Editing Willie Mays (section)

==Early life==
Willie Howard Mays Jr. was born on May 6, 1931, in [[Westfield, Alabama]], a primarily black [[company town]] near [[Fairfield, Alabama|Fairfield]].<ref>[[#Mays|Mays and Sahadi]], pp. 19.</ref> His father, Cat Mays, was a talented baseball player with the black team at the local iron plant.<ref>[[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], p. 11.</ref><ref>{{cite news |last=Chambers |first=Jesse |url=http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2013/08/new_documentary_film_remembers.html |title=New film remembers long-gone West Jefferson community of Westfield, home of Mays, Clemon |newspaper=[[The Birmingham News]] |date=August 2, 2013 |access-date=October 13, 2018 |archive-date=April 2, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190402161007/http://blog.al.com/spotnews/2013/08/new_documentary_film_remembers.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Annie Satterwhite, his mother, was a gifted [[high school basketball]] and track star.<ref>[[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], p. 12.</ref> To his family and close friends, and later to his teammates, Mays was affectionately referred to as "Buck."<ref>[[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], pp. 28, 405.</ref>

His parents never married and separated when Mays was three.<ref>[[#Mays|Mays and Sahadi]], p. 18.</ref> His father and two aunts, Sarah and Ernestine raised him.{{efn|Hirsch identifies Sarah and Ernestine as Willie's aunts; however, in his 1988 autobiography, Mays says they were two orphans his father took in.<ref>[[#Mays|Mays and Sahadi]], pp. 18–19; [[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], p. 13.</ref><ref>{{Cite book|title=African American Pioneers of Baseball |last=Freedman |first=Lew |publisher=Greenwood |year=2007 |isbn=978-0-313-33851-9 |url=https://archive.org/details/africanamericanp0000free |page=152}}</ref> Barra speculates that it was more likely that Sarah and Ernestine were related to Willie, noting that no account has surfaced to explain how Cat got the authority to move two underage girls into his house.<ref>[[#Barra|Barra]], pp. 22–23.</ref>}} Sarah took young Willie to an [[African Methodist Episcopal Church]] every Sunday.<ref>[[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], p. 22.</ref> Cat Mays worked as a railway porter and later at the steel mills in Westfield.<ref>[[#Mays|Mays and Sahadi]], pp. 18–25.</ref>

Cat exposed Willie to baseball at an early age, playing catch with him at five and allowing him to sit on the bench with his Birmingham Industrial League team at ten.<ref>[[#Mays|Mays and Sahadi]], pp. 16–17; [[#Hirsch|Hirsch]], pp. 14–15.</ref> His favorite baseball player growing up was [[Joe DiMaggio]]; other favorites were [[Ted Williams]] and [[Stan Musial]].<ref name="Mays at 75"/> Mays played several sports at [[Fairfield High Preparatory School|Fairfield Industrial High School]]. On the basketball team, he led players at all-black high schools in [[Jefferson County, Alabama|Jefferson County]] in scoring.<ref>[[#Barra|Barra]], p. 54.</ref> Mays played [[quarterback]], [[fullback (gridiron football)|fullback]] and [[punter (football)|punter]] for the [[high school football|football]] team.<ref>[[#Barra|Barra]], pp. 49–51.</ref> Though he turned 18 in 1949, Mays did not graduate from Fairfield until 1950, which journalist [[Allen Barra]] calls "a minor mystery in Willie's life".<ref>[[#Barra|Barra]], p. 101.</ref>