Late in the Game: The Integration of the Washington Senators

On September 6, 1954, more than seven years after Jackie Robinson stepped onto the diamond at Ebbets Field for the Brooklyn Dodgers, Carlos Paula trotted out to left field at Griffith Stadium in Washington, D.C. He was the first black to appear in a regular sea­ son lineup of the Washington Senators.

This event, while long a matter of speculation since the Robinson signing, barely rated a mention in the mainstream newspapers, and wasn’t covered in any great depth among the black media. The continued poor perform­ance of the bottom-dwelling Senators, plus Paula’s sta­tus as a Cuban national, contributed to the lack of cov­erage, as the Senators had a long history of using Latin American players.

Still, the integration of the national pastime in the nation’s capital deserves study. In order to understand the historic significance of this event, I will argue that the debut of Paula with the Washington Senators, while symbolically an act of integration, was in fact consistent with the team’s long-standing tradition of using Latin American play­ers. Furthermore, this act of integration was lost in the long period of time between Jackie Robinson’s 1947 appearance and the Red Sox 1959 integration and by Paula’s mediocre talents and the half-hearted manner in which his debut took place.

The history of the integration of major league base­ ball up until 1954 shows that the hiring of black ball players by individual teams was largely a matter of the personality and the philosophy of the individual owners. These owners obviously responded to larger shifts in the league and in society in regards to inte­gration. Major league clubs sharing the same city often had very different patterns of hiring black play­ers. In New York, for example, the Brooklyn Dodgers were the first and most aggressive in signing blacks, while the vaunted Yankees were one of the last teams to integrate.

The Senators had a poor record in the long process of integration. Clark Calvin Griffith dom­inated the history of the original Washington Senators that played in the nation’s capital from 1901-1960. Born in Clear Creek, Missouri, in 1869, Griffith was a first-rate pitcher who won 240 games as a major league hurler and won 24 games in the inaugural American League season of 1901 as a member of the Chicago White Sox. Griffith came to the Senators in 1912 as a player-manager and in 1920 bought a con­trolling interest in the team. He stayed with the Senators until his death in 1955 and was succeeded by his adopted son Calvin Griffith. Under Clark Griffith’s tutelage, the Washington Senators earned the most famous epithet in baseball history: “Washington—first in war, first in peace and last in the American League.”

With the possible exception of Connie Mack of the Philadelphia Athletics, no team in baseball more clearly reflected the image of one man than that of the Senators and Clark Griffith. He was certainly not alone in keeping blacks off his team in the first decades of the twentieth century, but he did play the paramount part in keeping blacks off the Senators after the Brooklyn Dodgers had integrated.

However, the history of the racial makeup of the Washington Senators is decidedly not an all-white affair. Part of the problem in dealing with the Senators’ late accept­ance of black ball players was their long history of association with Latinos. This characteristic of the Senators served as an irritant to both black and white sportswriters who followed the team, and was also part of the reason why Carlos Paula’s premiere brought so little attention.

The Senators were among the first teams to mine the untapped talent pool of the Caribbean and Central and South America. There was no gentlemen’s agree­ment about barring these players, and as long as they were considered white, they were able to ply their trade in the big leagues. In 1935, a full twelve years before Jackie Robinson’s debut with the Dodgers, the Senators put Bobby Estalella, a Cuban national, in the outfield at Griffith Stadium. Indeed, many D.C. fans of the time viewed Estalella as black. Next in line was Mel Almada, a Mexican, who was a full-time center fielder and batted .309 in 1937 in 100 games with the Senators. A Venezuelan, Alex Carrasquel, also widely perceived as being black, joined the Senators pitching staff in 1939.

There were other notable Latino players during the 1940s and 1950s. Cuba produced pitcher Rene Monteagudo and infielders Gil Torres, Pedro Gomez and Mike Guerra. Two Cuban brothers roamed the outfield for the Senators: Roberto Ortiz and Baby Ortiz. Mexico sent infielder Chile Gomez. Clearly, not all the Washington Senators players hailed from the breadbasket of the U.S.A.

There were two main reasons for this influx of for­eigners, especially during the 1940s and 1950s. The first of these was that non-U.S. citizens could not be drafted. Both before and during the war the appeal to Griffith of these foreigners was obvious: He would not lose the core of his team to the armed forces, while his competitors who relied on native-born talent would.

This strategy had mixed results, as the Senators fin­ished last and next to last in 1942 and 1944, but they did manage to finish second twice, in 1943 and 1945. Any Senators finish in the first division was an aberra­tion and was probably due to the fact that other

American League teams lost more talented players to the armed forces than the Senators. The second rea­son for Griffith signing so many foreign-born players was financial. Griffith was always in financial difficulty, and like their black counterparts a few years later, Latino players made less money than whites. In short, they were a good source of cheap labor. These immi­grant workers also served to point out the glaring absence of American blacks during this time.

Shirley Povich, the longtime sportswriter of the Washington Post, declared in 1953, “Mr. Griffith would give Washington fans dark players from other lands, but never an American Negro.” Povich was also an outspoken critic of other segregated professional teams in Washington. Writing on the Redskins, Povich declared, “The Redskins colors are burgundy, gold and Caucasian.” In a famous piece of Washington lore Povich wrote, “Jim Brown, born ineligible to play for the Redskins, integrated their end zone three times yesterday.”

Based on Povich’s writings, it is clear that most of the Washington, D.C., area’s sports fans were aware of the team’s exclusion of blacks and the moral and practical problems associated with this. Shirley Povich was no radical rabble-rouser and was writing for a mainstream newspaper. In fairness, Griffith was clearly not a leader in integrating major league base­ ball, but neither was he all that different from other owners of the time.

Povich was not alone among sportswriters in his condemnation of the racial practices of Clark Griffith. Writing in the Pittsburgh Courier in 1943, Wendell Smith declared that Clark Griffith “is one of the big league owners who prefers to go outside of the borders of these United States and bring in players, rather than hire American citizens of color.”

Both the mainstream and black press were critical of Griffith’s refusal to hire black players. As in so many aspects in American history, World War II played a key role in the fight to integrate Major League Baseball. With so many of its players lost to the draft, this era provided the ideal opportunity to hire black players to take their place. The fact that this did not happen speaks vol­umes about the “gentlemen’s agreement” about not hiring blacks. In the aftermath of the war, public protest against this exclusionary policy was evident at Griffith Stadium in Washington, D.C., as well as other ballparks around the country.

According to Jules Tygiel, author of Baseball’s Great Experiment: Jackie Robinson and His Legacy, protes­tors showed up sporadically at Senators home games during the early 1950s calling for integration and were dismissed by Griffith as a “committee of Commies”: As late as 1953 Griffith was unwilling to put a black play­er on the field. In April of that year he declared, “Nobody is going to stampede me into signing Negro players merely for the sake of satisfying certain pres­sure groups.”

At this point, Paula was playing at the Senators AAA affiliate in Charlotte, North Carolina, and while not tagged as a sure-fire major leaguer, Griffith certainly knew of his existence and the possi­bility that he would play for the Senators.

According to David Wiggins, Clark Griffith was not shy about letting people know how much he was against black players in the major leagues. There is no doubt that Griffith received much needed income from rent of his stadium to the Homestead Grays, and perhaps the diminishing talent pool of the Negro Leagues and the subsequent loss of income to Griffith were motivating reasons why he elevated Paula to the big leagues late in the 1954 season.

Three years before Carlos Paula played for the Senators, owner Clark Griffith said that the first black player on each team, “would have to be a great one.” Carlos Paula was a mediocre prospect who put up modest numbers even in the minors. At the time of his call-up in September, 1954, Paula was hitting .290 with the Senators’ Sally League affiliate in Charlotte, North Carolina. Why, then, was Paula the pick to become the first black player for the Senators?

Clearly, Griffith did not want a lot of press attention in this matter, for Paula was a late-season call-up for a seventh-place team some forty games out of first. Paula was slipped in during the first game of a mean­ingless doubleheader between two cellar-dwelling teams. The fact that Paula was not a hot prospect would also lead people to have low expectations of him. This was not a future all-star stepping on the field, but a role player whose shortcomings would soon become apparent.

Finally, the fact that Paula was a Cuban is most significant. The Senators had an almost 20-year history of employing Latino ballplayers. Paula would be just one more spice in the Latin flavor of the Washington Senators. Washington’s two biggest mainstream newspapers treated this historic event as a footnote in the sports section. The Washington Post first mentioned Paula in the third paragraph of an article detailing a doubleheader between the two worst teams in the American League. Commenting on the many new faces brought up from Charlotte, reporter Bob Addie wrote, “Carlos Paula, Jim Lemon, Steve Korcheck and Jesse Levan com­prised the Charlotte delegation in the second game and it’s sad to report that the quartet didn’t get a hit.”

In dealing with the historic aspect of this game the Post reported, “Paula, first Negro ever to play a regular game for the Nats [Senators], played in the first game too, and did contribute two hits including a two-run double.” In his column, “The Baseball Beat,” sports­ writer Burton Hawkins added this bit of perspective: ”Add historical notes: Carlos Paula became the first Negro to play in a regular game for Washington in the first game of yesterday’s double header.” In-depth social or political commentary is not to be expected on reporting of a baseball game; however, the fact that this event didn’t merit mention elsewhere in the paper is indicative that the Post did not consider it a big story.

Washington’s other major paper, the Washington Star, reported the event in much the same way as its competitor, although it was given slightly greater space. Paula at least rated a mention in the opening paragraph of the story. Again, ignoring any social implication whatsoever, the Star declared, “The Senators’ swarm of Charlotte graduates general­ly has touched off little whooping and hollering among the most devoted followers of the club, in strong-backed Carlos Paula and towering Jim Lemon they’ve sensed possible future help.” The paper also reported, “Paula, muscular Cuban Negro, whacked a 400-foot double and a single in the first game with the Philadelphia.”

In commenting further on Paula’s performance, it was reported, “He met three other pitches on the nose, although going hitless in the sec­ond game, which the Senators dropped 3-2. He also handles left field—a brutal sunfield—adequately.” Focusing solely on the baseball significance of Paula’s debut, the Star continued: “Paula will be tested more thoroughly by more adept pitching than he was stacked against yesterday. Carlos seemingly stands a half block from the plate and would appear to be at a loss against pitches nicking the outside of the plate. He got by in the Sally League with that stance, but major league pitchers may force him to alter it.”

The reporter, Burt Hawkins, had prescience about Paula’s batting style which would become a major cause of the demise of his major league career (along with his fielding), but by ignoring any social ramifica­tions of his appearance, the Star was reflecting the unconcern of the mainstream press, and by implica­tion the reading public. Interestingly, the black press, while more complimentary toward Paula, gave the event just slightly more coverage. The Washington Afro-American was the only local paper to print a pic­ture of Paula, although they, too, made little of the social significance of his premiere. Under a picture of Paula in the dugout, the Afro-American called his debut “impressive.”

The paper declared: “The first col­ored player in history to wear a Washington Senator uniform in a regular season game, Carlos Paula made an auspicious bow in the Labor Day double-header against Philadelphia at Griffith Stadium. The 25-year old, 6-foot, 3-inch Cuban outfielder collected two hits, one a double, and drove in two runs in the nightcap. Defensively, he had six putouts, one a spectacular leaping stab of a drive against the left field stands by Jim Finigan.”

It is again evident that baseball took precedence over any social significance. While being more compli­mentary with such words as “auspicious” and “spectacular,” and printing a picture of him, even the local black press downplayed the event. The Afro-American points out that Paula was a Cuban, and this seems to be a point of contention to many people, particularly American-born blacks. It is impossible to tell what would have happened if the first black Washington Senator had been native-born, but the fact that all papers pointed out that he was Cuban leads one to suspect that an American black may have received more press coverage.

Sam Lacy, writing in the Baltimore Afro-American, offered one of the few social criticisms of Paula’s debut with the Senators. Lacy was critical of Senators’ manager Bucky Harris not playing Paula against the New York Yankees the weekend before his actual premiere. Harris claimed that he was reluctant to play too many rookies against the Yankees for fear of drawing criti­cism by the league-leading Indians that the Senators were going soft on New York.

Lacy wrote, “This depart­ment thinks very highly of Bucky and appreciates the explanation . . . Otherwise, it might have been tempted to suspect that Paula was being spared the pressure of breaking in against a club so obviously anti [black].” This criticism was obviously a blast first at the New York Yankees and second at Bucky Harris. Both criti­cisms were unfair. First, while it is true that the Yankees were still an all-white team, they had in fact played against integrated teams with no apparent incidents. Second, the Senators were far out of the pennant race and it is tradition in baseball not to appear to be “giving up” by filling a lineup with rook­ies. That said, Lacy did have the courage to move beyond the baseball diamond in looking at the barrier the Senators were passing.

Lacy also offered an interesting economic incentive to Paula’s appearance. With tongue planted firmly in cheek, Lacy declared that he “wouldn’t dare conclude that the tan Cuban was being eyed hopefully by the front office as a sort of a prop for a holiday gate that had the misfortune to draw the bedraggled Philadelphia Athletics as a lure.”

This criticism was interesting on two fronts. First, the economic argu­ment is hard to accept. While Griffith was always strapped for cash and no doubt would have liked to draw a big holiday crowd, Paula’s appearance was not announced in advance. Second, the use of the words “tan Cuban” again reflect the mixed feelings of American blacks toward Paula. Lacy, to be fair, at least was able to view the larger context of the event, even if his criticisms were unfair. Paula played in a total of nine games during the 1954 season. He played a full season in 1955, participating in 115 games and hitting a commendable .299.

His shortcomings, however, were becoming apparent. For a man of his size he lacked power, hitting a paltry six home runs, an unac­ceptable number for an outfielder. Even Shirley Povich, an early supporter of integration, mocked Paula as hitting “destructive singles.” Along with his lack of power, it was his fielding that ultimately did in Paula. Baseball historian Peter Bjarkman wrote of Paula that his “abilities to smash a baseball never came near to compensating for his seemingly total inability to field one cleanly in the outfield.”

Even Povich had to admit that Paula was, “something of a crudity in the field.” He led all American League out­ fielders in errors during the 1955 campaign. Paula played in only 33 games for the Senators in 1956 and was sent to the minors for good at the start of the 1957 season.

George Will has called Jackie Robinson’s debut with the Brooklyn Dodgers “the most important event in the emancipation of black Americans since the Civil War.” While this may be overstated, it does reflect the drama and importance that many placed on Jackie Robinson. Carlos Paula, by comparison, received little attention or credit.

There are a few reasons for this. The first had to do with timing. 1954 was a critical year in the growing civil rights movement. The Brown decision had huge ramifications on a very personal level. White Washingtonians were faced with the prospect of integrating their public schools. Carlos Paula took the field the day before most of the area’s schools opened. It is easy to see why many people did not pay attention.

Second, Paula’s nationality was a factor in the limited press coverage he received and the lukewarm fan reaction toward him. Many white writers viewed him as another in a long line of Latino players to wear a Senators uniform. Many black writ­ers were resentful of the fact that a native-born man of color wasn’t the first to play for Washington.

Finally, the fact that Paula wasn’t a top prospect probably played the key role in the lack of attention given his debut. A .290 hitter in the minors, who lacked power and was a mediocre fielder at best, was not going to rivet the attention of even hard-core fans. The overall history of the original Washington Senators was large­ly one of mediocrity. One World Series triumph and three pennants in sixty years are testimony to this fact. The Senators continually displayed substandard per­formances; it is not surprising that their first dip into the interracial pool had similar results. 

DAVID EVANS was born in Washington, DC and attended Senators games at RFK Stadium with his father. He now lives in Charlestown, West Virginia.