Washington, D.C. — It’s not every day that a professional athlete shows up to your class to give a reading lesson. But that was the case for a group of first grade students in Southeast Washington, just over the Anacostia River about three miles from Nationals Park.
On a brisk October morning, Washington Nationals designated hitter Josh Bell arrived at KIPP DC Heights Academy, one of the participating schools in the Nationals’ Grand Slam Schools program, to read and discuss his new children’s book, “What Color is the Sky.”
“Our kids were extremely excited to get a chance to hear from a baseball player. They were just ecstatic to know that they would learn from someone who they can also see playing,” said Principal Michael McGee. “They were super engaged and really enjoyed the book. Getting a chance to see them instantly go back to their desks, open up their books, and practice those skills directly from a text they heard from Josh was just amazing.”
Bell wrote and published his first-ever children’s book, “What Color is the Sky,” in July 2025. The book, which is now available for purchase, explores a lesson taught to a young Bell by his father about keeping a positive attitude amid trying times, whether in school or on the diamond.
“It’s a question my dad asked me, growing up,” Bell said. “Whenever things were going poorly, whenever I had a bad day at school or a bad game, he’d ask me, ‘What color is the sky?’ He would tell me to look up, stay focused on what’s ahead of me.”
The idea to write his own book came during Spring Training ahead of the 2025 season. After considering several different concepts for the story, Bell found himself returning to the theme of finding one’s inner strength — a lesson he felt could be passed on to his own children.
“I think this story was the most prominent one for me in my childhood, and with little ones myself, was the one that I wanted to be able to tell my kids,” noted Bell, a father of three.
While not the first author in the family (Bell’s mother, Myrtle, has written a book of her own), he credits his grandmother, mother, sister and aunt — all of whom are educators — for helping cultivate his interest in reading from a young age.
“I’m the jock in my family, but I have some background, some rooting in literacy. Happy to be a part of that gang,” he laughed.
A longtime advocate for youth development, Bell has actively supported education, literacy and sports participation initiatives for much of his Major League career, particularly through his work with Washington Nationals Philanthropies and its signature program, the Nationals Youth Baseball Academy. Bell also made a recent visit to the Nationals Academy to read his book to a group of its Scholar Athletes.
Bell says that former player Ian Desmond was one of the first people to encourage him to work closely with the Nationals Youth Baseball Academy when Bell first joined the Club in 2021. During his initial stint in Washington between 2021–22, Bell was named the Nationals Youth Baseball Academy Player Ambassador and later launched Josh Bell’s Book Club, a monthly book club focused on self-improvement. He currently serves as Nationals Philanthropies’ inaugural ambassador to the Nike Reviving Baseball in Inner Cities (RBI) program, Major League Baseball’s flagship youth outreach initiative, which provides administrative, programmatic and infrastructural resources to underserved communities.
Bell is now using his story to benefit the Nationals Academy, as all proceeds from the book benefit the Academy’s farmers market, which provides fresh produce year-round at a highly subsidized rate to families in Washington, D.C.’s Ward 7.
“When this book came out, they asked me what I wanted to do with the proceeds when sales started coming in, and I said, first and foremost, let’s give back to the [Nationals Youth Baseball] Academy,” explained Bell.
Bell’s recent visits to both Heights Academy and the Nationals Academy are just the latest examples of Nationals players dedicating their time, particularly in the offseason, to foster meaningful engagement in the local community. He hopes his story can reach children of all ages and inspire them to keep a positive mindset and stay determined in pursuit of achieving their dreams.
“Hopefully, if even one of the kids in the classroom can remember this on a bad day, to keep their head up and to look up toward the sky, that’s a win for me.”
“What Color is the Sky” is now available for purchase at ello.com/JoshBell. All proceeds benefit the Nationals Youth Baseball Academy’s community impact work. To learn more, visit nats4good.org.