Millito Navarro

On April 27, 2011, Navarro was hospitalized at Hospital San Lucas in Ponce after suffering a minor heart attack. On April 28, he was transferred to the hospital's intensive care unit after suffering a stroke. He died two days later on April 30, 2011, after failing to overcome the effects of his stroke. He was survived by four children, 11 grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandchild.

On May 1, 2011, the New York Yankees held a moment of silence to honor Navarro before the start of their game against the Toronto Blue Jays. In 2011, his home municipality of Ponce named a sports complex after him, Ciudad Deportiva Millito Navarro. He is also recognized at Ponce's Parque de los Ponceños Ilustres in the area of sports.

On June 6, 2008, Major League Baseball held a ceremonial Negro league draft prior to the amateur draft. Navarro was selected by the New York Yankees. He was also honored at a game during the final homestand in Yankee Stadium history on September 18, 2008. In 2010, Navarro was honored by "Experience Works" who recognized him as an outstanding active Senior Citizen in the United States.

Navarro became a centenarian on September 26, 2005 and the following years saw many tributes to him in both Puerto Rico and the United States. His life and experiences in baseball were part of an American documentary called "Beisbol", on the contributions and influence of Hispanics in America's national pastime. He was elected to the Puerto Rico Baseball Hall of Fame in 1992 and the Puerto Rican Sports Hall of Fame in 2004. The Senate of Puerto Rico presented him with Resolution #1026 in recognition of his contributions to baseball on June 7, 2005. On December 29, 2006, Navarro was inducted into the Hispanic Heritage Baseball Museum. Former Astros great José (Cheo) Cruz presented the plaque of induction to Navarro.

In 1938, Puerto Rican sportswriter Emilio Huike voted Navarro as the "Ideal Professional Baseball Player".

In the 1920s, the United States was a racially segregated country and Navarro's skin color presented a problem for his participation in American baseball leagues — in baseball, blacks were not permitted to play in the same leagues as their white counterparts. As a consequence of this policy, a group of white and black businessmen joined forces and organized their own Negro leagues. The teams played against each other and even had their own Negro World Series. Two of those teams were the Cuban Stars, owned by Alex Pompez, and the Cuban Giants. Both of those teams consisted mainly of African-American or Afro-Latino players.

Emilio Navarro (September 26, 1905 – April 30, 2011), better known as "Millito Navarro", was the first Puerto Rican to play baseball in the American Negro leagues. At the time of his death, at age 105, Navarro was the oldest former professional baseball player and the last surviving player from the American Negro League.