The tributes to Willie Mays last week were bittersweet. Of course, he deserved all the lofty praise, but there was the regret of him having to endure the segregation, dissent, and humiliation of his native South, growing up in Westfield, Ala., nine miles west of Birmingham.Mays rose above the ignominy and indignity of his early years to exalted status in baseball. Many who sa...
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