May 02, 2009

SI list omits Sockalexis cousins

Author wants Sports Illustrated to honor Penobscot athletes’ legacyRice, a former journalist who now teaches journalism at the University of Maine, has researched the Sockalexis cousins’ lives and written books about them; “Baseball’s First Indian” was published in 2003 and “Native Trailblazer” was published in 2008. But his work on the Sockalexis cousins is not done. He’d like Sports Illustrated, the premier sports magazine in the country, to acknowledge the Sockalexis cousins among Maine’s top athletes and he’s e-mailed the magazine’s editors on several occasions asking them to do so.

“I have spent several years now trying to get Sports Illustrated Magazine to (1) acknowledge a terrible mistake it made in publishing a list of ‘50 greatest athletes from the State of Maine’ in 1999 and published again in 2003, celebrating the magazine’s 50th anniversary, and omitting both Sockalexis cousins, and (2) provide me with the name of the individual ‘stringer’ from Maine who, either through racial prejudice or extraordinary ignorance, provided that list to the national publication.”
Comment:  For more on Louis Sockalexis, see:

The bogus Cleveland Indians story
The first Indian baseball player
Who was on first first?
Chief Wahoo is no honor

Below:  "Ed Rice, who has written biographies of Andrew and Louis Sockalexis, is on a campaign to raise awareness of and respect for the athletic accomplishments of the Penobscot cousins. Pictured is Andrew in a 1913 photo during a cross country race."

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