While Buck O’Neil, a player and manager for the Kansas City Monarchs, and Minnie Miñoso, who played for the New York Cubans at the start of his career, were the first players from the Negro leagues to be elected to the Hall of Fame since 2006 — and the first to be elected since several Negro leagues were recognized by Major League Baseball last year as having been major leagues — Fowler’s career predated most of those organized Negro leagues. Much of it came before the white major and minor leagues effectively barred Black players in the late 1880s
Fowler helped organize teams and leagues of Black players, including the famed Page Fence Giants in Adrian, Mich., and was known to give scouting reports on Black players to teams looking for new talent. Official statistics are so sparse from his career that it is hard to paint a picture of him as a player, but reports from the time made it clear that he was among the game’s most talented players.
Despite starring in several leagues that were predominantly white, Fowler encountered racism throughout his career from teammates, club leaders, local communities, hotels and restaurants.
In 1887 he was playing in the International League, a top minor league that considered itself a rival of the National League, when multiple instances of players refusing to play with or against Black players — one of which was spearheaded by the Hall of Famer Cap Anson — resulted in that league formally barring Black players. That vote is seen by many as having established baseball’s racist “color line,” which held until Jackie Robinson was signed by the Brooklyn Dodgers and then assigned to the Montreal Royals in 1946.