Home Run: Integration of Baseball/Jackie Robinson, Sonié Joi Thompson-Ruffin

This quilt uses a striking square-in-square design in black, white, and ivory fabrics, some of which were designed by artist Sonié Joi Ruffin. The quilt celebrates the Kansas City Monarchs—the longest-running franchise in baseball’s Negro Leagues—as well as Jackie Robinson’s integration of Major League Baseball when he left the Monarchs and signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Robinson was the first African American to join an all-white Major League Baseball team. Ruffin has worked closely with the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City as part of her work as curator of Kansas City’s American Jazz Museum.