[TyrusRCobb]

I haven't posted in quite some time as I've found that as a very green collector I would be better served reading and learning. However, I couldn't resist posting on a thread dedicated to my favorite player. I've recently read Alexander's book. Clearly Cobb is one of, if not the greatest player to ever take the field. I'm wondering if any of you has anything other than anecdotal evidence that Cobb was not a racist. Other than what I've read, I have nothing proving that he was the racist many portray him to be.

Still, I can understand the reasons behind the racism (if such is truly the case) given the place and time of his birth. Cobb, being born in 1886 in rural Georgia is not far removed from the Civil War, the abolition of slavery and the following period of reconstruction. As such Cobb's supposed racism was simply the norm for the era and place. In fact the deep south, in many ways, (I'm in South Carolina) still seems to hold a grudge regarding the Civil War. You can still find people who refer to it as the war of northern aggression. I have friends who graduated from the Citadel Military College in Charleston, South Carolina, home of Fort Sumter where the first shot of the war is said to have been fired, who took a history class listed as the War of Northern Aggression.

If he truly was a racist does it diminish what he did on the field? Can we not both admire him as a ball player while also recognizing that he was a racist? Are the claims and stories found in Alexander's book held in the same light as Stumps deeply flawed work?