s last season with the Yankees. His little home (625 square feet) lacked windows, plumbing, or electric lights (Figure 2). He slept up to four to a bed with his siblings (“you had to fight for covers some nights”).¹ He made his own baseballs as a boy, wrapping nylon hose around an old golf ball, using rags tied together, handlebar grips, or tin cans crumpled up. He hit bottle caps with a broomstick.

Figure 2.

The childhood home of Hank Aaron, now a museum; the porch, windows, plumbing, and electricity were added later.

His paternal great-grandmother was half Cherokee Indian. When she died of an uncertain old age she was buried standing up, as per the Indian custom. His paternal grandmother lived to age 101. Hank’s mother lived to 96, his father to 89. The family was almost vegetarian by necessity, eating a lot of cornbread, butter beans, and collard greens. Maybe once every 2 to 3 weeks, the family ate some meat.

EARLY BASEBALL DAYS

Hank played for a local semipro team. During his first at-bat, he nearly put a ball through a tin fence around the outfield. He went to a Dodger tryout camp, but a scout told him he was too small.

He eventually signed with a Negro League team. At the time, he was batting cross-handed. When he left on the train to join them (he had never been away from home), his mother was too upset to accompany him to the station, fearful that she would cry too much. She stuffed $2 in his pocket and gave him several sandwiches to take along.

His new team ate lunch at a restaurant in Washington, DC, before a game there. The players heard the kitchen staff breaking the plates when they had finished, so no white customers would have to use them. They slept in a bus most nights.

When he eventually signed a Major League contract he was given a cardboard suitcase as a signing bonus. Later, while walking in the rain, the suitcase disintegrated and he was left holding only the handle.

His first Minor League assignment was to Eau Claire, Wisconsin. The only other black person the citizens there had seen was a man who would repeatedly flip a silver dollar, standing on a street corner.

The next spring training was in Waycross, Georgia, at a former military base. Aaron took the bus into town to get a haircut but missed it on the return and so had to walk. It was getting late, so he took a shortcut through the woods and climbed a fence. A security guard spotted him (“all he saw was a black kid sneaking up on the barracks”).¹ Without any warning, the guard opened fire. Fortunately, the player was able to crawl into the barracks without being hit. The next day, the general manager gave him a Bulova watch and told him not to miss the bus again. Later, reflecting upon the Waycross experience, Hank said with dry humor, “Other than being eaten alive with mosquitoes and getting shot at, it was great.”

It was soon apparent to the team leaders that the young man would become an all-around future star.

REFLECTIONS

When he finally made it big in baseball, Hank offered to build his parents a wonderful home to replace the tiny one (now a museum) they continued to live in. His mother declined his kind offer, telling him that she liked their place and that the only thing she wanted was to have Jesus in her heart.

It was once said of Aaron that it was a greater thing not just to hit home runs but to do the most with the home runs he hit. In that he has been a great success. In 1994, he and his wife established the Chasing the Dream Foundation. A more recent version in 2007 is funded by Major League Baseball and managed by the Boys and Girls Clubs of America. Children between the ages of 9 and 12 submit applications and receive monetary awards to pursue their talents and interests in science, literature, dance, the arts, music, and sports. The original goal of reaching 755 children has been greatly exceeded. Awards have been given through partner organizations in at least four states. Forty-four (his number) college scholarships in perpetuity have been established in his name. Aaron has also been successful in business, from auto dealerships to restaurants.

His awards and honors have been many and include the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award. The best hitters in both major leagues are given awards in his name. He has received numerous college honorary degrees and has given the commencement address at Harvard. He would probably prefer to be remembered, as one of his many fans simply stated, as a man who “stood up calmly in the face of racism, remained a gentleman, … and gave children a hero.”²