Detroit Mercy Professor of Communication Studies Jason Roche received a $17,088 grant from the Michigan Arts and Culture Council (MACC). The grant will help fund production of a documentary film about the remarkable history and current restoration of Hamtramck Stadium.
The baseball stadiums is currently one of only five remaining ballparks built specifically for Negro League baseball. The documentary also highlights the life and legacy of legendary center-fielder Norman “Turkey” Stearnes.
“I’m thrilled to receive this grant from MACC and I’m very excited to produce this documentary,” Roche said. “It’s a story most people haven’t heard but need to hear.”
In a career that spanned from 1923 to 1940, Stearnes led the league in home runs seven times, had a lifetime batting average of .349, and was renowned for his fielding prowess. In 2000, 21 years after his death, he was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.
Yet because of racial segregation, Stearnes was not allowed to play for the Detroit Tigers. And most white baseball fans have still not heard of him, something Roche is hoping to change.
“I hope this documentary will help make Turkey Stearnes a household name,” Roche said. “He deserves it, and his family deserves it. The man was one of the best players ever.”
The film, currently in production and untitled, also explores the history of Hamtramck Stadium through the decades after baseball integrated and the Negro Leagues disappeared. And it tells the story of a remarkable group of baseball-loving volunteers who have labored for years to restore the stadium and preserve its history.
The MACC grant will help fund production, writing, editing, scoring, and marketing for the film. Additional support for the project has come from the University of Detroit Mercy Professors Union and the College of Liberal Arts & Education.
Roche plans to wrap up shooting by summer of 2023 and finish the project in late 2023.
Roche and Detroit Mercy students were also recently featured in an article by Detroit Mercy Marketing & Communications centering around the documentary.
