In “The Last Hero: A Life of Henry Aaron,’’ veteran sportswriter Howard Bryant assumes the task of trying to get inside this misunderstood baseball legend. Supported by impressive research and interviews with Aaron’s former teammates, family members, and the Hall of Famer himself, Bryant paints a portrait of a man who grew up and played amid a racially tumultuous period in American history and did so with such an abundance of courage and dignity that he earned the respect of fans, players, and the leadership of Major League Baseball.
Aaron’s professional career began during the tail end of the Negro Leagues and continues to the present day with Aaron’s role as an executive in the Atlanta Braves organization. In 1954, Aaron began playing in the major leagues. By early 1974, he had slugged so many home runs for the Milwaukee and Atlanta Braves that he was poised to break Babe Ruth’s record of 714. He’d already achieved his personal goal of 3,000 hits.
Aaron, who was raised in the Jim Crow South and had faced racism throughout much of his life, was now threatening to break one of baseball’s most sacrosanct records, and that offended and angered many whites. There was sufficient vitriol in the air that when he hit his 715th homer, his mother embraced him on the field, and “held him so tight to prevent anyone from shooting him.’’
After breaking Ruth’s record, Aaron became a national figure, always called “Hank’’ by the public. Yet Bryant emphasizes he had never been anything but “Henry’’ to family and friends. He never made an issue of it.
Quiet as he was, he was “ill-equipped for the hero’s role’’ and privately struggled to define himself throughout his life. “Hate mail and home runs,’’ he lamented to Bryant. “You know, there’s more to me than that.’’
Bryant’s nuanced portrait offers far more than just that facile juxtaposition. He acknowledges as Aaron did to his biographer that the quiet hitter hadn’t much helped others to know him.
