Born in 1871 on Maine’s Penobscot Indian reservation and nephew of a chief, Louis Sockalexis became professional baseball’s first American Indian player. Ultimately, his prowess on the diamond inspired the name Cleveland’s baseball team carries today.

Exploring the brilliant but too-brief major league career of the Deerfoot of the Diamond, Baseball’s First Indian follows Sockalexis’s rise to the majors, his fall to the minor leagues of New England, and his final return to the reservation in Maine, where he continued to coach baseball and work as an umpire. This fascinating study of the life of Louis Sockalexis is filled with game action and leavened by the flamboyant and colorful stories of 19th century sportswriters who frequently invented what the truth would not supply. It’s a treasure for every student of baseball history.