Bob Luke

Bob Luke's life-long passion for baseball reached its peak on the field when he captained his Montgomery Blair High School's baseball team as a centerfielder in Silver Spring, Maryland. After graduating from Colgate University and earning a PhD in sociology from the University of Maryland, he turned to a career in Human Resource Development. In retirement his interest in the history of baseball, especially the history of the Negro leagues, led to two biographies of Negro leaguers, Willie Wells and Effa Manley, one book on the history of the Baltimore Elite Giants, and, most recently, a book about the integration of the Baltimore Orioles. His first book traced the life and career of his childhood next door neighbor, Bill McGowan, an American League umpire from 1924 to 1954. He has also published a book about the role that African American soldiers played for the Union in the Civil War.