Hank Aaron received a fair amount of hate mail while he was chasing Babe Ruth’s record. But Ruth’s widow was very supportive: “The Babe loved baseball so very much; I know he was pulling for Hank Aaron to break his record.”
Classy lady there.
As a kid, I watched Hank Aaron hit 714 and 715 on the old RCA television. My folks took pictures (slides) of the TV screen with the 35mm Pentax camera and Kodachrome film.
I can imagine those many people who wrote those letters were basically full of the idea that Ruth was God and no one, especially a black man, could challenge that and the home run record. And that is not at all dissimilar from the mentality behind the anger and hatred directed at Trump when he challenged and defeated Hillary.