The Daily Bulletin Archive

The Burchfield Penney Art Center at Buffalo State will present a special screening of Donn Rogosin’s There Was Always Sun Shining Someplace: Life in the Negro Baseball Leagues on Thursday, October 2 at 7:00 p.m.

The public is invited to join the Burchfield Penney's executive director, Anthony Bannon, and board member LeRoi Johnson in welcoming the film’s creator, Donn Rogosin, a writer, producer, television network executive, and head of the independent production company Donn Rogosin Productions.

The event, free and open to public, is part of Ideas Prime, a series of screenings, lectures, and conversations to exchange ideas and understand how local and global issues are interrelated. The center will host a wide range of presentations with topics and panelists each Thursday designed to bring people from diverse backgrounds together to lead, build, and foster positive change.

In 1947, Jackie Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier and became a hero for black and white Americans, yet Robinson was a Negro League player before he integrated Major League Baseball. Negro League ballplayers had been thrilling black fans since 1920. Among them were the legendary pitchers Smoky Joe Williams, whose fastball seemed to “come off a mountain top”; Satchel Paige, the ageless wonder who pitched for five decades; and such hitters as Josh Gibson and Buck Leonard, “the Ruth and Gehrig of the Negro Leagues.”

There Was Always Sun Shining Someplace chronicles the rich history of the Negro Baseball Leagues that flourished before Jackie Robinson integrated the major leagues in 1947. The exploits of these talented athletes and the times when baseball was a segregated sport are vividly brought to life. The film contains rare historical footage showing the ballplayers as they traveled the back roads of America, the Caribbean, Mexico, and Latin America.

Activities also include a presentation by local artist John Baker on Bye-Gone-Era, his outstanding collection of paintings on canvas reflecting the nostalgic history of Negro League Baseball. Baker’s works of art embody the spirit and heritage of the Negro Leagues, commemorating their historical significance in our past. Aside from the artistic merits, these paintings are a history lesson celebrating athletic accomplishments during the time of a racially divided culture in society. Each painting is part of the story that collectively enlightens audiences.

A graduate of the University of California at Santa Cruz and the University of Texas, Donn Rogosin helped organize a Negro Leagues exhibit for the Smithsonian Institution and is the author of Invisible Men. His public television work includes the documentaries East Wind, West Wind: Pearl Buck, the Woman Who Embraced the World (1992), There Was Always Sun Shining Someplace (1982), and Satchel Paige: Defying Time (2008) as well as a producing credit on Ballad of a Mountain (2000) for the American Experience.