Glenn Burke
Major League Baseball (MLB) player
Died when: 42 years 195 days (510 months)Star Sign: Scorpio
Glenn Lawrence Burke (November 16, 1952 – May 30, 1995) was a Major League Baseball (MLB) player for the Los Angeles Dodgers and Oakland Athletics from 1976 to 1979.
He was forcibly "outed" against his will to his teammates and the teams' owners, thus becoming the first MLB player known to have been openly gay while playing in Major League Baseball.
Though he would eventually embrace his sexuality publicly, being outed involuntarily eventually proved to be an emotional, psychological, and professional burden he could no longer endure; leading to his retirement from Major League Baseball after only four years. stating, "They can't ever say now that a gay man can't play in the majors, because I'm a gay man and I made it." In October 1977, Burke ran onto the field to congratulate his Dodgers teammate Dusty Baker after Baker hit his 30th home run;
Burke raised his hand over his head and Baker slapped it.They are widely credited with inventing the high five.
Burke kept active in sports after retiring from baseball.He competed in the 1982 Gay Olympics, now re-named Gay Games, in track, and in 1986 in basketball.
He played for many years in the San Francisco Gay Softball League.He died from AIDS-related causes in 1995.In August 2013, Burke was among the first class of inductees into the National Gay and Lesbian Sports Hall of Fame.
Burke was inducted into the Baseball Reliquary's Shrine of the Eternals in 2015.