Gay, Lesbian Sports Hall Of Fame Honors Late A's Outfielder Burke
OAKLAND (CBS/AP) -- The late Glen Burke is being indicted into the National Gay & Lesbian Sports Hall of Fame.
An outfielder with the Oakland Athletics and the Los Angeles Dodgers in the 1970s, Burke is widely believed to have delivered the first high-five.
Though he did not publicly come out until two years after he left baseball, Burke maintained until he died of complications due to AIDS in 1995 that he was run out of the game by "prejudiced and homophobic" managers and front offices that knew he was gay.
"This will help preserve history," said Executive Director Bill Gubrud. "You are not going to know where to go if you don't know where you've been and many in the gay community don't know Glenn Burke."
On Friday night, Burke will be honored in the first class of inductees that includes tennis greats Martina Navratilova and Billie Jean King, Olympic diving champion Greg Louganis, and the NBA's Jason Collins, who in April became the first active male professional athlete in a major team sport to publicly reveal he was gay.
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