Harris, Cecil. Different Strokes: Serena, Venus, and the Unfinished Black Tennis Revolution. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2020. Pp. 243. 15 illustrations. $29.95 hardcover and ebook. Reviewed by Łukasz Muniowski The story of Serena and Venus Williams is as unprecedented as it is unlikely. Two Black sisters, coming from humble beginnings, have dominated a predominantly white sport,…
By Russ Crawford The WFA held their championships on July 23rd and 24th at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, Ohio. The stadium, located just across the street from the Pro Football Hall of Fame, also hosts the annual NFL Hall of Fame game, and so the women were playing on a big…
Bike, William S. The Forgotten 1970 Chicago Cubs: Go and Glow. The History Press, 2021. Pp. 144. Acknowledgments, bibliography, epilogue, end notes, index, photographs, preface, prologue, $21.99 paperback. Reviewed by Bob D’Angelo It still stings 52 years later. The Chicago Cubs won a World Series title in 2016 to snap a 108-year drought, but 1969 will always…
By Russ Crawford The Women’s Football Alliance (WFA), the largest and longest running professional women’s tackle football league in the United States will be holding their national championships at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, Ohio the weekend of July 23-24. Since women’s professional football arguably started in Ohio in the 1930s, it…
Gitlin, Martin. Kyrie Irving: Uncle Drew, Little Mountain and Enigmatic NBA Superstar. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2019. Pp. 224. 16 illustrations. $26.95 hardcover and ebook. Reviewed by Łukasz Muniowski During a fall 2018 fan event at the TD Garden, the home of the Boston Celtics, former Celtics player Brian Scalabrine asked the best player on the team,…
Peter C. Bjarkman. Fidel Castro and Baseball: The Untold Story. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2019. 364 pp. Reviewed by Michael T. Wood Peter C. Bjarkman was a giant in the field of sport history. Over the course of his prodigious career, Bjarkman authored over 40 books and contributed chapters and articles to edited collections. The Society…
Approximately one year after ‘The Last Dance’ captivated sports’ fans across the globe, guest contributor Łukasz Muniowski revisits the docuseries and deconstructs its mythologies. By Łukasz Muniowski Much has already been written about The Last Dance, the award-winning ESPN/Netflix documentary miniseries by Jason Hehir. As such, there is hopefully no need to explain in detail multiple…
Douglas, Andra. Black and Blue: Love, Sports, and the Art of Empowerment. New York: BookBaby, 2019. Pp. 310. $18 USD paperback. Reviewed by Russ Crawford Andra Douglas owned the New York Sharks, a women’s semi-professional football team, from 1999 to 2018. The Sharks began as a flag football team and won a national championship in that…
Stueve, Spencer, and Johnson, Marques (forward). UCLA Basketball Encyclopedia: The First 100 Years. New York: Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., 2019. Pp. 281. Photos, black & white. No index. $26.99 paperback. Reviewed by Richard A. Macales Before the Los Angeles Lakers and the NBA became global phenomena, there was the UCLA Bruins collegiate men’s basketball team. The Bruins recruited…
Stephen R. Wenn and Robert K. Barney. The Gold in the Rings: The People and Events that Transformed the Olympic Games. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2020. Pp. 360. Photographs, notes, bibliography, index. $24.95 paper, $14.95 ebook. Reviewed by Nicholas E. Sarantakes In the historiography of American sport, there are many sub-fields and topics. Most sport historians…
Sport in American History 