Buddy Armour

Although he didn’t enjoy the prominence of many players of his era, Alfred Armour posted a solid professional baseball career, including three all-star appearances and a Negro League World Series championship in 1945. Because the peak years of his career predated talks of integrating the White major leagues, he never attained enduring fame on the scale of some of his peers, evidenced by a telling comment in 1941 when a preview article naming reserves for the Ninth Annual East-West All-Star Game in Chicago noted, “Alfred Armour, St. Louis (a sensational centerfielder who should be in the starting lineup … can hit and throw: lack of publicity has kept this boy out of the headlines).”1

Armour was born on April 27, 1915, in Madison, Mississippi. The historical record of his youth has yet to be found. The family moved to Carbondale, Illinois, at some point before 1930, as that year’s census shows him living there in the household of his grandparents, Alfred and Fannie. Alfred was a laborer at a tire factory, and Fannie was a laundress for a private family.2 Armour’s biological father, the son of his grandfather and also named Alfred, died in 1932, when Buddy was 17.3

The earliest mention of Alfred in the local press was in 1929, for his eighth-grade graduation from Crispus Attucks High School,4>/sup> an African American school organized in 1920, which operated independently until its students were integrated into Carbondale Community High School in 1964.5

Attucks offered basketball and track and field as sports. The possibility of baseball is mentioned on the Illinois High School “Glory Days” website, but there is “no record of trophies or plaques won by Attucks in baseball or any other extracurricular activity at the state tournament level.”6 The record of past individual accomplishments fails to mention Armour.

In 1933 Armour appeared professionally as a reserve third baseman for the Indianapolis ABCs/Detroit Stars. His performance as an 18-year-old is modest: He played in nine games and went 4-for-25 (.160). However, he is not listed on a professional roster again until 1938, apparently toiling on semipro teams.

From 1934 to 1935, the trail of Armour’s playing career goes cold. If he was a member of a professional organization, it’s barely documented. More likely, he played for a barnstorming or semipro team, which wasn’t uncommon for the time.

Two sources list Armour as reaching the Negro Leagues in 1936. All Mississippi Baseball, a blog self-described as highlighting Mississippi-connected players from preps to pros, past and present, notes that “Alfred Allen Armour reached the ‘big leagues’ of Black baseball in 1936, when he signed with the St. Louis Stars.7

A “bullpen” post on Baseball Reference asserts that “Armour got his start with the 1936 St. Louis Stars. After a couple years on the bench, he was the starting shortstop for the 1938 Indianapolis ABC’s.”8

Independent confirmation of this was elusive, as there is no statistical mention of Armour on either Baseball Reference or Retrosheet for the 1936 and 1937 seasons. But he appears in a photograph of the Mounds (Illinois) Blues, participants in the 1937 Illinois Semipro Baseball Championships in Elgin.9

Later, that team is mentioned as the predecessor to the Indianapolis ABC’s, which became the Stars in 1939.10

Eliminated from play by the Elgin West Ends after winning two earlier contests,11 the Blues returned to the St. Louis area and competed against area teams throughout the remainder of 1937. Whenever a box score accompanies a summary of the game, Armour is generally listed at shortstop and batting second in the lineup.

Finally, in 1938, Armour secured a starting position, this one with the Indianapolis ABC’s of the Negro American League. In the preview of an early series with the Atlanta Crackers, he is characterized as follows:

“Alfred Armour, short stop, throws right, hits life [left], is very fast, and a good hitter. He is rated by Manager Big George] Mitchell to go to first base in 3 seconds.”12

Indianapolis finished sixth with a 17-21 record with Armour mostly batting leadoff and again playing shortstop. Accounts differ regarding his offensive production, but Seamheads lists Armour as a .250 hitter in 17 games played. A Retrosheet download indicates 24 hits in 72 at-bats (.333 average). The discrepancy could be partially explained by the inclusion of three exhibition games.

With the franchise moving to St. Louis in 1939, the now St. Louis Stars fared no better than the ABC’s, finishing sixth again in the Negro American League, but Armour, then 24, was hitting his stride as a player. Again, statistical sources differ slightly, but the Retrosheet log reports 29 hits in 94 at-bats for a .309 batting average. Generally batting in the middle of the order, he had 16 RBIs.

That season was also the first time Armour was referred to by his nickname. Early-season coverage of the Stars’ 14-11 win over the Indianapolis ABC’s stated that “‘Buddy’ Armour who was spiked Sunday night was still out of the lineup, [Marshall Riddle] playing short and Dan Wilson holding down second base.”13 No further explanation of the moniker was noted.

With ongoing financial difficulties, the club split its home games between St. Louis and New Orleans in 1940 and 1941, becoming the St. Louis-New Orleans Stars. Armour’s emerging stardom was evident in an early-season preview of a series with the Atlanta All-Stars, in which he was characterized as a “shortstop who is exceptionally fast and a good fielder who carries the power of a 200-pounder although he weighs only 150.”14

Armour put up impressive numbers in 1940, now as an outfielder, with John Lyles becoming the staple at shortstop. Armour’s average was third among regular players with the Stars, .327 in 29 games, trailing only first baseman Ed Mayweather and second baseman Riddle in that category.

The Stars finished fourth in the Negro American League, well behind the Kansas City Monarchs, a team that included such greats as Buck O’Neil, Satchel Paige, and an aging Turkey Stearnes. But Armour’s performance was garnering notice.

Back with the Stars in 1941, Armour’s production waned, and he had yet to play for a first-division team in his professional career. The Stars were 21-27-3, with the Monarchs again winning the league. But despite the lack of team successes, 1941 saw Armour being selected as a reserve for the West team in the annual East-West All Star Game at Chicago’s Comiskey Park.

In that game, Armour replaced Neil Robinson in center field in the fifth inning and singled in his first at-bat in the sixth but was stranded at second base. He struck out in the eighth, but a dropped third strike by East catcher Roy Campanellaput him on first, and he ultimately scored the second run for the West in an 8-3 loss.

With ongoing financial struggles and a developing interest in the New York Black Yankees, Allen Johnson, a nightclub owner in Mounds, Illinois, and the Stars’ financial backer, dissolved the Stars and attempted to move 10 players to the Black Yankees, then of the Negro National League. The other owners objected, but former Stars manager George Mitchell, serving as business manager for Johnson, cited a previous ruling by the league that “any owner could quit one league and join the other league taking at least 10 players with him.”15 The Black Yankees did field a team in 1941, and a comparison of rosters shows eight of the 1941 St. Louis-New Orleans Stars as members of the 1942 Black Yankees.

Professionally, 1942 was lost for Armour, as he was not among them.

The 1943 season was only marginally better. A member of the Negro National League II operating as the Harrisburg-St. Louis Stars with home games played on the Island Park diamond in Harrisburg, had a roster made up of former members of the St. Louis Stars, and “players recruited from the disbanded American circuit.”16 For Armour, that meant limited opportunity, as he wasn’t part of the featured nine. The collective record of both teams was 12-32, again a second-class team performance that seemed to plague Armour’s career.

The chronicling of his personal successes is hard to define, because many of his games were exhibitions or not formally reported. His official stats for 1943 show participation in 14 games, split between Harrisburg and the Black Yankees. But other new entries, including one in June 1944, note that “[the cleanup] hitter for Cleveland, Buddy Armour, plays left field and slugged the horsehide at a .330 clip in 1943.”17

Armour’s career break occurred when he joined the Cleveland Buckeyes early in the 1944 season. He was 29 years old. An early-season match with the New York Cubans introduced him:

“The Cleveland Buckeyes are confident that they have overcome the faults of their first week’s practice, and with the addition of Alfred ‘Buddy’ Armour, former New Orleans-St. Louis Stars centerfielder, they believe they possess the punch and pitching to halt the Cubans.”18

Finally playing for a contender, Armour was again selected to the East-West All Star Game. As a starter, he batted cleanup and got a hit, stole a base and scored two runs in the West All Stars’ 7-4 victory.

The Buckeyes finished second behind the Birmingham Black Barons, 15½ games back. For Armour, his season results showed a .296 batting average in 20 games, with 15 RBIs. Although considered by many as a left-handed power hitter, he failed to tally a home run.

On the cusp of greatness, Cleveland entered the 1945 season with a similar lineup and high expectations. Armour was again a fixture in the outfield, and the Buckeyes dominated the first and second halves of the season to win the Negro American League championship by a wide margin over the Kansas City Monarchs. At the end of league play, the Buckeyes lost only 17 times in 80 outings, qualifying them for a shot at the Homestead Grays, a Negro League dynasty and winners of the previous two World Series. Like the Buckeyes, the Grays had won both halves of their season.

Armour was positioned seventh in the batting order for the Series. His 3-for-3 performance in Game Three was a key element in the Buckeyes’ 5-0 victory. The Buckeyes swept the Grays in four games, and after laboring with subpar teams for most of his career, Armour was a champion.

Armour returned to Cleveland in 1946. A new manager and multiple player changes to the core group found the Buckeyes less competitive, and they finished third behind Kansas City and Birmingham. But Armour regained his form, again batting over .300. (Seamheads lists his batting average as .333.) He was invited to and played for the North-South All Stars in a late-season clash against the Homestead Grays. But despite his production, Buckeyes general manager Wilbur Hayes traded him to the Chicago Giants for 24-year-old Clyde Nelson.19

Again saddled with a losing franchise (Chicago finished last in the 1947 Negro American League standings), Armour was still proficient on the field and was selected to the first 1947 East-West All-Star Game for the third time. (In 1946, 1947, and 1948, the Negro Leagues held two All-Star games a few days apart, one in Chicago and the other in New York or Washington.) As the starting right fielder in Chicago, he was 2-for-4 with two doubles and scored a run for the winning West team. He also played in the second game, starting in right field and going 0-for-1 before being replaced.

Armour stayed with the Giants in 1948 and again hit .300. But the team was once again a bottom-dweller, and with baseball being integrated and the Negro Leagues ultimately a casualty of that decision, his days in the spotlight were essentially over.

Reports of Armour playing in the Negro Southern League and the Canadian League are sporadically reported, but he did join the Homestead Grays, now an independent club, with a nod to his earlier accomplishments, in 1950.

“The signing of Buddy Armour was pleasing news to Manager Sam Bankhead, who immediately installed the former Cleveland Buckeye star in centerfield,” wrote the Washington Afro American. “Armour, a capable defensive player, also will add to the Grays already power-laden batting attack. He was batting king in the Canadian League last year.”20

It was the final year of the Grays, and the final year of Armour’s baseball career.

When his baseball career ended, Armour settled back in Carbondale and worked as a custodian for the city. He was married with a daughter, according to the 1950 census.

After his career ended, occasional mentions in the local newspaper listed him as an instructor for the Carbondale Junior Baseball League.21

Armour died on April 15, 1974, after a two-year illness. He is buried in the Oakland Cemetery in Carbondale.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author accessed Retrosheet.org, Baseball-Reference.com, SABR.org, and Seamheads.com.

Notes

1 Hayward Jackson, “Windy City All Agog Over Big Classic; Expect 40,000, Atlanta Daily World, July 15, 1941: 5.

2 1930 Census, Ancestry.com.

3 US, Deaths and Stillbirths Index, 1916-1947, Ancestry.com.

4 “Colored Pupils to Get Diplomas Tonight,” Carbondale (Illinois) Free Press, May 29, 1929: 3.

5 Brad Pace, “The Spirit of Attucks Schools,” https://carbondalespiritofattucks.weebly.com/the-spirit-of-attucks-schools.html.

6 https://illinoishighschoolglorydays.com/2022/03/01/carbondale-crispus-attucks-hs-bluebirds/.

7 www.allmississippibaseball.net/spotlight-on-4/ February 15, 2011, entry.

8 https://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Buddy_Armour

9 “The Mounds Blues, With St. Louis Boys, Near the Illinois State Championship,” St. Louis Argus, August 6, 1937: 6.

10 “Card Twin Bill,” Indianapolis Star, July 23, 1938: 13. In 1937 a team from Mounds, Illinois (Blues) competed in the Illinois Semi Pro Tournament held in Elgin. A photograph of that team, with players identified, includes at least seven players who were on the roster of the Indianapolis ABCs of the Negro American League in 1938, including Armour. The ABCs moved to St. Louis in 1939 and became the St. Louis Stars.

11 “Elgin Defeats Colored Blues Last Night,” Dixon (Illinois) Evening Telegraph, August 11, 1937: 6.

12 “Indianapolis ABC’s Coming to Atlanta for Big Series,” Atlanta Daily World, June 5, 1938: 5.

13 “Stars Show Power in Hot 19-10 Victory,” St. Louis Argus, May 19, 1939: 11.

14 “Lucius ‘Melancholy’ Jones,” “St. Louis Stars Play Atlanta Nine at Harper Field This Sunday,” Atlanta Daily World, April 3, 1940: 5.

15 “Lucius ‘Melancholy” Jones”, “Sports Slants,” Atlanta Daily World, March 11, 1942: 5.

16 “Enter Negro Nine in League Here,” Harrisburg (Pennsylvania) Evening News, May 6, 1943: 21.

17 “Buckeyes Invade Twin City for Giant Twilight Game,” Hammond (Indiana) Times, June 16, 1944: 21.

18 Hayward Jackson, “Bremmer’s Pitching May Halt Cubans’ Power in New Orleans,” Pittsburgh Courier, April 22, 1944: 14.

19 “Buckeyes Get Nelson of Chicago in Trade for Armour,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, December 31, 1946: 22.

20 “Grays Sign Buddy Armour,” Washington Afro American, May 13, 1950: 30.

21 “Carbondale Boys Get More Lessons,” Southern Illinoisan (Carbondale), May 23, 1958: 9.