The untold story of a man who changed the face and pace of professional sports

Mark Jacob is the co-author of eight books about history, sports, and photography. His newest book — to be released this October — has been written with his brother Matthew.

Globetrotter: How Abe Saperstein Shook Up the World of Sports is a biography of Abe Saperstein, the Jewish immigrant who started the all-Black Harlem Globetrotters basketball team and turned it into a worldwide sensation.

Globetrotter explains Saperstein’s role in one of pro basketball’s biggest rule changes — the three-point shot. The book also details how Saperstein helped shatter the racial barrier in Major League Baseball. And Globetrotter reveals how the State Department worked behind the scenes to support and help plan the Harlem Globetrotters’ overseas tours during the Cold War.

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Mark’s previously published books are:

  • Aftershock: The Human Toll of War (CityFiles Press, 2019)

  • Chicago Rules: Federal Cases That Defined the City and the Nation (CityFiles Press; 2019)

  • 10 Things You Might Not Know About Nearly Everything (Midway, 2013)

  • Treacherous Beauty: Peggy Shippen, the Woman Behind Benedict Arnold’s Plot to Betray America (Lyons Press, 2012)

  • What the Great Ate: A Curious History of Food and Fame (Three Rivers Press/Random House, 2010)

  • Chicago Under Glass: Early Photographs from the Chicago Daily News (University of Chicago Press, 2007)

  • Wrigley Field: A Celebration of the Friendly Confines (Contemporary Books, 2002)

  • The Game That Was: The George Brace Baseball Photo Collection (Contemporary Books, 1996)