On April 8, 1974, Henry Aaron hit his 715th career home run, breaking Babe Ruth's famous record and placing Atlanta on the national stage as a major city.
Famed Dodgers broadcaster Vin Scully, calling Aaron's smash against Dodgers pitcher Al Downing, said, "A black man is getting a standing ovation in the Deep South for breaking a record of an all-time baseball idol. What a marvelous moment for baseball. What a marvelous moment for Atlanta and the state of Georgia. What a marvelous moment for the country and the world."
Atlanta's majestic display of racial unity cast a brief glow over deeper divisions: The city of Atlanta lost more than 100,000 residents in the following decades from "white flight" spurred by the 1973 election of Maynard Jackson, the city's first black mayor.
A population boom in recent years has returned Atlanta to its 1974 population of 495,000, reducing the city's longtime black majority. The metro area's population has leaped to more than 6 million from 1.3 million 50 years ago.
Before breaking Ruth's record, which had stood since 1935, Aaron received an avalanche of racially poisoned hate mail. Despite death threats, he continued his stellar play.
Like fellow Mobile, Ala. native Willie Mays, Aaron rose from the harshly segregated South to take his place among the first generation of black stars who invigorated baseball following Jackie Robinson's integration of the Major Leagues. Early in his career, Aaron and other black players were forced to stay in different hotels than their white teammates, especially in the South.
Following his Hall of Fame baseball career, Aaron gained success as an entrepreneur, Braves executive and supporter of human rights, education and black political equality. His death in January 2021 drew deep national mourning.
The brief flight of Aaron's record-breaking home run over the left centerfield wall was one of those historic moments that define a city and a nation.
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