A statue of Hall of Famer Leroy “Satchel” Paige inside the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. (USA TODAY Sports Images)

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Baseball’s Negro Leagues were borne of ugliness, an unofficial “gentlemen’s agreement” among team owners that established the sport’s racial barrier in the late 19th century after Hall of Famer Cap Anson refused to play on the same field as African-American catcher Moses Fleetwood Walker. Segregation in the game throughout most of the United States’ Jim Crow era kept some of the greatest players in baseball history out of the Major Leagues, and prevented black players from competing with or against their white counterparts at the professional level until Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.

But the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City’s 18th and Vine district, just a block away from the Paseo YMCA where the Negro National League was first established in 1920, hardly harps on that ugliness. A stunningly staged, 10,000 square-foot collection of photos, newspaper clippings, memorabilia and equipment, the museum honors the dazzling history that grew out of baseball’s color line.

“Some people come here expecting to be introduced to a sad, somber story,” Bob Kendrick, the museum’s president, told USA TODAY Sports on Tuesday. “They’re in the wrong place. This is a celebration. It’s a celebration of the power of the human spirit to persevere.

Negro Leagues Baseball Museum President Bob Kendrick outside the museum’s entrance in 2012. (USA TODAY Sports Images)

“It’s easy for people to dwell on the negativity that American segregation led to — it was a horrible time in this country’s history. But out of segregation grows this wonderful story of triumph and conquest, based on one simple principle: If you won’t let me play in the Major Leagues, I’ll create my own league. That’s the American spirit. America was trying to prevent them from experiencing the joys of our so-called national pastime, but the American spirit allowed them to persevere and prevail. That’s why this story is such an awe-inspiring story.”

Founded in 1990 as a single-room office by a group of Negro League veterans that included charismatic former Kansas City Monarchs player and manager Buck O’Neil, the museum moved to its current location three years later. But after O’Neil’s death at age 94 in 2006, the museum fell into financial straits, losing important donation money due to recession and losing its greatest ambassador in O’Neil.

Kendrick, a close friend of O’Neil’s, took over as president in 2011. Under his stewardship — “I was in the right place at the right time,” he says — the museum has turned a profit in each of the last three years after capitalizing on the All-Star Game played in Kansas City in 2012 and unexpected interest in the Negro Leagues following the release of the movie 42 in 2013.

In 2014, the Royals’ unexpected World Series run has helped draw more fans to the turnstiles.

Buck O’Neil poses with a statue of himself at the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in 2005. (PHOTO: AP Photo)

“People are excited about the game, and when they’re excited about the game, we’re that other baseball thing for people to do,” Kendrick said. “So of course it has a direct impact. But the club has been such a great part of the museum, helping promote what we do. This amazing playoff run has certainly bolstered our attendance at a time when it’s usually a little bit dormant here, right after tourist season ends in August.”

The museum has yet to compile its official attendance and revenue totals this month, but Kendrick said it has enjoyed a noticeable uptick in visitors from previous Octobers. And the extra attention and attendance bring more merchandise sales and memberships. This week, the museum will play host to a watch party and a panel discussion honoring the Royals’ 1985 championship team. On Wednesday morning, Sharon Robinson — Jackie’s daughter — will speak about her father and read from her books to a group of elementary students at the museum.

Kendrick noted that the current Royals play “similar to a Negro League style of play” due to their aggressive baserunning and strong defense. And the club and museum share a connection to O’Neil, who served as a longtime scout for the Royals. The team maintains O’Neil’s seat in Kauffman Stadium as the “Buck O’Neil Legacy Seat,” given nightly to a member of the community who “embodies an aspect of Buck’s spirit,” according to the Royals’ website. And O’Neil’s apparently irrepressible spirit, which gained national recognition after his work in Ken Burns’ Baseball documentary, seems to permeate many of the aspects and exhibits of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.

A baseball diamond outside the Kansas City YMCA where the Negro League Baseball Museum will soon expand.(USA TODAY Sports Images)

The museum plans to expand to the very YMCA in which the Negro National League was founded 94 years ago and convert it into the Buck O’Neil Education and Research Center. Kendrick said one floor should be open by the spring, with the rest of the building converted by sometime in 2016.

“If it had not been for Buck O’Neil, there would not be a Negro Leagues Baseball Museum to tell this story that had escaped the history books,” Kendrick said. “That was what was at stake: This story would die when that last Negro Leaguer left the face of this Earth. This was going to go extinct if not for the work the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum.

“One of the things that has really warmed my heart through the Royals’ playoff run is all the people who have expressed the sentiment, ‘I really wish Buck was here to see this,’ ‘How much would Buck enjoy this?’ His memory is still there. There is no one who was a more ardent lover of the Kansas City Royals than Buck O’Neil.”