Published April 15, 2025 | Updated June 15, 2026

You probably don’t think of Nebraska when you think of Negro League Baseball. Neither did I. But as it turns out, they played in Oxford, Nebraska of all places. Not only that, but Omaha has been home to several independent teams throughout the years: the Omaha Giants (1911-1915), Omaha Black Tigers, Omaha Monarchs, and the Omaha Rockets (1947-1949).

While Major League Baseball billed the game between the Kansas City Royals and Detroit Tigers at Omaha’s TD Ameritrade Park in 2019 as its first-ever regular season game in Nebraska, that likely changed when it elevated seven different leagues encompassing hundreds of teams to Major League status in 2020.

The Rockets were a barnstorming team that played in Nebraska, South Dakota, Kansas, Iowa, Colorado, Minnesota, and elsewhere. The independent team played in the Pioneer Nite League as well as the Nebraska Independent League.

Barnstorming teams left their home communities to play wherever they could to gain experience and make money. When it was in Omaha, the team played on a variety of fields including Creighton University, Levi Carter Park, and Council Bluffs. It stayed at the Calhoun Hotel, which was owned by Will Calhoun, the hotel and team owner as well as its manager. Calhoun paid for the team’s bus fare, uniforms, baseballs, bats, and even a portion of their salaries. To start its inaugural season in 1947, he managed to arrange an exhibition with the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro National League.

The Rockets included a number of star players including future Major League Baseball Hall of Famer Satchel Paige and future NFL Hall of Famer Dick “Night Train” Lane. It’s been said that another Hall of Famer, Omaha native Bob Gibson played for the Rockets as a teenager, though his name never appeared on any official roster.

Paige played for several teams over a two-year period before his own Major League debut in 1948. At the age of 42, he became the oldest rookie in Major League history when he signed with the Cleveland Indians. He went 6-1 and helped the team win the pennant.

Gibson grew up in the Logan-Fontenelle housing project in North Omaha and was barred from trying out for the Tech High baseball team because its coach didn’t allow Black players. He went on to become one of the greatest pitchers of all time and a two-time Cy Young Award winner.

While in Council Bluffs, Lane was noticed by a Negro League scout while playing pickup games. After signing and playing for the Rockets, he enrolled at Scottsbluff Junior College and made the All-Nebraska and NJCAA All-American teams in football. After serving four years in the Army, he began his Hall of Fame career in the NFL.

While the Omaha Rockets became a farm team for the Monarchs, Omaha continued its association with professional baseball as a minor league affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals, Los Angeles Dodgers, and Kansas City Royals.

Pro baseball and negro league baseball in Oxford, a town of 1,200 nearly all white citizens isn’t something I saw coming.

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