Died. Wendell Smith, 58, sportswriter and broadcaster who helped promote baseball's racial integration; of cancer; in Chicago. Early in 1945, Smith took Jackie Robinson and two other black players to open tryouts with the Boston Red Sox. When the Red Sox demurred, Smith stopped off in Brooklyn to report the incident to the Dodgers' Branch Rickey, who sent his own scouts out for a look and hired Robinson. Later, at the Chicago American as the first full-time black sportswriter on a major daily, Smith led a successful fight to desegregate baseball housing facilities...
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