I WAS RIGHT ON TIME, SIGNED BY BASEBALL LEGEND JOHN "BUCK" O’NEIL, THE FIRST BLACK COACH IN THE MAJORS

O'NEIL, Buck. I Was Right on Time. (New York): Simon & Schuster, (1996). Octavo, original half red cloth, original dust jacket. $350.

First trade edition of John "Buck" O'Neil's candid memoir, signed by the pioneering manager and "league-leading hitter with the Kansas City Monarchs, one of the Negro leagues' most acclaimed team… and the the first black coach in the majors" (New York Times), illustrated with 16 pages of black-and-white photographs.

John "Buck" O'Neil, Jr. was "a two-time league-leading hitter with the Kansas City Monarchs, one of the Negro leagues' most acclaimed teams, and he also managed them. He spent more than three decades working in the Chicago Cubs' system, becoming one of organized baseball's first black scouts and then the first black coach in the majors. In all, his baseball career spanned seven decades… For all his accomplishments, O'Neil was little known to most baseball fans until he was interviewed for Ken Burns's nine-part 1994 television documentary Baseball… 'Thanks to Ken Burns, I became an overnight star in my 80's,' O'Neil said in his memoir, I Was Right on Time, published when he was 85. 'But as far as I'm concerned, I felt like I was already on top of the world when I got to play with and against some of the best ballplayers who ever lived" (New York Times). Co-authored with Steve Wulf and David Conrads, with a foreword by Ken Burns. Preceded the same year by a limited edition (1300 copies).

In fine condition.