Hank Aaron gave us baseball memories, but his legacy is one of enduring inspiration

At eight, if you are fortunate, you don’t know about the hatred. You can’t possibly understand the societal significance of the moment either.

You know only that this a big deal. It’s big because Miss Eldridge halts her lesson, wheels in the “A/V cart,” and announces to her third-grade class at Kittredge Elementary School in Atlanta that the rest of the afternoon will be devoted to watching a baseball game on television. In color, too. If she can get the antenna positioned just right.

During school hours!

Nearly 47 years later, the quiet of that moment remains the highlight of my academic career, which could best be described as “he attended.” It took three batters and four pitches on April 4, 1974 for Henry Aaron to slam a pitch from Cincinnati’s Jack Billingham into the stands. It tied him with Babe Ruth at 714 home runs, most in history. The classroom erupted.

On Friday, the world lost Henry Aaron, whose feats as a home run hitter were only surpassed by his grace and courage in the face of hate. He was 86. He hit 755 home runs in a Hall of Fame career. The most famous of those homers – No. 715 – came four days after the shot off Billingham.

You’ve seen that video a million times. Aaron stands in the on-deck circle with his Braves helmet in his hands. He drives a ball to deep left field off Dodgers lefty Al Downing. Bill Buckner frantically attempts to scramble up the plexiglass fence. Aaron, circling the bases, brushes away two knuckleheads who ran on the field. He hugs his mother tight in the mob at home plate.

“What a marvelous moment for baseball,” Vin Scully says on the Dodgers’ broadcast. “What a marvelous moment for Atlanta and the State of Georgia. What a marvelous moment for the country and the world. A Black man is getting a standing ovation in the Deep South for breaking a record of an all-time baseball idol. And it’s a great moment for all of us.”

Again, at eight, you couldn’t possibly comprehend the weight of all that. You know only that you are jumping up and down in the living room. You know only that it was a really big deal if mom and dad let you stay up past nine to watch.

It is only over time you begin to understand.

It is only over time that you realize he began his career at a time when he couldn’t even sleep at the same hotels as his white teammates. It is only later that you read of the piles of hate mail and death threats he received for having the audacity to be a Black man chasing baseball history.

You grasp that breaking the record may have been a cause for celebration, but the chase for it represented a suffocating burden.

“It really made me see for the first time a clear picture of this country is about,” Aaron told the New York Times later as the 20th anniversary of breaking the record approached. “My kids had to live like they were in prison because of kidnap threats, and I had to live like a pig in a slaughter camp. I had to duck. I had to go out the back door of the ball parks. I had to have a police escort with me all the time. I was getting threatening letters every single day. All of these things have put a bad taste in my mouth and it won’t go away. They carved a piece of my heart away.”

It is only later still you realize that despite all that, Aaron stayed true to himself and giving to his teammates and community. When his home run total was passed, he was gracious while baseball fans were divided over successor Barry Bonds’ alleged PED use. He lent his name to the trophy given to the best hitters in baseball. He worked at building a better Atlanta and a more equal country.

Right up until the end. Only three weeks ago, he was Tweeting about receiving his first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, along with former U.N. Ambassador Andrew Young, in a push to encourage Black Americans to get the shot.

“Hank Aaron was the most important influence on my life, next to my dad,” Astros manager Dusty Baker, who began half-century friendship with Aaron as a skinny young teammate in the Atlanta organization. “He was the best person that I ever knew, and the truest, most honest person that I ever knew. He taught me how to be a man and how to be a proud African-American. He taught me how important it was to give back to the community, and he inspired me to become an entrepreneur. Hank impacted my life, my family and my world, both on and off the field. He was a great man.”

On the day he dies, you are reminded of that magical baseball moment. And if you take a second, it dawns on you: Sure, Hank Aaron’s bat made school stop, but his life made for an enduring lesson.

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