In celebration of Black History Month, Chapman Athletics will be looking back on the Black athletes in our Hall of Fame. First up, is the barrier-breaking Emmett Ashford.
On April 11, 1966, Major League Baseball saw an African American umpire take the field to officiate a ball game for the first time ever. It just so happened that this particular umpire graduated from Chapman College (now Chapman University) in 1941.
Emmett Ashford, born in Los Angeles in 1914, took a rather unusual route to the big leagues. The young man coming off four years of service in World War II quickly found himself scrambling for work in Santa Ana. He decided to take a position at the local post office, but maintained his passion for baseball — which he grew up playing, even attempting to play semi-professionally — by picking up umpiring duties in the Santa Ana municipal softball league.