WALLY YONAMINE: THE INDEPENDENT OBITUARY

My obit of Wally Yonamine, who died three months ago, is in today's Indy, you can link to it here. It's a great story: a Japanese-American football star who suffered racial abuse in the AAFC, then switched to baseball in Japan and suffered even more from prejudice there. He is a legend in Japan, and in Hawaii, and the whole story of foreigners playing baseball in Japan is a fascinating one that probably deserves its own study.

So does the history of pro football on the Pacific Coast before the Rams (transplanted from Cleveland) and the 49ers (from the All American Football Conference) established themselves in the NFL. The PCFL featured a lot of stars who went on to bigger things, including Jackie Robinson and Woody Strode, as well as integrating the NFL, and the tale of barnstorming outfits like the Hawaiian Warriors is another with no equivalent nowadays.