“This is a lazy, intellectually dishonest dodge. Race is not the point; assimilation is. The people in that 1950s footage were, in many cases, themselves first- or second-generation Americans—Irish, Italian, Polish, Jewish, among others. They were people whose parents or grandparents had arrived here through Ellis Island. They did not come to recreate the old country on American soil, transforming it. They came to become American—to transform themselves. They learned the language, embraced the civic norms, cheered on the same teams as their neighbors, and played by the same unwritten rules that made public spaces safe and orderly. Baseball was not merely entertainment. It was a sacrament of a shared American identity.” ~~ Brian Lonergan