Negro Leagues Baseball Museum announces celebration of KC’s first championship team

Pete Grathoff

Chiefs fans are still celebrating the team’s Super Bowl LVIII championship, which was secured earlier this month.

That’s the latest in a growing list of the titles won by Kansas City sports teams. Another championship team will be honored throughout this year.

The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum will be celebrating what it says was the first championship in the city’s history 100 years ago. The Kansas City Monarchs won the 1924 Negro Leagues World Series by defeating the Hilldale Daisies in a 10-game series.

“If you know anything about a nonprofit organization, we will indeed make up an anniversary if we think we can raise some money around that anniversary,” NLBM president Bob Kendrick quipped during a news conference. “But the 100th anniversary of this milestone event is a legitimate cause for celebration.”

There’s also a new logo for the 100th anniversary. Here is a look.

Bob Kendrick, president of the Negro League Baseball Museum, unveiled a new logo to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the first Negro Leagues World Series played in 1924 between the Kansas City Monarchs and the Hilldale Club of Darby, Pennsylvania. In 1924, the Monarchs won that inaugural World Series, which was the first championship for a professional team in Kansas City. Kendrick said the museum is planning city-wide events to celebrate the anniversary of the championship.

Luis Maes, the Royals’ vice president of community impact, said the team’s annual Negro Leagues game will be July 28 when the Cubs come to Kauffman Stadium.

Also, JE Dunn and the Kansas City Royals Foundation will be donating $100 for every run scored by the Royals at Kauffman Stadium this season to the museum, Maes announced Wednesday.

Kansas City mayor Quinton Lucas explained why the centennial celebration is meaningful.

“It is important that we celebrate and we celebrate our champions,” Lucas said at the news conference. “We’ve had a lot of opportunities recently to talk about and think about champions in Kansas City. And removing some of the painful memories, think about the joy you had when the Super Bowl was won.

“Think about the joy you had when the Royals won the World Series in ‘15 and in ‘85. And think back to that being a thing in a community. Think about the euphoria that people in Kansas City in 1924 had the opportunity to experience. And no, it didn’t erase the challenges. It didn’t erase any of the issues that people faced, but it gave people some joy. It gave people something to love. It gave people something to believe.”

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