Bill Blair (baseball, born 1921)

William ("Bill") Blair (born October 17, 1921, in Dallas, Texas) is a former Negro league pitcher. Blair graduated Booker T. Washington High School in Dallas and briefly attended Prairie View A&M University. He began his baseball career at the age of 16, playing for a barnstorming team in Mineola, Texas, and went on to join the United States Army, where he became the youngest African American to serve as a first sergeant in the Army during World War II. He pitched from 1946 to 1951, for the Cincinnati Clowns and Cincinnati Crescents, playing against players such as Cool Papa Bell, Satchel Paige, and Hilton Smith. After retiring from baseball, he became a fixture in the community, running a local newspaper, the Elite News, and organising golf tournaments and parades.