Joseph Wilbur Adcock was born on October 30, 1927, in Coushatta, Louisiana, located about 45 miles south of Shreveport on the east bank of the Red River. His father was Ray Adcock, a businessman, farmer, and longtime sheriff of Red River County; his mother, Helen (Lyles) Adcock, was a teacher. Joe and his younger sister, Mary Ann, grew up on the family farm, where they were expected to help out with the chores by the time they were 7 years old.

Joe was always big for his age and gradually drifted toward basketball; baseball, on the other hand, seemed as uncommon as heavy snow in Northwestern Louisiana. “There was no town team, no school team, not even a diamond,” said Adcock years later as a big leaguer. “The closest I came was a bit of one old cat as a kid with perhaps five kids playing at a time. I’d hit a rock with a stick out by the roadside down home and I’d knocked corncobs up on the barn roof with a broomstick. But as far as playing baseball, that was just something I heard my dad talk about.”1

Adcock was a standout basketball player at Coushatta High, leading the school to the state Class B finals as a senior in 1944. Basketball coach Jesse Fatheree at Louisiana State University offered the 6-foot-4, 210-pound Adcock and two of his teammates scholarships to play on the hardwood for the Tigers. Like many colleges (and professional baseball) teams at the time, rosters were depleted because of World War II. Baseball coach A.L. “Red” Swanson took over the team when Fatheree was drafted into the service. “One time in the spring of my freshman year, I was watching the varsity baseball team practice,” Adcock recalled of his introduction to baseball.2 In desperate need of players, Swanson invited Adcock try out for the team. Adcock stumbled learning to throw and catch fly balls, but proved to be a good hitter with an eagle eye. “I was all hit and no field,” he recalled. “I’d never worn spikes. I’d never had a uniform. I never played a game with nine men on a side.”3 Adcock’s first love remained basketball; he led the Southeastern Conference in scoring (18.6 points per game) in the 1945-1946 season and had offers to play professionally.4 On the diamond he established his reputation as a right-handed slugger and capable first baseman. Adcock attracted scouts during his junior year when he helped lead the Tigers to the Southeastern Conference championship. Cincinnati Reds scout Paul Florence signed him to a contract in 1947.

Adcock began his professional baseball career as a 19-year-old in Columbia, South Carolina, playing for the Reds’ affiliate in the Class A South Atlantic (Sally) League. The second youngest player on the team, Adcock batted .264 with a .414 slugging percentage and earned an invitation to the Reds’ spring training in 1948. Among the first cut from camp, Adcock returned to Columbia, where he improved his average to .279 (though his slugging dropped about 30 points), and was named to the Sally League’s midsummer all-star team. He also suffered a knee injury, the first of many injuries that plagued him throughout his career.

After another look-see at Reds spring training in 1950, Adcock was assigned to the Tulsa Oilers in the Double-A Texas League. Still a raw fielder, Adcock worked closely with manager Al Vincent to develop his technique. “He changed my whole style,” said Adcock of Vincent. “I started from scratch with him and he taught me everything.”5 Playing with a knee brace, Adcock emerged as one of most promising young sluggers in the league, belting 41 doubles and 19 home runs to go along with a sturdy .298 average for the league champions.

Adcock secured a Reds roster spot in 1950 but encountered a serious problem. An emerging star, big Ted Kluszewski, seemed to be the club’s first sacker of the future, leaving Adcock without a natural position. Adcock’s three seasons with the Reds were subsequently filled with frustration, missed opportunities, and injuries.

Adcock’s impressive debut as a 22-year-old first baseman against the Pittsburgh Pirates on April 23 (2-for-4 with a double) was followed by an embarrassing outing early in the game the next evening. “I’m sitting on the bench … before the game,” he recalled, “and [manager] Luke Sewell throws me a glove and says, ‘You’re playing left field.’ It was the first time in my life that I ever had a fielder’s glove. The first groundball hit to me should have been held to a single, but I had to chase it all the way to the wall.”6 Struggling at the plate through June in limited duty, Adcock showed that he could hit big-league pitching in a six-game stretch (10-for-24) in early July, then replaced the weak-hitting Peanuts Lowrey in left field after the All-Star Game. From July 5 through the end of the season Adcock hit a team-high .315 (102-for-324) and earned a berth on The Sporting News Rookie All-Star team.

Firmly ensconced as the Reds’ left fielder in his sophomore season, “Billy Joe” (a nickname he earned from Dodgers announcer Vin Scully) gradually replaced Kluszewski as the cleanup hitter. Batting a respectable .281 and slugging a team-best .489 during the first seven weeks of the 1951 season, Adcock injured his right knee and ankle while sliding into second base against the Boston Braves on June 3, foreshadowing a much more serious incident six years later. After missing more than three weeks of action, Adcock slumped in his return (he batted just .212 after the injury) and fielded tentatively.

By his third season, Adcock was vocal in his opposition to playing left field because of his home park’s distinctive embankment, which bothered his knees. “Every player who came into Crosley Field,” said the New York Giants Bobby Thomson, “paid attention to … the unique outfield terrace that ran in front of the left and center field walls.”7 Increasingly moody, Adcock got off to a hot start (batting .333 and slugging .667) when he aggravated his knee injury on May 22 in Brooklyn, missing three weeks. Hobbled in his return, his average steadily declined to .278 by season’s end with little power. He clashed with Rogers Hornsby (the club’s third manager during the season), who desired a more athletic and speedy left fielder.8 Adcock wanted to play first base, but with just 31 home runs in his first three seasons, he failed to show the consistent power to dislodge Kluszewski, a consistent .300 hitter who had hit 54 home runs during the same period. On February 16 Adcock was traded to the Braves, at the time officially located in Boston, in a complicated four-team, five-player plus cash deal.

Adcock arrived at an exciting yet unsure time in Braves history. After months of speculation, team owner Lou Perini announced on March 13 the club’s move to Milwaukee, bringing baseball to the upper Midwest. “[Adcock] gives us a balanced team,” said general manager John Quinn, noting that the Louisiana slugger and another offseason acquisition – outfielder Andy Pafko – would take pressure off left-handed slugger Eddie Mathews.9

Adcock’s aggressive style of play appealed to manager Charlie Grimm. “Adcock is my kind of player – a holler guy,” said Jolly Cholly.10Adcock’s first home run for the Braves was a prodigious 475-foot blast against the New York Giants at the Polo Grounds on April 29.11 He launched a pitch from Jim Hearn that landed ten rows up on the left side of the center-field bleachers; he was the first player to do so since the ballpark was renovated in 1923. Another titanic shot, against the Pittsburgh Pirates on July 18, rocketed almost as far, clearing the 457-foot sign in cavernous Forbes Field just to the left of straightaway center. Just as important as Adcock’s 18 home runs and 80 runs batted in for the season were his durability (he played in all of the team’s 157 games) and his fielding. “He has a good pair of hands and shifts well,” said Grimm, a former first baseman with the Cubs.12 The surprising Milwaukee Braves finished in second place and led the National League in attendance.

A classic pull hitter, Adcock crowded the plate with a locked-in stance and took a big step into the ball, which left him vulnerable to getting hit with inside pitches. Sportswriter Red Smith wrote, “National League strategy insists that he can’t pull the ball if it’s close to his wrists,”13 but Adcock continued to make headlines with his slugging in 1954. The power-hitting Braves challenged the supremacy of the Brooklyn Dodgers and their ensuing rivalry throughout the decade proved to be one of baseball’s fiercest. On July 31 Adcock became just the eighth big leaguer to belt four home runs in one game when he victimized four Dodgers pitchers at Ebbets Field. “I hit a fastball for the first homer, a slider for the second, a curve for the third, and a fastball for the fourth,” he told The Sporting News.14 He also hit a double to set a then major-league record for 18 total bases in one game.

In the following game Brooklyn reliever Clem Labine beaned Adcock on the left side of the head. The “distinct thud” heard throughout Ebbets Field came from Adcock’s’ batting helmet, still a relative novelty at the time, but which sportswriters quickly noted may have saved his life.15 “When they throw at me high and tight,” said Adcock, “I can duck, but when they throw behind your head, they mean business.”16 The Braves’ next series in Brooklyn proved to be even more dangerous for Adcock. On September 10 the big right-hander walloped his ninth home run of the season in Ebbets Field to set a new record for visiting players. In the first inning of the next game, Don Newcombe plunked the slugger, breaking his right thumb and ending his season during the Braves’ stretch drive. Adcock finished with 23 home runs, 87 RBIs, and a career-best .308 batting average.

In 1955 Adcock’s season came to a premature end for the second consecutive year. On the anniversary of his four-home-run game against the Dodgers, Adcock’s right hand (near his wrist) was broken by an inside pitch from the Giants’ Jim Hearn. “That’s how I earn my living. Hitting, I mean,” Adcock told sportswriter Red Smith. “You’ve got to make up your mind – do you run away from pitches or stay in there and hit? There are a dozen different stances but I’ve got to use the one that’s natural for me and stay in there.”17

Given 3-1 odds against winning the World Series in 1956, the Braves got off to a slow start, leading to Grimm’s replacement by Fred Haney after 46 games. In his first game as manager, Haney scrapped Grimm’s plan of platooning the slumping Adcock at first base with Frank Torre. Adcock responded by belting two home runs in the first game of a doubleheader on June 17 in Brooklyn. His second blast, one of his record 13 against the Dodgers and the game-winner in the ninth inning off Ed Roebuck, was the first ball ever to soar over the 365-foot mark in left-center field, clear a height of 83 feet, and land on the double-deck roof of Ebbets Field before rolling off into a parking lot on Montgomery Street.

A notoriously streaky hitter, Adcock assaulted pitchers for an NL-record 15 home runs and 36 runs batted in during the month of July which included “one of baseball’s wildest scenes” in memory.18 Adcock, increasingly angered by what he perceived as “head-hunting,” charged the mound on July 17 at County Stadium after New York Giants pitcher Ruben Gomez hit him on the wrist. In the ensuing melee, Gomez threw another ball at Adcock, striking him in the leg. Adcock then chased Gomez into the Giants’ dugout, where by some accounts Gomez found an ice pick but was wrestled to the ground by teammates before he could return to confront Adcock. Two days later Adcock took revenge by clouting two home runs, including one of his ten career grand slams, and driving in a career-high eight runs in a 13-3 Braves victory. The Braves seemed to be headed for their first pennant in Milwaukee, but struggled down the stretch (14-13 in September) and lost the pennant on the final weekend of the season. Adcock enjoyed arguably his best season, ranking second in the NL in home runs (38), RBIs (103), and slugging percentage (.597).

The Braves rewarded Adcock’s success with a rare two-year contract worth a reported $25,000 annually.19 But the big slugger was injury-plagued during the ensuing three years and ultimately forced into an unwanted and frustrating platoon role with Frank Torre. The initial injury occurred 33 games into the 1957 season when Adcock (batting .306 and slugging .562) tore ligaments in his right knee against the Chicago Cubs on May 26. He returned to the starting lineup on June 5 and played through the pain but was platooned thereafter. Adcock’s season came crashing down in a game against the Philadelphia Phillies on June 23 when he fractured his right fibula and tore ligaments in his right ankle sliding into second base in an awkward manner trying to protect his already-injured knee.20 Adcock returned to the Braves roster in September, but was noticeably hampered in the field as the Braves cruised to their first pennant in Milwaukee.

In the World Series against the New York Yankees, Fred Haney followed script by platooning Adcock against left-handers and Torre against right-handers with the exception of Game Three. Adcock started Games One, Two, Three, and Five, but was replaced in the late innings in each game by Torre. Just 3-for-15 in the series, Adcock did line an opposite-field single to right off Whitey Ford to drive in Eddie Mathews in the sixth inning for the only run in the Braves’ 1-0 victory in Game Five. Adcock was forced into the uncomfortable role of fan in the final two exciting games as the Braves captured their first and only championship in Milwaukee.

Adcock was confident that the Braves would capture another pennant in 1958. “We could run away with this thing like the Dodgers did in 1955,” he told Lou Chapman of the Milwaukee Sentinel. “There isn’t a ballclub that can touch us outside of Los Angeles.”21 In Haney’s platoon system, Adcock played first base primarily against left-handers and started just 71 times; however, when left fielder Wes Covington went down with an injury in June, the big Louisianan took over his spot. “That’s a lot of pasture out there,” said Adcock in his folksy Southern accent. “You could run several head of cattle out there in all that territory. But we’re hurting and I’m going to try to do my best. Let’s face it, though, I’m not happy about it.”22 Seeing his first action in the outfield since 1952, Adcock started 24 times despite a painful right knee, which had not fully recovered from the injury the previous year and required surgery following the season. “I couldn’t swing a bat right [in 1958],” said Adcock. “Whenever I put pressure on my back leg, out would go the knee. I didn’t play a game when my leg didn’t lock up on me six to eight times.”23 A team-first player, Adcock complained neither about his role on the team nor his pain. In just 320 at-bats, he belted 19 home runs and slugged .506 to help the Braves secure their second consecutive pennant.

In a rematch of the previous World Series, the Braves and Yankees squared off again in 1958. Adcock started Games One, Four, and Six against Whitey Ford, while Torre started the other contests. In Game One Adcock went 2-for-5 and scored the winning run on Bill Bruton’s single in the bottom of the tenth inning to give the Braves an exciting 4-3 victory. With a three-games-to-one lead, the Braves were on the verge of another championship, but lost three consecutive games during which they struck out 25 times and scored just five runs. In the Series, Adcock went 4-for-13 with no runs batted in; Torre had three hits in 17 at-bats with one RBI.

“I don’t like playing one day and sitting on the bench the next,” said Adcock during a 1959 spring training marred by a holdout and trade rumors. “I can’t do either myself or the team justice.”24 Adcock’s relationship with Haney became increasingly acrimonious. He once again split his time at first base and left field. In one of baseball’s most memorable games, Harvey Haddix of the Pittsburgh Pirates had a perfect game through 12 innings at County Stadium on May 26. In the 13th inning, with Felix Mantilla on second base courtesy of an error and Hank Aaron on first via an intentional walk, Adcock uncorked the first Milwaukee hit of the game, a towering home run to right-center field. Mantilla scored the winning run; however, in the ensuing melee, Aaron scampered to the dugout after rounding second base while Adcock circled the bases. Adcock was later ruled out for passing Aaron and his home run was scored a double. Three days later Adcock supplied another walk-off game-winner under bizarre circumstances when, as Gene Conley of the Philadelphia Phillies attempted to walk him intentionally, he “reached out over the plate a plucked a dribbler” to drive in Aaron on a fielder’s choice.25 Enjoying his best health in three years, Adcock put together a career-best 20-game hitting streak en route to 25 home runs while playing in just 115 games. In the team’s two straight losses in a best-of-three playoff against the Los Angeles Dodgers to determine the pennant winner, Adcock’s big bat was silent with no hits and two strikeouts in four at-bats.

Adcock returned to first base in 1960 under new manager Chuck Dressen, and never played in the outfield again in his career. On April 14 he blasted a titanic shot off Curt Simmons that soared over the 390-foot mark in right-center field in Connie Mack Stadium in Philadelphia, becoming the first right-hander (and just the third player) to clear the 64-foot-high scoreboard. Asked about his estimated 500-foot home run, Adcock responded, “I hit one off Seth Morehead [on September 3, 1958] that went over the roof in left center. That’s even higher than the scoreboard and just as far.”26 “Billy Joe” never lacked confidence. For the first and only time in his career, Adcock was named to the All-Star team; he started both games of the midsummer classic and rapped three hits in five at-bats. (From 1959 to 1962 two All-Star Games were played each season.) Consistent all season, Adcock led the team with a .298 batting average accompanied by 25 round-trippers while the Braves finished in second place for the fourth time in eight seasons.

Adcock was an accomplished and underrated first baseman whose long arms helped him dig out errant throws. He led first basemen in fielding percentage four times, including three consecutive seasons (1960-1962), and retired with the third-highest fielding percentage (.994) at first base in major-league history.

The Braves were in transition in 1961, though it might not have been apparent at the time. The oldest team in the National League, they got off to poor start, sported a losing record at the All-Star break for the first time since their move to Milwaukee, and needed a surge in August to finish in fourth place at 83-71. More disconcerting to owner Lou Perini was the rapidly declining attendance, which reached its nadir the following two seasons at just over 9,400 per game after leading the NL in attendance for six consecutive seasons (1953-1958). Like his team, Adcock struggled, too, before his bat awoke in the second half of the season (21-for-62, .330) to finish with a team-high 35 home runs and career-best 108 RBIs. On June 8 against the Cincinnati Reds, Mathews, Aaron, Adcock, and Frank Thomas belted a record four consecutive home runs in the eighth inning (since accomplished twice in the American League). Aaron (34), Mathews (32), and Adcock became the first Braves trio to each blast 30 home runs in the same season.

At the age of 34, Adcock showed signs of slowing down in 1962. His precarious right knee limited him to just 112 starts at first base, and he completed just 45 of them. He had difficulty running, but still possessed his awe-inspiring power. On July 21 in Philadelphia, he smashed two home runs, the second of which, reported the Milwaukee Journal, soared “over the roof atop the double-decked stands in left center” at Connie Mack Stadium.27 With rumors of his impending trade widely circulating by season’s end, Adcock concluded his final season in Milwaukee with 29 home runs and slugged over .500 for the seventh consecutive season. In their nine years together, Adcock (221), Aaron (298), and Mathews (327) belted 846 home runs, just nine fewer than the Dodgers trio of Duke Snider, Gil Hodges, and Roy Campanella had in ten years.

The offseason signaled an end of an era for Adcock and the Braves in Milwaukee. Owner Lou Perini finalized his sale of the club to the Chicago-based LaSalle Corporation on November 16. Less than two weeks later Adcock was sent to the Cleveland Indians as part of a multi-player trade. “This is just the start [of trading]” said new Braves manager Bobby Bragan, who had succeeded Birdie Tebbetts.28 Adcock was not surprised by the trade and departed with a lasting shot to the Braves management. “The front office took things for granted too much with guys who won the pennant. They figured they’d keep going. Maybe they sat too long, but then they moved too fast, panicky.”29

No longer an everyday player, Adcock spent one injury-plagued season with Cleveland platooning at first base with Fred Whitfield. “[Adcock] never once quit on me in Milwaukee,” said Tebbetts, now managing Cleveland. “I admire Adcock because he’s one of the few players I have ever seen who never has taken a short step … I have never seen him dog it even once.”30

In a trade widely criticized by sportswriters and fans, the Los Angeles Angels completed a trade of popular outfielder Leon Wagner for Adcock and pitcher Barry Latman on December 6, 1963. Reunited with Haney, then GM of the Angels, Adcock played his final three seasons in Southern California. Still a valuable home-run threat, he platooned at first base and pinch-hit. The Sporting News wrote that Adcock retained his boyhood enthusiasm for the game, ran out every grounder despite his aching knees, and was an unselfish player who tutored young hitters.31 On August 27 he reached a milestone when he launched a pitch from Diego Segui of the Kansas City Athletics for a home run at Municipal Stadium, becoming at the time just the 23rd major leaguer to belt 300 home runs. Playing home games in cavernous Chavez Ravine (Dodger Stadium), Adcock led the Angels in round-trippers in 1964 with 21 in just 366 at-bats. He concluded his playing career in 1966, the Angels’ inaugural season in the more batter-friendly Anaheim Stadium. He paced the team with 18 four-baggers (in just 231 at-bats) and launched two of longest home runs in his career. On July 4 he blasted a pitch from Mickey Lolich of the Detroit Tigers into the upper deck just under the left-field roof at Tiger Stadium; and on September 2 he walloped a pitch from Washington Senators reliever Bob Humphreys off a light tower in deep left field at Anaheim Stadium.

Adcock retired as a player after the 1966 season to become manager of the Indians. “The boys can expect me to be strict and I’ll stress fundamentals,” he said. “I think there are a lot of mental errors made that shouldn’t be.”32 He lasted only one season (an eighth-place finish), and was replaced by Alvin Dark. Adcock piloted the Triple-A Seattle Angels in the Pacific Coast League in 1968 before walking away from the game he loved. In his 17-year big-league career, Billy Joe hit 336 home runs, knocked in 1,122 runs, and batted .277.

Adcock retired to his hometown of Coushatta, where he had purchased Red River Farms as a player and spent most of his offseasons. He bred thoroughbred racing horses and was involved in farming. Adcock lived with his wife, the former Joan James, whom he met after his hand and wrist injury in 1955 when she worked as a nurse for the Braves team physician, Dr. Bruce Bower. They married in November 1956 and raised four children.33 Adcock gradually drifted away from baseball, though he periodically appeared at events commemorating the Milwaukee Braves. In 1975 he was inducted into the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame.

Suffering from the effects of Alzheimer’s disease, Joe Adcock died on May 3, 1999, in Coushatta. He was 71 years old. He was buried in Holly Springs Cemetery in Marin, Louisiana.

This biography is included in the book “Thar’s Joy in Braveland! The 1957 Milwaukee Braves” (SABR, 2014), edited by Gregory H. Wolf. To download the free e-book or purchase the paperback edition, click here.

Sources

Newspapers

Milwaukee Journal

Milwaukee Sentinel

The Sporting News

Websites

Ancestry.com

BaseballLibrary.com

Baseball-Reference.com

Retrosheet.org

SABR.org.

For better or worse, everyone had a favorite memory and an opinion of Bob Addy, even when their views seemed contradictory. Cap Anson famously described him as an “odd sort of genius” because, to the horror of the single-minded Anson, Addy “quit the game because he thought he could do better at something else.”4 Yet others found his passion for baseball unsurpassed. “Bob Addy is the modern wonder,” declared one sportswriter. “If base ball ever dies out, we believe Bob will want to die. His whole soul is wrapped up in the sport. To see him run in from the extreme field, and hear him beg for a high in-field ball, like a child begging for a bun, is amusing.”5 Cone agreed that Addy’s “temperament was such that he could never miss seeing a game.”6

On one point there was no dispute: that he was unforgettable. “Everybody remembers Bob Addy,” declared a Hartford Courant reporter in 1886 – twelve years after Addy had spent a mere six months playing ball in that city.7 More than three decades after Addy had played his last major league game, the nickname of rookie Shoeless Joe Jackson prompted a sportswriter to recall that “the famous second baseman, Bob Addy, did that very often, as he was much troubled with sore feet.”8

But it was not just his eccentricities and his wit that made Bob Addy so memorable. For one thing, he was one of the best players of his era in spite of being very late to take up baseball. In addition, he played the game with a spirit of reckless abandon that led teammate George Bird to call him “about the toughest fellow I ever saw. He would go after anything, any way, and his hands were broken and battered out of shape.”9 Finally, Bob Addy was the first Canadian major leaguer and, unlike many early Canadian-born players, he had actually grown up there.

When and where Bob Addy was born has long been a disputed issue, with most sources indicating that he was born in Rochester, New York, in 1845. Addy seems to have given this information out in his later years, but there is overwhelming evidence that he was actually born in Canada. He was living in Port Hope, Ontario, when the 1861 Canadian census was taken – his birthplace was listed as Upper Canada (Ontario), and his age was given as 19. Nine years later, he was living in Rockford with many of his baseball teammates and was reported to have been born in Canada around 1842. It was not until the 1880 census that he was first listed as being born in New York.

While the census data points to a Canadian birthplace, it is other evidence that clinches the matter. A. G. Spalding, who knew Addy from their days on the Forest City Club of Rockford, described Addy as “originally a Canadian cricketer.”10 Canada was also given as Addy’s birthplace in an 1874 book written by George Wright.11 Finally, when the Forest City Club stopped in Hamilton, Ontario, during an 1870 tour, the locals learned of his Canadian birth and Addy became “the object of special pride on the part of the Canucks, they claimed him from the start as one of them.” This made Addy the subject of kidding from his teammates and he finally declared: “I don’t care nothing for them, I tell you I don’t care nothing about ’em.’”12

Exactly when he was born remains unclear. Late in life he began claiming an 1845 year of birth, but the evidence suggests otherwise. His tombstone has 1838, which would be very intriguing if true, but the source of this information is not known. The 1860 and 1870 censuses suggest that he was born around 1842, and that seems most plausible.

Bob Addy reportedly “belonged to several cricket clubs in the Dominion,” but any details are lost to history.13 Nor is much known about his early years except that he was born shortly after his parents emigrated from Ireland and that his father, whose name appears to have been James, had died by 1857.

It becomes easier to follow Addy’s trail in 1861, when he appears in Port Hope on the Canadian census, already working in his lifelong profession as a tinsmith. Listed with him are his mother Ellen (age 44, born Ireland), his younger brother James (17, born Upper Canada, a saddler), and his older brother George (25, born Ireland, a clerk). George’s presence in Port Hope is a bit odd, since he had been listed in Ogle County, Illinois, on the 1860 U.S. census and got married in that county in February of 1861. So perhaps he was still in the process of relocating to the United States.

By 1866 George Addy was a well-established Ogle County produce dealer with two young children, and Bob had followed him there. Both brothers also started playing on the Clipper Base Ball Club of the nearby town of Rochelle. While the club itself had limited success, Bob Addy made the sort of indelible impression that he so often did. A. G. Spalding would later recall paying a fateful visit to Rochelle in June of 1866 with the Forest City Club of Rockford, during which “Robert Addy startled the players of the Forest Citys by a diving slide for second base. None of us had ever witnessed the play before, though it may have been in vogue. Certainly we were quite nonplussed.”14

On the basis of Spalding’s comments, Addy has often been credited with inventing the slide. It would be nice to report that this was true, but baseball innovations are rarely that clear-cut. Slides seem to have gradually evolved from accidental slips while trying to make a sudden stop at a base into deliberate evasive maneuvers. While a slide in 1866 would still have been a novelty, there is no way to definitively pinpoint the first intentional slide.15

What we can be sure of is that Addy’s play made a vivid impression the visiting players. “He showed wonderful ability as a ball player in this game,” recollected Spalding, “by practically playing the whole game, captain of the team, pitcher, catcher, and, in fact, took every position where the player had developed weakness by making an error.”16 Both his standout play and his tendency to try to cover the entire field would become recurring themes of the career of the “celebrated base ball character.”

Addy was soon offered a place on the Forest City Club and a job at a Rockford hardware store, both of which he accepted. It was a coup for the Forest Citys and the start of the club’s highly successful policy of recruiting players from the surrounding countryside.

The Forest City Club was still experimenting with lineups, and Addy played all four infield positions during the remainder of the 1866 season. He began a two-year stint as a club director in 1867, and it was during these years that the Forest Citys began using a regular lineup in which Addy played second base and batted leadoff. The new stability paid off on July 25, 1867, when the Forest Citys traveled to Chicago to face the Nationals of Washington, a seemingly invincible club that was making a historic tour of the South and Midwest. Spalding recalled that “we were all frightened nearly to death, with possibly the exception of Bob Addy, who kept up his nerve and courage by ‘joshing’ the National players as they came to bat with witticisms.”17 Addy also launched his reputation as a clutch performer by scoring four runs and turning a key double play as the Forest Citys pulled off a stunning 29-23 upset that put the club on the national map.18

The Forest Citys made a gradual transition from amateurism to professionalism over the next three years, a process that entailed the replacement of several starters. Only three players remained fixtures in the club’s lineup: Spalding, Addy, and a young protégé of Addy’s named Roscoe Barnes. Spalding and Barnes went on to become superstars in the first major league, the National Association (1871-1875). Addy is much less remembered today, in large part because his National Association statistics are not on a par with Spalding’s and Barnes’s gaudy numbers. But those who saw him play, especially during his years in Rockford, believed that he too was a star of the first magnitude.

George Wright wrote that Addy was “a thorough ball-player, and a most earnest worker; a splendid base runner, a good batter, and a lively fielder. He is a valuable member of any organization from the fact of his steady play having [a] tendency to infuse confidence into the minds of his fellow-players.”19 Anson recalled Addy as “a good, hard, hustling ballplayer, a good base runner and a hard hitter.”20 As late as 1876, he was still considered “one of the hardest working players and best run-getters in the country.”21

Such judgments do not mean much when they are not supported by the statistical record, and a superficial look at Addy’s National Association and National League statistics suggests that he was a run-of-the mill major leaguer. But such a conclusion can only be drawn by overlooking the key fact that by the time those leagues were formed, Bob Addy was already on the downside of his career – exactly how far past his prime he was again depends on the knotty issue of his correct age. While we have less extensive statistics from the 1869 and 1870 seasons, when Addy was in his prime, the available records show that he deserved to be regarded as one of the game’s best players.

In 1869 Addy averaged well over five hits per game, a figure that ranked him first among all the players on the more than 400 clubs that were members of the National Association of Base Ball Players.22 While the absence of at-bats make the comparison from club to club an imperfect one, he also easily topped a club that included Ross Barnes and many other future major leaguers in both hits per game and total bases.23 Barnes was only 19 that year, but the following year, it was again Addy who led the star-studded Forest City Club in batting, collecting 204 hits in 56 games.24

These two glorious seasons almost never happened. As the start of the 1869 season approached, Addy was talking seriously about heading west to “seek his fortune.”25 But in the end he decided to stay in Rockford for another summer, and he enjoyed a season that has to be ranked as the best of his career, since his five-plus hits per game were compiled while making the switch to the game’s most demanding defensive position.

Forest City catcher George King had chosen to retire after the 1868 season, so Addy moved behind the plate. Catchers wore no equipment except a rubber mouthpiece, making the position extraordinarily dangerous, and they also needed great dexterity to prevent passed balls. Working with a hard-throwing pitcher like Spalding was especially onerous, but Addy made a seamless transition to the new position. Even more impressively, when he saw Doug Allison of the “Red Stockings” of Cincinnati standing close to the plate to catch, he immediately made the same decision.26

The 1869 season is remembered as the undefeated season of the “Red Stockings” of Cincinnati, but it was also a memorable campaign for the Forest Citys. The Rockford club, although still ostensibly amateur, lost only four games all season – all of them to the openly professional Red Stockings. In one of those contests, the Forest Citys came within two outs of pulling off an upset that would have changed baseball history.      

The match was played in Cincinnati on July 24, and “Addy was the hero of the game in every way. Not only was he catching directly behind the bat, something he had done only at critical moments until two weeks before, but he allowed only two passed balls to [Cincinnati fill-in catcher Asa] Brainard’s five, scored four runs in five times at bat, one a home run, and continued the game after having been knocked flat by a foul in the sixth inning.”27 Addy’s insistence on remaining in the game after the gruesome injury led a Cincinnati paper to praise his “commendable pluck.”28

More than half a century after the fact, Addy’s brother-in-law Victor Wheeler still remembered the game vividly. “Bob was absolutely unafraid,” he recalled. “He would step into the fastest ball and it didn’t seem that anything could get away from those twisted fingers of his, strong as steel cables. Down in Cincinnati that day they carried him to the players’ tent on the grounds, with part of his teeth knocked loose, and sent for a doctor. Addy wouldn’t stay. He came back on the field and took up his place behind the batter. Then the game had to stop while Cincinnati stood up and cheered him for ten minutes.”29

Led by Addy’s heroics, the Forest Citys were clinging to a 14-12 lead as the game went to the bottom of the ninth inning. But after the first batter was retired, the Red Stockings mounted a three-run rally to preserve their undefeated season.

Bob Addy left Rockford at the conclusion of the 1869 season and announced that he would not be returning. But “the week before the election Bob was back again, swearing to locate permanently, and establishing himself in a tinning and jobbing shop opposite the court house.”30  He returned to second base in 1870 as the Forest Citys completed the transition to open professionalism. The club compiled a 42-13-1 record during a prolonged schedule that included Addy’s previously mentioned return to Canada and that climaxed with an October 15 victory over the Red Stockings. On one of the club’s few off-days, on August 13, Addy found time to get married in Rockford.

The winter following the 1870 season saw the birth of the National Association and the departure of three club stalwarts, as Spalding, Barnes, and Cone all chose to sign with Boston. The Forest Citys nonetheless decided to enter the new league, and Addy thus became the club’s longest-tenured member (with the exception of Al Barker, who played sparingly). A much younger lineup resulted, with Addy the grizzled veteran among a group of newcomers who included the nineteen-year-old Cap Anson.

Scott Hastings is now listed in record books as the manager of the 1871 Forest Citys, but there seems to be no basis for this designation. Most baseball clubs of the 1870s did not have anyone whose role resembles that of today’s manager, so listings of this sort are just an exercise in futility. Hiram Waldo, a Rockford bookseller, was the man who signed players and made player personnel decisions, while Addy was named the club’s captain and made in-game decisions.31

Addy got off to a sizzling start, pounding Asa Brainard, the former Red Stockings pitcher, for four hits in the club’s second National Association game and then collecting five hits two games later to lead the Forest Citys to a thrilling extra-inning come-from-behind victory over the Kekiongas of Fort Wayne. But then he cooled off, and so did his teammates. The season was not a success, but neither was it anywhere near as bad as the 4-21 record that appears in the record books – the club actually won eight of its 25 games but had to forfeit four wins when Hastings was ruled to have been ineligible.32

The Great Chicago Fire put a temporary halt to professional baseball in the region then known as the West and a permanent end to the brilliant career of the Forest City Club of Rockford. For a while, it appeared it would also mark the end of Bob Addy’s career, as the newlywed elected to remain in Rockford and pursue business.

He returned to the diamond in 1873 with the White Stockings of Philadelphia (one of two National Association entries from that city that year). His new club won seventeen of its first nineteen games to grab a commanding lead in the pennant race. But in early June, Addy requested and received his release. Despite his short stay in Philadelphia, he had made such a vivid impression that he was “he was presented with a magnificent gold watch by the directors of the club, and was tendered a dinner.”33

Business concerns were said to have been the reason for his return to Rockford, but a more personal matter may have been the determining factor. Bob and Ida Addy’s only son was a boy named George. Following in the family tradition, George would later give contradictory information about his date of birth, but it appears most likely that he was born on August 1, 1873.

Shortly after that date, following a two-month absence, Bob Addy signed to join Spalding and Barnes with Boston. The Red Stockings were nine games behind his old team at the time of the signing, but he provided a much-needed spark. He batted .355 in 31 games, and Boston won twenty-six of those games to cruise to the pennant. Tim Murnane later credited Addy with having “pulled the Bostons through for the championship by his fine work at right field and timely hitting and baserunning in 1873.”34

The hard-won pennant was jeopardized by claims that Addy was ineligible because of having played for a club in Rockford after leaving Philadelphia. But former Forest City Club officer A. N. Nicholds attested that Rockford had no club of any kind, and that Addy had merely taken part in a contest involving “little boys.” The controversy simmered down, and Boston was awarded the pennant.35

Addy spent the 1874 season in Hartford, his last year as a regular infielder. At season’s end, it was announced that he planned to organize a new professional club in Springfield, Massachusetts. But he was slow to sign players, prompting speculation that he would only enlist the services of a pitcher and catcher and would cover the rest of the field by himself.36  Eventually plans for the Springfield Club were abandoned, and Addy instead returned to the White Stockings of Philadelphia where, according to one rather far-fetched retrospective article, he pretty much ended up fulfilling the prediction that he would have to cover the entire field.

The roster of the White Stockings was strewn with talented players who had suspect reputations. According to this article, “in one game eight of the players were fixed to lose. The one true man was Bob Addy … It was thought by those who were engineering the ‘skin’ that it would not be necessary to buy Addy, and besides he had the reputation of being a square player.” Throughout the contest, Addy did “great work in the field and was striving to win, covering a wonderful amount of ground,” even while his teammates were conspiring to lose. Finally, at a pivotal moment Addy made a long run and saved the game by catching a ball that a teammate intended to let drop.     When the teammate realized what had happened, “his disgust was supreme, and in a tone of contempt and scorn he remarked: ‘Look here, Bob Addy, do you want to play the whole game?’”37

The story is at the very least exaggerated, and may be pure fabrication. Yet it is fascinating how well it captures two of the characteristics that were at the heart of Bob Addy’s reputation as a “celebrated base ball character”: his tendency to venture into the territory of teammates and his scrupulous honesty in an era when rumors of game-fixing were rampant. As Anson would say, “He was honest as the day is long.”38

After the 1875 season the National League was formed as a successor to the National Association. The main motive for this coup was that it legitimized Chicago’s William Hulbert’s signing of Boston’s four best players, the so-called “Big Four” of Spalding, Barnes, Jim “Deacon” White, and Cal McVey. From Rockford’s perspective, the development was most ironic: five years earlier, the National Association had been launched when Boston had signed Spalding and Barnes, and the two young men who had grown up in Rockford had led Boston to four straight pennants. So their return to Illinois seemed a case of turn-about being fair play.

The demise of the National Association left the fate of many players, including Addy, up in the air. It was at first reported that he would remain in Philadelphia with a club that would combine some of the most talented and unsavory players from a city swarming with men who embodied both traits. The New York Times reported with dark irony that the managers of the new club had “engaged such able and honorable players as Dick Higham, John Nelson, George Zettlein, Billy Craver, Treacy, Meyerle, Bob Addy, and Shafer. Mr. Bob Addy will officiate in the capacity of Captain. The one great advantage in having a nine of this kind is that they always play to win – perhaps. As an evidence of the high standing of this club, it is only necessary to state that at a recent election all the officers were required to subscribe an oath to the effect that they would not countenance the selling of a single game. Some people are curious to know why the imposing of such an oath was necessary.”39

But as the Chicago Tribune was quick to point out, the Times had done an “injustice to Addy in classing him with such a gang.”40  Like many of his teammates, Addy was owed money at the end of the 1875 season and was anxious to leave Philadelphia.41 Meanwhile, Spalding had been named captain of the new club in Chicago and Anson had been added to the club’s contingent of Forest City alumni. Spalding soon offered Addy a spot on the team and the two men who had already been teammates in Rockford and Boston were reunited for the third time.

Upon his arrival in the Windy City, Addy made his usual indelible impression and displaying the now-familiar traits. An account of the team’s home opener reported, “every man was where he belonged, from impassive White around to the agile Addy, and from the sure-handed Iowa infant [Anson] down through the grades of height to Capt. Bob Shorty, who teetered all over the infield as he thought there was occasion.”42

His wit also remained conspicuous. When a July exhibition game to raise funds for an orphanage was rained out, the Tribune observed that “the orphans were unlucky – in fact, to use the words of that venerable philosopher, Robert Addy, it was to have been expected that they would be unlucky, for if they hadn’t been unlucky they wouldn’t have been orphans at all.”43

Exactly how venerable Addy was by this time can only be estimated, but he was most likely nearing forty and now exclusively played the outfield. Nevertheless, he was as energetic as ever, and several game accounts describe slides like the one that had startled Spalding a decade earlier. According to one of these reports, “Addy opened the second inning and took his base on called balls. He at once stole second in his usual underground manner, and to the great detriment of his good clothes.”44

Chicago won 36 of its first 43 games to take a commanding lead in the race for the National League’s inaugural pennant. But Addy got off to a slow start at the plate and found himself sharing time in right field with Oscar Bielaski and Fred Andrus. His benching apparently was not Spalding’s decision; a Cincinnati Enquirer sportswriter maintained after the season that “a higher authority than Spalding laid Addy off the nine and put Bielaski in his place – Bielaski, whose batting shows him eighty per cent weaker than Addy, and five per cent weaker as a fielder.”45  

But the pennant race suddenly tightened up in August when the White Stockings were swept at St. Louis. Addy was reinstalled in right field and again showed his knack for clutch performances. He pounded out four hits in a crucial game against St. Louis and continued to swing a hot bat as Chicago maintained its lead.46

In September, with the pennant within sight, Boston came to town for a game that featured numerous players from the old Red Stockings-Forest City rivalry. Addy, Spalding, and Barnes all took the field for the home side, while the visitors included Andy Leonard and both Wright brothers. For good measure the umpire was Fred Cone, the third player who had left the Forest Citys after the 1870 season to play for Boston.

Boston jumped to a six-run lead, but Chicago roared back and finally pushed across two decisive runs in the ninth inning for a 12-10 win. According to a game account, “Addy and White carried off the honors very easily, both in fielding, batting, and run-getting. The former made five wonderful catches, those off [Jim] O’Rourke, [Jack] Manning, and [Harry] Schafer being as fine bits of play as ever were seen in any game. Addy’s base-running also drew out great applause.” The dramatic win allowed Chicago, in the words of the Tribune’s reporter, to reach “a step in the championship race which is next door to the absolute securing of the pennant.”47

The labyrinthine phraseology was necessary because of some disputed games, but there was now little doubt about the league’s first pennant-winner. Four days later, the last shred of doubt was eliminated when Chicago defeated Hartford. Once again, Addy was the hero in the clincher, making “a couple of extraordinary catches” in the ninth inning of the 7-6 nail-biter, one of which seemed “fairly impossible until taken.”48

Bob Addy had now played an important role for championship teams in both the National Association and National League, but his mid-season benching still rankled, and he was not interested in returning to Chicago.49 He instead signed with Cincinnati, prompting a reporter to offer this satirical warning to the fans of that city: “whatever happens on your ball-field the Hon. Bob will have part and lot in it; if a man is to be run out between third and home, Bob will show up and take a hand in it like as if he had been standing there all the while.”50

Upon his arrival in Cincinnati, Addy made the same kind of impression that he had made throughout his career. Before played his first league game with his new team, it was reported that “The Hon. Bob Addy seems to be a sort of demi-god in Cincinnati; if he stubs his toe the fact is recorded with due solemnity; if he tumbles down while fielding the ball, it is immediately telegraphed throughout the entire country, headed, ‘Sad disaster;’ and if he makes a base hit, the local reporters spoil their entire reserve of lead-pencils, in making a half-column note of it.”51 Alas, it was Cincinnati’s season that proved a sad disaster. After a 3-11 start, Addy took over as captain, only to see the team disband a few days later. Following a two-week hiatus, the team was reassembled, but the club finished with a dismal 15-42 record in a season that ended Addy’s major league career. In an odd twist, he also played a role in the end of Spalding’s pitching career – on June 5, Addy smashed a line drive that hit his old batterymate in the chest and literally knocked Spalding out of the box in what proved to be the final start of his illustrious major-league career.52

In November, Cincinnati announced that it was releasing Addy on the ground of drunkenness.53  But whether this was the real reason remains open to doubt. A Chicago sportswriter quipped that the charge, “sounds oddy,” and pointed out that “Bob, though never a reliable player, has always been considered an honest man.”54 More to the point, Addy had a two-year contract, and the allegation enabled parsimonious Cincinnati owner “Si” Keck to avoid paying him for its second year.55

“Philosopher Bob” returned to Chicago that winter and opened a skating rink on the corner of Madison and Ada streets. To drum up business, he even organized a game of baseball on ice.56  Addy’s new enterprise prompted one reporter to quip that “Bob stands up better on ice than he does on land.”57

But Addy soon gave up the skating rink business and finally did what he had so often talked of doing by heading out west, where he remained for the rest of his life. He brought along his young son George but not his wife Ida. She was still alive according to Bob’s listing the 1880 census, but otherwise she remains a mysterious figure. Her marriage record gives her name as Ida Belle Seeley, while her son’s marriage record says that it was Ida Enose, but she cannot be identified under either name. Nor is anything known about what became of her after Bob moved west.

Even after permanently settling in the West, Addy’s doings continued to be chronicled in the eastern press. In 1879 he was reported to be playing baseball in Salt Lake City for a team known as the Gentile Club.58  Seven years later, a claim that he had become a Mormon with twelve wives was widely reprinted.59 Other unfounded reports had him in Oregon and California.

The reality seems to have been more prosaic. By the time of the 1880 census, he was living in Evanston, Wyoming, and he was still there at the end of the decade. Around 1891, he moved to Pocatello, Idaho, where he opened a hardware store and, on the first day of 1892, was remarried to a much younger woman named Louise Emma Clark. The marriage produced one child, a daughter named Ellen Louise, who was born on December 1, 1897.

As we have seen, Bob Addy continued to be remembered with great fondness in baseball circles long after his retirement. His feelings toward the game are more difficult to ascertain, but it certainly appears that he retained his passion for baseball. As late as 1890 he was still playing for the town team in Evanston.60 His last known involvement with baseball came in 1899 when he took part in a “fat versus lean” game in Pocatello. Appropriately, the man who had been known for roaming the field at will started the contest with the “fat” side but ended it with the “leans.”61 One can imagine one of his fellow players exclaiming, “Look here, Bob Addy, do you want to play the whole game?”

Bob Addy died in Pocatello on April 9, 1910, after a severe attack of apoplexy.62  His widow passed away in 1929, and their daughter died in 1974. At least one grandson is still alive as of 2009. His son from his first marriage moved to Spokane, Washington, and then to Oregon, where he is believed to have died in 1957. His brother George was last heard from in 1900, when he was living in Philadelphia and made news by making a desperate trip to England. The purpose of the voyage was to prevent his youngest daughter Arlan, a soprano who was singing with the D’Oyly Carte Opera, from marrying Dr. Henryk Arctowski, the Polish explorer who had recently returned from heading the celebrated Antarctic Expedition. But after meeting Arctowski, George Addy dropped his opposition and gave his blessing to the wedding.63

This biography is included in “Boston’s First Nine: The 1871-75 Boston Red Stockings” (SABR, 2016), edited by Bob LeMoine and Bill Nowlin.

Sources

Coverage of the Forest City Club is usually based upon A. G. Spalding’s fascinating but unreliable America’s National Game: Historic Facts Concerning the Beginning, Evolution, Development, and Popularity of Base Ball, with Personal Reminiscences of Its Vicissitudes, Its Victories, and Its Votaries (1910) (reprint, Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1992). I have instead relied primarily on two sources: an extraordinary 44-part history of the club that was written by Horace E. Buker and published serially in the Rockford Republic in 1922 and a five-part series by John Molyneaux that appeared in Nuggets of History, a publication of the Rockford Historical Society (“The Sinnissippi Base Ball Club,” 43: 1 (March 2005); “The Forest City Base Ball Club: The Amateur Years,” 45: 1 (March 2007); “No Longer Amateurs: The Forest City Base Ball Club in 1868,” 46: 2 (June 2008); “‘We Can Beat the Spots Off the Best Club That Ever Lived’: The Forest City Base Ball Club in 1869,” 46: 3 (September 2008); “The Eastern Tour – The 1870 Season of the Forest City Baseball Club,” 47: 3 (September 2009)). Other sources that were of help included coverage of the 1896 Harry Wright Day celebrations in the Rockford Register-Gazette on April 13 and 14, 1896; the reminiscences of Fred Cone (“Baseball Thirty Years Ago,” Lima News, July 15, 1899) and Charles Page (E. C. Bruffey, “Bruffey Tells of Charles T. Page, Atlanta Constitution, August 10, 1919: A4; Atlanta Constitution, March 14, 1909); “Spalding’s Start,” Sporting Life, June 20, 1908, 16; Harriet Spalding, Reminiscences of Harriet I. Spalding (East Orange, New Jersey: PUBLISHER, 1910); Peter Levine, A. G. Spalding and the Rise of Baseball (New York: Oxford University Press, 1909); a history of baseball in Rockford written by James McKee that appeared in Sporting Life on April 9, 1884: 4; Harvey T. Woodruff, “Forest Citys a Noted Team,” Chicago Tribune, March 31, 1912: C2; Adrian C. Anson, A Ball Player’s Career (1900: reprint, Amereon), and William J. Ryczek’s When Johnny Came Sliding Home: The Post-Civil War Baseball Boom, 1865-1870 (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1998). Joe Overfield’s profile of Addy in Nineteenth Century Stars, eds. Robert L. Tiemann and Mark Rucker, (Kansas City: Society for American Baseball Research, 1989) was also very valuable. Coverage of Addy’s time in the National Association and National League is mostly based on contemporaneous newspaper accounts and on William J. Ryczek’s Blackguards and Red Stockings: A History of Baseball’s National Association, 1871-1875 (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 1992). Specific sources are cited in the notes.    

Notes

Artemus Ward “Nick” Allen was born September 14, 1888, in Norton, Kansas. His parents, Edward Greene Allen and Emily Josephine Hobbs, lived in the Chicago area. Family genealogical research shows that Nick was a descendent of Edward Boone, brother of the famous Daniel Boone. He was also a second cousin, once removed, of President Harry S Truman.

Nick’s parents headed west to some property owned by his maternal grandfather. A short time later they moved back to the Chicago area. A final move returned them to Kansas in time for Nick’s birth. His family settled on land also owned by his grandfather near Udall. Nick was to call this area home the rest of his life.

Nick’s mother mainly raised her large family by herself. Nick played baseball as a young man. He, according to family stories, also was involved in prizefighting town bouts. Perhaps he showed his toughness in the ring then as he later did on the ball field.

In February 1910 Nick began his professional baseball career. He signed with Wichita, which then farmed him out to Newton in the Kansas State League. His initial salary was $100 a month. He remained with Newton in 1911. The league disbanded on July 11, and Nick was signed by Dubuque and optioned to Lincoln of the Western League.

In October 1911, Nick was drafted from Dubuque by the Chicago White Sox. The Sox released him to Des Moines. In May 1912, Nick signed with Minneapolis of the American Association; a teammate on that club was the famous Rube Waddell. Here, Nick enjoyed the first of five pennants his teams would win in his career.

In 1913 Nick played with Minneapolis and Fargo. In October, Fargo placed him on their reserve list for 1914. Nick then violated the reserve clause of his contract, signing with Buffalo of the upstart Federal League. As Sporting Life reported in its February 28, 1914, issue: “Allen, who caught pretty fair ball for Minneapolis A.A. last year announced he has signed with Feds.” The Federal League was an attempt to create a third major league. The experiment lasted two years.

Nick played sparingly his first season in Buffalo. Injuries and illness took him out the lineup. He injured a thumb early in the season. He was stricken with appendicitis and sent home in June.

Nick continued with Buffalo in 1915. That season he saw the most action of his major league career. He played in 84 games, compiling 215 at-bats. A good defensive catcher, Nick struggled at the plate. At the end of his major league career, The Sporting News explained that he can “everlastingly pulverize southpaws. Allen destroys lefties but can’t much hit righties.”

1916 saw Nick briefly in the National League. He made his Chicago Cubs debut on May 7, going 0-for-4. He lasted five games, with just one hit in 16 at-bats. The rest of the season saw him playing in Topeka. The Cincinnati Reds purchased his contract for 1917. The Reds optioned Nick to Providence, subject to recall. He stayed there through the 1917 season.

In 1918 Nick made the Reds, appearing in 37 games. In August — as many players had done — he, too, joined the military. He served in the Army from August 30 through January 18, 1919. His service was entirely in the United States.

The 1919 season found Nick back with the Reds. This team went on to become world champions, defeating the notorious Black Sox in the scandal-ridden World Series. Nick served mainly as a bullpen catcher. He was used in only 15 games that season, hitting .320 in 25 at-bats. Nick remained with the Reds through the 1920 season.

In 1921 Nick was involved in a deal that brought catcher Eugene “Bubbles” Hargrave to Cincinnati. He went to St. Paul of the American Association, where he was to remain for eight years. There he continued as a catcher from 1921 to 1924. In 1924 he took on the additional task of manager.

Nick’s managerial career began with a bang. In his first season he led the St. Paul Saints to a pennant. The appreciative fans of St. Paul gave Nick an automobile in recognition of his achievement.

His club next claimed a victory over the famous Baltimore Orioles squad of Jack Dunn in a series between champions of the American Association and the International League. An account in the Akron Beacon Journal relates that he and Dunn engaged in a fistfight on the Baltimore bench during the series. The winner of the fight was not recorded.

The St. Paul club then went west to play the champion of the Pacific Coast League, Seattle. Only one game was played, due to inclement weather. St. Paul won, 12-3.

Nick’s overall managerial record at St. Paul was 447-384, a .538 winning percentage. Even with this outstanding record, his teams after 1924 never finished higher than third place in the standings. Hoping to land a major league managing or coaching position, Nick resigned as manager of St. Paul in October 1928. He did not land a coaching position with the Chicago White Sox as he had hoped.

In June 1929, Nick took over the Tulsa team of the Western League, leading it to the pennant. That December he was hired to manage the Jersey City squad of the International League for 1930. In August 1930 he resigned, being replaced by Joe Tinker. He returned home to Udall to work for an oil business managed by his brother, Mark.

Nick was out of baseball in 1931 and ’32. He applied for the managerial position at Minneapolis for 1933. He did not land the job. In May 1933, Nick replaced Tris Speaker as manager of Kansas City in the American Association. Speaker remained with the team as part-owner and secretary.

On July 11, 1933, Nick married Helen Louise Pettit at St. Joseph, Missouri. Marriage apparently did not mellow him. That August, Nick argued a call at second base by umpire Al Devormer. The argument continued for some time, with plate umpire Johnny Johnson ejecting Nick. When Nick refused to leave, the umpire gave him a specified time to do so. To make sure Nick complied, umpire Johnson pulled out his watch. Nick still did not obey. Eventually five police officers came from the stands to remove him. He left, still yelling. Incidents like this earned him the name “Roarin’ Nick.”

In 1934 and 1935, Nick scouted for the New York Yankees.

Nick was named manager in March 1936 of the Akron club of the Middle Atlantic League, a Yankees affiliate. He replaced Johnny Neun, who played for Nick at St. Paul in 1924; Neun had moved on to manage Norfolk. An article from an Akron newspaper quoted Nick as saying he is an umpire baiter. He says it is true; he has been a wild bull but the antics were just for show to increase attendance.

In 1938 and ’39 Nick scouted for the Brooklyn Dodgers. About the month of February in 1939, Nick was hospitalized for an operation. He was fighting cancer. After eight months in the Edward Hines Jr. Veteran’s Hospital in Hines, Illinois, on the 17th of October Nick passed away. He is buried in the Ninnescah Cemetery, just outside Udall. His grave is marked with a soldier’s tombstone. His wife, two brothers and two sisters survived him. Nick and Helen had no children.

Allen was a member of the Disabled American Veterans, a Mason and an honorary life member of the Kansas Old Timers Baseball Association.

Sources

Helen Pettit Allen scrapbook.

State of Illinois death certificate.

Phone interview, e-mail correspondence with Keith Brandon, great-nephew of Nick Allen.

Nick Allen Hall of Fame file.

National Association Contract cards.

Newspaper Obituaries: Kansas City Post, Omaha World Journal, newspapers in Wichita, Kansas, and Columbus, Ohio.

Reach Guides 1913, 1920.

The Sporting News, 1910-1932, in particular issues of February 3, 1921, February 7, 1924, December 20, 1928, and December 12, 1929.

Sporting Life, 1914-1916, in particular issues of February 28, 1914, and November 21, 1916.

U. S. Federal Census: Cowley County, Kansas, 1910, 1920, 1930.

Columbus State Journal August 7, 1933, issue.

Johnson, Lloyd and Miles Wolff, editors. The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball 2nd Edition, Durham, N.C.: Baseball America, Inc., 1997.

Thorn, John and Pete Palmer, et. al., editors. Total Baseball. 7th Edition. Kingston, New York: Total Sports Publishing, 2001.

Second baseman Newt Allen’s Kansas City Monarchs teammates gave him the nickname “Colt” in 1922 because he was the youngest member of the team.1 Over the course of a 23-plus-year career in the Negro Leagues that also included stints in other countries, Allen proved to be one of the best players ever to man the keystone sack. During his tenure with the Monarchs, Allen contributed sterling defense and a potent bat to 11 championship squads.2

At the conclusion of his second full season with Kansas City, he played in the first Negro League World Series, in which the Monarchs defeated the Hilldale Club of the Eastern Colored League. Eighteen years later, now a seasoned veteran, he helped the Monarchs triumph over the Negro National League’s Homestead Grays in the first Negro League World Series between those two circuits. During the intervening years, Colt Allen had galloped over all competition so soundly that in 2006 he was on the final ballot of the Special Committee on the Negro Leagues for induction into the Hall of Fame, though he ultimately fell short of enshrinement.

Newton Henry Allen was born on May 19, 1901, in Austin, Texas, to Newton H. and Rose (Baker) Allen. The elder Newton and Rose had married in 1897 and led a hardscrabble existence as they raised a family in Texas’s capital city. Newton Allen was a laborer who worked whatever odd jobs he could find while Rose worked as a laundress. Young Newt had an older sister, Dora, and was joined later by another sister, Eva Mae, and a brother, Lawrence; two other siblings, including a sister named Mary who was born in 1903, died in childhood prior to 1910.

Newt’s father succumbed to tuberculosis on July 21, 1910, forcing Rose and the four children to fend for themselves. This new circumstance contributed, in a roundabout way, to Newt’s arrival in Kansas City, Missouri. Rose briefly took the children to Cincinnati – presumably she had family there – and, shortly thereafter, Newt accompanied her to Missouri to visit an aunt whose young son had recently died. As Allen later recalled:

“I went to live with my auntie, Ophelia Henderson, in Kansas City. She had a boy and he and I were the same age. And he passed. And when she lost him, then she took me.

I lived at 17th Street, about 17th and Woodland. Just across the street from where I lived was a ballpark by one of them playgrounds. I was out there all the time. That was Parade Park.”3

Such were the unusual circumstances by which Newt grew up in Kansas City while his siblings were raised by their mother, first in Austin and later in Cincinnati.4

Allen attended Bruce Elementary School and Lincoln High School and became close friends with Frank Duncan, a future Monarchs teammate and manager. According to Allen, another future Monarchs star, pitcher Rube Curry, was also part of their circle of friends who played sandlot ball together.5 As Allen and his friends advanced from sandlot to semipro ball, he started to chase after balls from the minor-league Kansas City Blues’ games, saying, “[I would] come back with the ball and sell it or keep it. That’s the way our ballteam [sic], which was a semipro team, always had balls to play with when we would go out to play.”6 Allen also started to work at the Monarchs’ ballpark at 20th Street and Prospect where, he said, “I pulled the canvas and filled the water jug for them, things like that.”7 Allen and Duncan played for the semipro Kansas City Tigers, but Newt spent a lot of time on the bench and soon joined the Paseo Rats as well as playing for Swift’s in a packinghouse league.8

Duncan began his professional career with the Chicago Giants in 1920 – the same year that Curry debuted with the Monarchs – and joined Kansas City early in the 1921 season, but Allen had to take a longer road to join his longtime friends on their hometown team. First, he ventured to Nebraska, where he honed his skills playing for the Omaha Federals in 19ry21. Monarchs’ co-owner J.L. Wilkinson had resurrected his barnstorming All-Nations team – so called because it was integrated and employed players of different races and ethnicities – and based it in Omaha. He soon took notice of Allen and gave him a tryout in 1922, after which he assigned Allen to the All-Nations team, placing him under the tutelage of the diverse squad’s manager, already-legendary pitcher John Donaldson.

Allen toiled for the All-Nations team, which also served as a farm club for the Monarchs, for most of the season before being called up to the Monarchs in October for a six-game “City Championship” series against the Double-A Kansas City Blues.9 The Monarchs won five of the six games against their White counterparts to claim the title as champions of Kansas City. Allen fared poorly at the plate, going 1-for-14 for an .071 batting average in five games, but he nonetheless had learned well in 1922 and was able to break spring training with the Monarchs the next season.

Perhaps the reason for Allen’s poor performance in the City Championship series was that he was distracted by his early-October marriage to 17-year-old Mary Edwards and the impending arrival of their first child, Newton Henry Allen Jr., who was born on November 27, 1922. Newt Jr. eventually graduated from Western Baptist Bible College, the same institution his father had attended for two years before pursuing his baseball career, and he founded Kansas City’s Mount Joy Missionary Baptist Church.10 Newt Sr. and Mary had a second son and a daughter, but their marriage did not endure. Allen recalled, “After my wife and I separated, [teammate Newt Joseph] and I lived together here in Kansas City for about five years. The two Newts.”11

The difficulty in Allen’s marriage was representative of the problems that have shaken many ballplayers’ marriages in all eras. According to one historian, “[M]arried players always spoke of the ‘understanding’ a man and his wife had to have.”12 Allen said, “It’s a hard life. There has to be an understanding between you and your wife – a good understanding.”13 Whether that understanding entailed the expectation of marital fidelity or the acceptance of infidelity may have varied from marriage to marriage. Allen was known to revel in his celebrity as a ballplayer and confessed, “The women, they were lovely everywhere we went. If they didn’t recognize me in my regular clothes, then I’d go up to them and tell them who I was. But sometimes they could be a worrisome deal.”14

One concern that Allen hoped would no longer be worrisome was his status with the Monarchs, a member team of the Rube Foster-founded Negro National League. He began the 1923 season at third base with Kansas City and batted .304 in 33 league games but was returned to the All-Nations team in June and spent the summer barnstorming throughout the Midwest again.15 The Monarchs finished with a 54-32 league record (61-37 overall) and wrested the NNL championship away from Foster’s Chicago American Giants, the team that had claimed the first three league pennants. Although Allen had not spent the entire season with Kansas City, he still had been a major contributor to the first of the 11 Monarchs championship squads on which he played.

Finally, in 1924, Allen took over at second base for Kansas City for the long term. He gained his older teammates’ acceptance through hard play and by taking their pranks in a good-natured way. Allen noted, “The players would ride you to see if you can take it,” and recalled that one time some of the Monarchs veterans “told the hotel where we ate not to give me no meat because I’d have fits. I ate breakfast without meat and lunch without meat. So I asked them what was going on and they told me the players told them if they gave me meat, I’d have fits.”16 His first full season with the Monarchs involved a learning curve on the baseball diamond as his batting average fell to .258 and he committed 33 errors in the field in 73 league games; his .918 fielding percentage was slightly below the league average of .925.

In time, Allen remedied all shortcomings. He was not a big man – standing 5-feet-9 and weighing 165 pounds – so he learned how to become an ideal number-two hitter in the Monarchs lineup. Later in life, when asked what he considered to be his outstanding achievement in baseball, Allen answered that he “learned how to play second base, bunt and hit behind the runner, and think while playing.”17 That Allen was a fast learner was evidenced by the improvements in his performance at the plate and in the field as the Monarchs faced the Hilldale Club in the first Negro League World Series that October.

That first World Series provided as much excitement as any fan could desire. The Monarchs prevailed 5-4-1 over Hilldale. The tie occurred in Game Three, which had to be called due to darkness with the scored knotted, 6-6, after 13 innings. Allen improved his batting average to .282 with 11 hits (seven doubles) and 8 runs scored and his fielding percentage rose to .968. However, one of the two errors he committed proved costly.

In Game Four, which was played on October 6 at Maryland Baseball Park in Baltimore, the teams were tied, 3-3, when Hilldale loaded the bases in the bottom of the ninth. Hilldale catcher Louis Santop hit “a routine grounder to Newt Allen at second and Allen [threw] wildly to catcher Duncan, allowing Judy Johnson to score the ugly, but winning run.”18 Hilldale’s winning pitcher was Allen’s childhood friend Rube Currie, and the Philadelphia-area club took a 2-to-1 Series lead.

Allen was able to redeem himself in Game 10, which took place on October 20 at Schorling Park in Chicago. Hilldale’s Script Lee and Jose “The Black Diamond” Mendez, the Monarchs’ Cuban hurler, engaged in an epic pitchers’ duel that remained scoreless until the bottom of the eighth inning. In that fateful frame, the Monarchs offense exploded for five runs. Allen drove in the second and third runs with a single to right field and put the exclamation point on Kansas City’s rally by scoring the fifth and final run on Dink Mothell’s double. Mendez finished the shutout, and the Monarchs were the champions of Black baseball.

On the heels of Kansas City’s championship, Allen and Monarchs teammate Wilbur “Bullet” Rogan traveled to Cuba to play for the Almendares Alacranes (Scorpions) during the 1924-25 Winter League season. Almendares fielded four future Hall of Famers in Rogan, Raleigh “Biz” Mackey, John Henry “Pop” Lloyd, and Oscar Charleston and was the dominant squad on the island. In fact, “Almendares reclaimed the title by such ample margin that the league, as was customary in those days, stopped the activities to prevent financial harm to the different clubs.”19 Allen contributed a .313 batting average in 48 at-bats while splitting the third-base duties with Cuban Jose Gutierrez.20 With the regular season cut short, it was decided that a special eight-game series would be held between “All Cubans” and “All Yankees” teams. The All Yankees, composed exclusively of Negro League players, finished with a 5-2-1 record in the series, and Allen went 8-for-30 for a .267 average while playing third base in all eight games.21 He returned to Cuba only once, in 1938-39, and split the season between Almendares and Habana. He hit .269 combined between the two squads but fell short of a championship as the Santa Clara team won the title that season.22

In April 1925 the Chicago Defender noted that the Monarchs would field an all-veteran starting lineup to begin the season.23 Kansas City’s talent and experience led them to the NNL’s first-half title, but the St. Louis Stars captured the second-half flag, and it took a hard-fought seven-game series for the Monarchs to retain the NNL championship. Allen once again handled the second-base chores, batted .289 in 80 regular-season games, and raised his level of play and batting average to .370 in the NNL championship series against the Stars. The Monarchs’ reward was a rematch against Hilldale in the 1925 World Series. Between their exhausting series against St. Louis and an injury to pitching ace Bullet Rogan, who “was hurt in a freak accident at home and spent the entire series on the bench,” the Monarchs were no competition for Hilldale this second time around.24 Hilldale’s pitchers quieted Kansas City’s bats and captured the championship in six games. The Monarchs likely wished that Rube Curry had still been on their side, as their former righty, who had gone 1-1 with a 0.55 ERA in the 1924 World Series, posted two victories in the rematch. Curry threw a 12-inning complete-game victory in Game One and hurled another complete game in Hilldale’s 2-1 triumph in Game Five. Meanwhile, Allen slumped to .259 and only one Monarchs hitter – Dobie Moore – managed to bat over .300 for the Series.

Rogan recovered in time to play in the California Winter League’s 1925-26 season and Allen accompanied him west. The two played for the Philadelphia Royal Giants in what was at that time the only integrated professional baseball league in the United States. Allen scuffled to a .254 batting average in 29 games, but Rogan posted a 14-2 record to help the Royal Giants run away with the league title. Allen returned to California for the next five Winter League seasons, playing for the Philadelphia Royal Giants in 1926-27, 1929-30, and 1930-31 and for the Cleveland Giants in 1927-28 and 1928-29. During his six winters in the Golden State, Allen compiled a career .324 batting average, and his teams captured the league title every year except in 1927-28.

Allen’s career settled into a winning pattern in both California winters and Kansas City summers. However, as successful as the Monarchs were, they were unable to return to the World Series in 1926, losing a nine-game playoff series to the archrival Chicago American Giants. There had long been bad blood between the Monarchs and the Giants, and it brought out one of Allen’s less desirable traits: his temper. Chicago’s Dave Malarcher had once spiked Allen as he slid into second, opening a gash that required 18 stitches. Allen held a long grudge, recollecting, “It took me three years to repay him, but they say vengeance is sweet. One day we were leading by two runs, he was on first, and I took the throw at second for a double play. Well, instead of throwing to first, I threw straight at Malarcher charging into second. I hit him right in the forehead. … Hurt him pretty bad. He was out of the ball game for three days.”25

Malarcher was one of many players with whom Allen had run-ins during his long career in the rough-and-tumble Negro Leagues. In looking back, Allen admitted:

“A lot of times I had a nasty feeling within myself, not against a ballplayer. I was pretty bad playing ball, yes, I was pretty bad – run over a man, throw at him. I did a lot of wrong things. But I got results out of it, because they were leery of what I was going to do, and I’d get by with it. …

We used every trick in the book to win a ball game. All kinds of good tricks and nasty ones. In fact, there were more nasty ones than there were good. Caused many a ballplayer to get hurt.”26

Although Allen put fear into some opponents via the use of his “tricks,” he also gained the respect of his peers as one of the best second sackers to play the game. Pitcher Chet Brewer, who joined the Monarchs in 1925 and was a longtime teammate, raved, “Newt was a real slick second baseman, he could catch the ball and throw it without looking. Newt used to catch the ball, throw it up under his left arm; it was just a strike to first base. He was something! Got that ball out of his glove quicker than anybody you ever saw.”27 Buck O’Neil, who came to Kansas City in 1938 and who had an eye for talent as good as (or better than) Wilkinson’s observed, “When I got there, Newt was in his mid-thirties, but even after sixteen years he was an excellent second baseman, and he had six more good years left in him. He could make all the plays around the bag, and I’ve never seen a second baseman with as good an arm.”28 Even White baseball took notice, as New York Giants manager John McGraw asserted, “Allen is one of the finest infielders, white or colored, in organized baseball.”29

While their second baseman made a name for himself, the Monarchs franchise was about to embark on a new phase of its existence. Allen batted .332 for the 1929 squad as Kansas City won its final NNL championship by virtue of capturing the league title in both halves of the season, finishing with a 63-17 record in league play (66-17 overall). The Great Depression was taking its toll on NNL teams, and the league folded after the 1931 season. Wilkinson had seen the handwriting on the wall and withdrew the Monarchs from the league after the 1930 season, turning the franchise into a barnstorming team. Wilkinson figured that he could turn a profit via his innovative portable lighting system that had introduced night baseball to America in 1930. Thus, the Monarchs became an independent barnstorming team from 1931 to 1936. Although Allen spent the entirety of his career with the Monarchs, circumstances now forced him to seek employment with other teams for brief periods of time. Prior to the Monarchs beginning their barnstorming season, he played for the St. Louis Stars in 1931 and the Homestead Grays in 1932.

Additionally, while Allen had already been to Cuba, he soon got to see other parts of the world as well. On December 12, 1931, the Chicago Defender reported, “The Kansas City Monarchs left Tuesday morning for Mexico City to play a series of games. This trip is being made under the supervision of the Mexican government. The club will travel in a special Pullman and will be quartered in one of the best hotels in the southern republic.”30 The Mexico City Aztecas provided the primary opponent over the course of the 30-day tour, and newspaper accounts showed the Monarchs to have a 19-2 record.31

Two years later, during the winter of 1933-34, Allen and five Monarchs teammates – including his winter traveling companion Bullet Rogan – were members of a 12-player all-star team that toured China, Japan, and the Philippines. The three-month exhibition tour was organized by Lonnie Goodwin, the manager of the California Winter League’s Philadelphia Royal Giants, and the all-stars competed against Army teams and clubs from sugar plantations.32 On the return trip, the team played additional games in Hawaii. According to Allen:

“A man named Yamashiro, a superintendent down at Dole Pineapple Company, offered Rogan and me a salary and the only thing we’d have to do was check crates of pineapples and play ball two days a week, Saturdays and Sundays. At the end of the ball season, the team split all the money. The factory just furnished us the suits and the name. But we decided to come on back home and play.”33

Having returned stateside, Allen and Rogan, as members of the Monarchs, integrated the prestigious Denver Post Tournament in 1934 as they vied for the $5,000 purse that was to be awarded to the winners. The House of David team responded to the powerful Monarchs entry by hiring Satchel Paige (who later became more closely associated with the Monarchs than any other team he had played for) and catcher Cy Perkins of the Pittsburgh Crawfords as mercenaries to play for their otherwise all-White squad. Paige outdueled Chet Brewer, 2-1, in a semifinal game. The Monarchs made it to the championship game but again succumbed to the House of David, 2-0, as Brewer lost another duel, this time against Spike Hunter. Allen ended up being the tournament’s leading basestealer, but that was of no consolation to him or the rest of the Monarchs.

The Monarchs, along with Paige and Perkins, as the first Black players to participate in the tournament, had to deal with a great deal of discrimination in the press. The Post ran numerous insulting articles; in one item, “[a]cting as if Paige’s nickname of ‘Satchel’ wasn’t good enough, the newspaper invented a new one – ‘The Chocolate Whizbang.’”34 Like most Black players, the members of the Monarchs had long ago become inured to the prejudice they encountered in the age of Jim Crow, but sometimes they could be pushed over the limit. Allen recalled one incident when, after a Michigan restaurant owner told them they could not eat inside his establishment, “We just all walked out – we left them with fifty some hamburgers on the grill. It was one of those times when you even the score.”35

Although some White players also lacked racial tolerance, it was much rarer for the Monarchs to experience discrimination from the White players on local teams or major-league all-star teams that they played against. Allen explained, “Ball players – white and black – have a lot of respect for each other. They know they can play ball, and they know they’re going to play with them or against them. You hear a lot of harsh words from the grandstand, but very seldom find prejudiced ball players.”36

The Monarchs were also the only Negro League team under White ownership, and Wilkinson and his players gave mutual respect. Wilkinson was so proud of his players’ success in exhibition games against major-league teams that he once boasted “his team could compete with the New York Giants or Yankees, the two teams in the 1937 white major leagues’ World Series.”37 However, pride in their abilities alone would have meant little to the Monarchs players. They respected Wilkinson because of the way he treated them. Allen stated, “He was a considerate man; he understood; he knew people. Your face could be as black as tar; he treated everyone alike. He traveled right along with us.”38

In 1937 Wilkinson decided that the Monarchs would rejoin a league. The franchise became one of the charter members of the Negro American League rather than enlisting with the second iteration of the Negro National League that had been established in 1933. The Monarchs dominated their new competitors, claiming the NAL championship in five of the league’s first six seasons. They defeated two former NNL rivals now in the NAL, the Chicago American Giants and St. Louis Stars, in 1937 and 1939 respectively to win the pennant in those two seasons. From 1940 to 1942, Kansas City was declared the NAL champion by virtue of finishing with the league’s best record. Even when the title eluded the Monarchs in 1938, the team still owned the NAL’s best overall record; however, it failed to win either the first- or second-half league title.39

Allen batted .314 in 51 league games and continued to man second base for Kansas City as the franchise embarked upon its first NAL title run in 1937. However, over the next three seasons his batting acumen and defensive range began an inevitable decline. In 1941 the now 40-year-old Allen was moved to third base; he also took the managerial reins and guided the Monarchs to a 25-11 league record (34-13 overall) in his lone season as the team’s skipper. Despite the falloff in Allen’s overall play, he was a well-established, popular star and was elected to play in four East-West All-Star Games (1936-38, 1941).40 The fact that Allen went 0-for-15 with the bat in the four all-star contests, however, was one indicator that his best playing days were behind him.

Nevertheless, in 1942 Allen managed one last hurrah as he manned third base in 24 of the Monarchs’ 39 league games and batted .304. Kansas City won the NAL with a 27-12 record in league play (35-17) overall and earned the right to face the NNL’s Homestead Grays in the first World Series between the two rival leagues. Thus, almost two full decades after participating in the first-ever Negro League World Series, Allen now took part in another landmark event. The Grays ruled the NNL in the same manner as the Monarchs reigned over the NAL, so it was expected that this Series might be every bit as dramatic as its predecessor had been in 1924. The Monarchs had other ideas, however, and swept the Grays in four games. As a 23-year-old youngster, Allen had batted .282 against Hilldale in 1924. Now, at the venerable age of 41, he played in three of the four games and hit .286 against Homestead as he won the final championship of his long career.

After two subpar seasons, in which he batted .239 and .236, Allen voluntarily retired after the 1944 season. However, in March 1945 he was around in spring training to evaluate a new player for Wilkinson, a former college athlete fresh out of the Army by the name of Jackie Robinson. Allen’s assessment was, “He’s a very smart ball player, but he can’t play shortstop – he can’t throw from the hole. Try him at second base.”41 Although Allen identified the position with which Robinson would become most associated after breaking the White major leagues’ color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947, Robinson won the Monarchs’ shortstop job by default in 1945 when starter Jesse Williams suffered an arm injury. Later in life, Allen continued to extol Robinson’s baseball acumen, saying, “Jackie was smart, he was an awful smart ballplayer. He didn’t have the ability at first, but he had the brains. … Jackie had one-third ability and two-thirds brains, and that made him a great ballplayer.”42

Allen had been a great ballplayer for a long time as well, and as is often the case with such individuals, he could not resist one final attempt at playing the game he loved. In April 1947 the Chicago Defender listed Allen on the roster of the NAL’s Cincinnati-Indianapolis Clowns, who now had future Hall of Fame shortstop Willie Wells Sr. as manager.43 Allen and Wells had formed the keystone combo for the St. Louis Stars in the first half of the 1931 season, prior to Allen’s rejoining the Monarchs for their barnstorming schedule. In his limited playing time with the Clowns, Allen turned back the clock at the plate, batting .314 in 13 league games, before hanging up his spikes for good. Wells did not have the same success as manager that he had enjoyed as a player and was replaced by Jesse “Hoss” Walker after the Clowns started the season 14-29. The Clowns finished fifth in the NAL with a 31-52-1 record, while Allen’s hometown franchise, the Monarchs, finished second at 52-32.

Once Allen’s baseball career was at an end, he settled in Kansas City, where he became involved in Democratic Party politics and worked as a foreman in the county courthouse. In the mid-1960s, Allen enjoyed attending yearly player reunions that were usually held in nearby Kansas City, Kansas. In 1971 he stated, “[T]he last five years we’ve had a reunion every year, all the ballplayers, white and colored [from the area’s former semipro and professional teams].”44 He also kidded, “You talk about hearing some baseball – everybody’s talking, and among the habitual drinkers, that’s when the truth comes out and there are some tall tales told. One guy says that’s the only time he ever hits .300, when he remembers the old days at those parties.”45

Eventually, Allen moved back to Cincinnati to be closer to family members who lived in the area. By the time the Kansas City Star interviewed him for a profile article in 1985, he was already residing in an assisted-care facility. In January 1986 Allen’s eldest son, Newt Jr., died. The Rev. Allen’s obituary listed as survivors his wife, Bertha; his father, Mr. Newton H. Allen Sr., of Cincinnati; as well as his mother, Mrs. Mary E. Allen, and a sister, Mrs. Myrtle Vanoy, both of Kansas City.46 No mention was made of Allen’s other son, who had made a career out of the Army and may also have preceded his father in death.47

Newt Allen Sr. died of a heart attack on June 9, 1988, at Cincinnati’s Golden Age Nursing Home. No obituaries were published in Cincinnati or Kansas City newspapers; only the Kansas City Times ran a short blurb about Allen’s death. In the Times’s brief write-up, Buck O’Neil was quoted as saying, “He was one of the best I’ve ever seen. I’d compare him with [longtime Kansas City Royal] Frank White, except Newt’s arm might have been a little stronger. He had soft hands and great range. The three best players I saw at the position were Newt, Frank and Bill Mazeroski.”48

Considering such accolades, it is even more distressing that Allen lies buried in an unmarked grave in Cincinnati’s Union Baptist Cemetery, a historical Black graveyard. In 2020 Negro League researcher/author Paul Debono and Cincinnati-area historian Chris Hanlin were able to identify Allen’s final resting place among other members of his family. Efforts began to enlist the aid of the Negro Leagues Baseball Grave Marker Project and other entities to place a headstone at the site to commemorate the life of Newt Allen, one of the stars of the old Negro Leagues.

Sources

Ancestry.com was consulted for public records including census information; birth, marriage, and death records; military draft registration cards; and ships’ passenger logs.

California Winter League statistics and records were taken from: McNeil, William F., The California Winter League: America’s First Integrated Professional Baseball League (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2002).

Negro League player statistics and manager/team records were taken from Seamheads.com, unless otherwise indicated.

Sanford, Jay. The Denver Post Tournament (Cleveland: Society for American Baseball Research, 2003).

Notes

1 “Teammates’ Tests Put Allen on Way to Long Career,” Kansas City Star, July 23, 1985.

2 This number includes first-half and second-half league titles, composite-standing league titles, and World Series championships. It is not to be understood as an assertion that the Monarchs won 11 World Series titles.

3 “Teammates’ Tests Put Allen on Way to Long Career.” Although Allen was raised in Kansas City from about the age of 9 years, the identity of his aunt is a mystery. Allen gave her name as Ophelia Henderson in the 1985 interview with the Star, but the only person by that name that this author could identify was younger than Allen; therefore, this Ophelia Henderson could not have been the woman who raised him. Allen may have mixed up names, especially as this interview was given late in his life. It also would not have been the first time he had told part of his life story inaccurately: In a 1971 interview with historian John Holway, Allen claimed to have been born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1902 (see John Holway, Voices from the Great Black Baseball Leagues, Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, Inc., 91). Regarding Parade Park, it may be of interest to note that it is now the home of the Kansas City MLB Urban Youth Academy (see https://kcparks.org/places/the-parade-park/).

4 The 1920 US census shows that Rose Allen was still living in Austin; however, by the time of the 1930 census she had moved her family to Cincinnati permanently. Although Newton H. Allen had died in 1910, four children – two daughters and two sons – were added to the immediate family after his death; as there is no evidence that Rose ever remarried and all four had the surname Allen, it is possible that she adopted the children, perhaps from one or more relatives (as she had allowed her own son, Newt, to be taken in by a relative). Rose Allen died in Cincinnati in 1957 at the age of 81 or 82. (She was born in 1875, but her exact date of birth is unknown.)

5 Holway, 91. Rube Currie’s last name was also spelled “Curry” at times; see http://www.seamheads.com/NegroLgs/player.php?playerID=curry01reu.

6 “Teammates’ Tests Put Allen on Way to Long Career.”

7 “Teammates’ Tests Put Allen on Way to Long Career.”

8 Phil S. Dixon, Wilber “Bullet” Rogan and the Kansas City Monarchs (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2010), 75.

9 Dr. Layton Revel and Luis Munoz, “Forgotten Heroes: Newton ‘Newt’ Allen,” http://www.cnlbr.org/Portals/0/Hero/Newton-Newt-Allen.pdf, accessed December 29, 2020.

10 “The Rev. Newton H. Allen Jr.” (obituary), Kansas City Times, January 8, 1986, 39.

11 Holway, 93. Although Newt and Mary separated, this author uncovered no divorce records; thus, the couple may have remained married even though they ceased to live together.

12 Janet Bruce, The Kansas City Monarchs: Champions of Black Baseball (Lawrence: University of Kansas Press, 1985), 43.

13 Bruce, 43.

14 Dixon, 76.

15 Revel and Munoz, 3.

16 “Teammates’ Tests Put Allen on Way to Long Career.”

17 “Newt Allen Questionnaire for Normal ‘Tweed’ Webb’s Record Book.” Thanks go out to SABR Negro League Research Committee Chair Larry Lester for providing a copy of Allen’s questionnaire.

18 Larry Lester, Baseball’s First Colored World Series: The 1924 Meeting of the Hilldale Giants and Kansas City Monarchs (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2006), 134.

19 Jorge S. Figueredo, Cuban Baseball: A Statistical History, 1878-1961 (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2003), 157.

20 Figueredo, 159.

21 Severo Nieto, Early U.S. Blackball Teams in Cuba: Box Scores, Rosters and Statistics from the Files of Cuba’s Foremost Baseball Researcher (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2008), 161.

22 Figueredo, 222.

23 “World Champion Monarchs Start Spring Training with All Veterans in the Lineup,” Chicago Defender, April 4, 1925: 10.

24 Kyle McNary, Black Baseball: A History of African Americans & the National Game (New York: PRC Publishing Ltd., 2003), 110.

25 Holway, 94.

26 Holway, 95.

27 Lester, 48.

28 Buck O’Neil with Steve Wulf and David Conrads, I Was Right on Time: My Journey from the Negro Leagues to the Majors (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996), 79-80.

29 Lester, 49.

30 “Monarchs to Play Series with Mexico,” Chicago Defender, December 12, 1931: 8.

31 Revel and Munoz, 10.

32 Bruce, 86-87.

33 Holway, 102.

34 Dixon, 144.

35 Bruce, 61.

36 Bruce, 80.

37 William A. Young, J.L. Wilkinson and the Kansas City Monarchs: Trailblazers in Black Baseball (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2016), 101.

38 Bruce, 19.

39 The Memphis Red Sox won the first-half championship, and the Atlanta Black Crackers clinched the second-half title in the 1938 NAL season.

40 The inaugural East-West game was played in 1933 while the Monarchs were an independent barnstorming team. Although Kansas City was still an independent team in 1936, the franchise’s players were eligible to be voted onto the West team for that season’s all-star game.

41 Bruce, 106.

42 Holway, 103.

43 “Red Sox to Play Three with Clowns” Chicago Defender, April 12, 1947: 23.

44 Holway, 104-5.

45 Holway, 105.

46 “The Rev. Newton H. Allen Jr.” (obituary).

47 Holway, 104. In this 1971 interview, Allen mentioned that his younger son was making a career out of the Army and was stationed in Europe at that time.

48 “Ex-Monarch Second Baseman Dies,” Kansas City Times, June 14, 1988: 30.

Upon arriving in the United States in the spring of 1956, without knowing a single person, ignorant of the native language, customs, and food, and unaware of racism, Felipe Alou was armed with nothing but his mind, courage, determination and talent. No Dominican had ever played in the major leagues, and there were as yet only a handful of dark-skinned Latinos playing in the US. Over the course of the next five decades, Alou would become and remain one of the most respected figures in baseball, an All-Star player, a team leader, and a successful manager. While he was admired throughout baseball, among his fellow Dominicans, who would soon be plentiful, he was a revered hero.

“Felipe was really the first,” remembered Manny Mota, “the guy who cleared the way. He was an inspiration to everybody [in the Dominican Republic]. He was a good example.”1 Juan Marichal, like Mota a fellow Dominican, agreed. “Everybody respects Felipe Alou,” he recalled. “He was the leader of most of the Latin players.”2 Willie Mays, a teammate of all of these players, remembered, “It was like a family when they came over.”3 These men helped define the baseball of their time, and Alou was both a leader and a friend to many of them.

Felipe Rojas Alou was born on May 12, 1935 in Bajos de Haina, San Cristóbal, on the southern coast of the Dominican Republic, a few miles from Santo Domingo. (His nickname at home is El Panqué [Sweet Bread] de Haina.) The first child born to José Rojas and Virginia Alou, he was followed by María, Mateo, Jesús, Juan and Virginia. José also had two children with a previous wife who had died young. Though José was dark-skinned and Virginia (descending from Spaniards) was white, Felipe did not give this much thought—race was not a big issue in his country.

José Rojas was a carpenter and blacksmith who built their small four-room house, and many of the other houses in the vicinity. The Rojas family had very little money, as they were often at the mercy of their neighbors’ ability to pay their bills. World War II brought further hardship, causing José to turn to fishing to feed his family. Although they did not always have food, their well-built home afforded them shelter that not everyone in their neighborhood had.4 Felipe swam in the nearby ocean, and was an avid fisherman—a hobby he kept up the rest of his life.

In keeping with the Latin custom, this man is known in full as Felipe Rojas Alou, with each parent contributing half of the double surname. The paternal half is normally used in everyday life, and in the Dominican people know Felipe, Mateo, and Jesús as the Rojas brothers. During Felipe’s time in the American minor leagues he began to be called (incorrectly) Felipe Alou, rhyming (again incorrectly) with “lew” rather than “low.” However, he did not feel empowered enough to correct the error. Two of his brothers, Mateo and Jesús, followed him to American baseball and also, because of the error with Felipe, assumed the surname Alou during their Stateside careers. Similarly, three of Felipe’s sons played professionally, one becoming a star, and all of them used the name Alou even though it was not a part of their name at all (it being their grandmother’s maiden name, not their mother’s). For convenience, this biography will refer to the subject by the name most readers are familiar with: Felipe Alou.

Alou spent six years in local schools and went to high school in Santo Domingo, a 12-mile trip he often made on foot. He also worked on his uncle’s farm and helped his father with his carpentry business. An excellent student, he became a member of the Dominican national track team, running sprints and throwing the discus and javelin. As a senior in high school, he participated in the 1954 Central-American Games in Mexico City. Though track kept him from playing high school baseball, he did play and star for local amateur teams.5

In 1954 Alou entered the University of Santo Domingo in its pre-med program, part of his parents’ dream that he become a doctor. Alou batted cleanup for the team that won the 1955 collegiate championship. He returned to Mexico City for the Pan-American Games, intending to run sprints and throw the javelin, but at the last minute was removed from the track team and placed on the baseball team. He got four hits in the final game against the United States as the Dominican Republic won the gold medal.6

After the tournament Alou received many offers from the major leagues, which at first he had no intention of taking. His resolution lasted until his father and uncle both lost their jobs. As it happened, his university coach, Horacio Martínez, doubled as a bird dog scout for the New York Giants. “Rabbit” Martínez had played shortstop for Alex Pómpez, owner of the New York Cubans, and later a Giants scout. Alou signed in November 1955 for $200, which paid off his parents’ grocery bill. More importantly, he had a job. Despite his parents’ mixed feelings, “we needed somebody to start contributing some earnings to the house.”7

Alou began his professional career in Lake Charles, Louisiana, helping to integrate the Evangeline League. Soon after he arrived, the league voted to expel Lake Charles and Lafayette (the two clubs that had black players).8

Instead, the blacks were shifted to other teams in other leagues; Alou, having just arrived in the United States, rode a bus to Cocoa, Florida to play in the Florida State League. Desperately homesick, and stung by racism for the first time in his life, he pulled it together enough to hit a league-leading .380 with 21 home runs. On September 23, far away in New York, Ozzie Virgil made his debut with the Giants, becoming the first Dominican native to play in the major leagues. (Because Virgil had gone to high school in New York city, his path to the majors was different than Alou’s.)

Alou began 1957 at Triple-A Minneapolis, but his .211 average in 24 games led to a demotion to Springfield, Massachusetts, where he recovered with a .306 average and 12 home runs. It could have been better—Alou was hitting over .380 in mid-season before injuring his right leg on a slide into home plate; he hobbled the rest of the year. Nonetheless, his season earned him an invitation to major league camp in 1958 and a raise to $750 a month. Alou spent very little of it—he kept enough to live on and sent the rest home to his family. During the offseason, the New York Giants moved to San Francisco, and their top minor-league affiliate was now in Phoenix, where Alou was ultimately assigned. Batting leadoff for the first time, he hit .319 with 13 home runs in just 55 games before the Giants brought him to the big leagues.

On June 8 Alou became the second Dominican major leaguer, playing right field and leading off at San Francisco’s Seals Stadium. He singled and doubled off Cincinnati’s Brooks Lawrence in his first two at-bats, and, three days later, got his first home run off Pittsburgh’s Vernon Law. After a hot start that kept him over .300 for a month, he cooled down in July and finished at .253 with 4 home runs in 182 at-bats.

In his first few years Alou could never quite establish himself as a regular player, hampered mostly by the competition on his own team. Beginning in about 1958, a large wave of young players, mostly African-Americans and Latinos, arrived with the Giants. In just this single season, the Giants debuted Alou, Orlando Cepeda, Willie Kirkland, and Leon Wagner. Bill White had a fine rookie year in 1956, went into the Army, came back in late 1958 and had no place to play. Felipe Alou competed with all these guys, along with several others on their way; Willie McCovey and José Pagán joined the club in 1959.

Most of these players were outfielders and first basemen. Alou had the advantage of being athletic enough to play center field, but with the peerless Willie Mays on hand, that skill did not help Alou get on the field. He played as a fourth outfielder in 1959, but with McCovey hitting .372 with 29 home runs for Phoenix in late July, the Giants wanted to bring McCovey up and send Alou back down. With just a year’s seniority under his belt, the 24-year-old told the Giants he would not go back to the minors. His wife was going through a difficult pregnancy, and Alou did not believe the move to Phoenix and the return to San Francisco in September would help. Instead, he told Giants manager Bill Rigney that they would go home. The Alous checked out of their apartment and booked flights to Santo Domingo. The Giants backed down, and instead made room for McCovey by making Hank Sauer a coach.9

Still, the addition of McCovey meant that either he or Orlando Cepeda had to play the outfield, and, with Willie Mays out there already, that left just one spot for Alou and several other qualified players to fight for. Over the 1959 and 1960 seasons combined, Alou hit .269 with 18 home runs in 569 at bats. In 1961, under new manager Al Dark, Alou played most of the time, got 447 at-bats, and responded with 18 home runs and a .289 average.

While Alou’s star was rising in his profession, something else became even more central to his life. “The day I joined the Giants in San Francisco was one of the most important days of my life,” recalled Alou. “That was the day my new teammate Al Worthington introduced me to Jesús Christ.” Alou had often read the Bible in the minor leagues because he had a Spanish-language version and it became his only reading material. But because of Worthington, and later Lindy McDaniel (“who baptized me into the new faith”), Alou became one of the more devout Christians in baseball. His devotion caused some discomfort within his own family, but they remained very close.10

Felipe’s brother Mateo, generally called Matty in the States, signed with the Giants before the 1957 season and began to work his way up through the minors. He debuted in late 1960, and reached the majors full time in 1961, hitting .310 in 200 at-bats. Although his presence was great for Felipe personally, Matty also was another outfielder—by September, Dark was platooning the two Alous in right field. Meanwhile, 19-year-old brother Jesús, yet another outfielder, was hitting .336 for a Giants affiliate in the Northwest League.

Felipe finally broke through as a full-time player in 1962, winning the right field job outright and keeping it all season. In 605 at-bats, Alou hit .316 with 25 home runs. He was selected to the NL All-Star team in July, coming in for Roberto Clemente and hitting a sacrifice fly in his only plate appearance. More importantly, the Giants won the NL pennant, overcoming a four-game deficit with seven games to go to tie the Dodgers, then winning a three-game pennant playoff. In the playoff series, Alou was 4-for-12 with two doubles.

The 1962 World Series was a classic seven-game affair pitting the Giants and the New York Yankees. Alou played every inning in right field, and managed 7 hits in 29 at-bats. But he has never forgotten his last chance, in the ninth inning of the final game, with the Giants trailing 1-0. Matty led off with a bunt single, and Felipe tried to sacrifice him to second base. “I was asked to bunt, and I bunted poorly and the ball went foul. Then, with the infield charging for the bunt, I swung at a bad pitch and fouled it off for strike two. Then I struck out.”

“That was the lowest point of my career. This is something I am going to die with because I failed in that situation.”11 Alou was not often asked to bunt, but he did not blame Dark. He believed, then and later, that he should have been practicing bunting in case he was asked. Years later, as a manager, he obsessed over his clubs being capable of bunting. After another out, Willie Mays doubled Matty to third, but they were both stranded when McCovey lined out to second base, ending the game and Series.

The Giants fell back to third place in 1963, though Alou had another fine season—20 home runs and a .281 batting average. The highlight of the year came in September when his brother Jesús was recalled from Triple-A Tacoma to join Felipe and Matty. Late in the game on September 15, Jesús and Matty replaced Mays and McCovey, creating an all-Alou outfield. The brothers repeated this two more times that month, and appeared in the box score together a few other times. This feat has never been repeated in the regular season, and Felipe has a theory as to why. “Because people don’t want to have children,” he reasoned. The odds of three boys, all ballplayers, all on the same team, are quite remote.12

Meanwhile, in 1963 Alou found himself embroiled in some politics with the baseball establishment. Throughout his professional career, Felipe returned home every October and played baseball in the Dominican Winter League. On his way up to the majors, he won back-to-back batting titles in 1958-59 and 1959-60. A growing list of fellow major leaguers joined Alou, including his brothers, Manny Mota, Juan Marichal, and more. The Alous and Marichal usually played for Leones del Escogido in Santo Domingo, which won five of six championships beginning with the 1955-56 season. In 1956, Escogido club president Paco Martínez Alba — brother-in-law of Rafael Trujillo, the long-time Dominican strongman — formed a working agreement with the Giants.

Trujillo was assassinated in 1961, leaving the country in the hands of the military. The Winter League season was shortened in 1961-62, and cancelled outright in 1962-63. The Dominican government arranged a series of games with a touring team of Cuban players who were living in the US (exiled from their own country, and their own winter league). Among those who participated were Felipe Alou and Juan Marichal. Baseball commissioner Ford Frick, deeming these games “unauthorized,” fined the players $250 each.

Many of the Dominican players were upset, but it was Alou who went public. In the spring of 1963, Alou suggested that Latin players have a representative in the commissioner’s office, someone who understood Latin culture and politics, and could explain their unique set of problems. “They do not understand,” Alou said, “that these are our people and we owe it to them to play for them.”13 In December 1965, Commissioner William Eckert hired Bobby Maduro to fill exactly this position.

Alou expanded on his people’s grievances in a courageous first-person account in Sport (as told to Arnold Hano) that fall. “When the military junta ‘asked’ you to do something, you did it. If I had not played, I would have been called a Communist.” Most Latin players came from very impoverished circumstances, and earning the extra money in the off-season (there were no other jobs available) helped feed huge extended families. In the US, the players were often isolated from their teammates by language, and often criticized or even disciplined for speaking Spanish amongst themselves. Alou was very complimentary of the United States, calling it a “wonderful country,” but left no doubt where his heart lay. “I am a Dominican. It is my country. And I love it.”14 Alou pulled no punches, criticizing Frick and also Alvin Dark, his own manager. In the words of writer Rob Ruck, “Nobody had ever spoken so eloquently or forcefully about Latin ballplayers, much less prescribed how baseball could and should address their unique concerns.”15

In early December, not long after the article in Sport appeared, the Giants traded Alou to the Milwaukee Braves as part of a seven-player trade. Whether the deal was related to Alou’s outspokenness is unclear, but his Latino teammates, including Cepeda, Marichal, and Pagán, were devastated. “I think that was one of the biggest mistakes the Giants ever made,” said Marichal decades later.16 The Giants did have a surplus of outfielders, and needed the pitching they acquired. Jesús Alou, who many thought would surpass both his brothers, was anointed as the new Giants right fielder.

Alou spent the next six years with the Braves. Before reporting in 1964 he had injured his knee playing in the Dominican Winter League. He played through it, knowing that the Braves needed him to play center field, but he got off to a slow start hitting and fielding. In June manager Bobby Bragan (faced with an outfield surplus with the sudden emergence of Rico Carty, a rookie Dominican) asked Alou to play first base, and a few games later he tore cartilage in his knee reaching for a ground ball. He missed a month of action, and hit just .253 with nine home runs on the season. In 1965 he recovered nicely, alternating between first base and the outfield, hitting .297 with 23 home runs.

In 1966 the Braves moved to Atlanta, and Alou responded to the hot climate with his best season. Again playing first base and all three outfield positions, Alou hit .327 with 31 home runs, leading the NL with 218 hits, 122 runs scored, and 355 total bases. He lost out on the league batting title to his brother Matty (.342), who had been traded to Pittsburgh and was capitalizing on his first chance at regular playing time. Felipe returned to the All-Star Game, though he did not see any action.

The Atlanta writers named Alou the team MVP, and some of his teammates were in awe. “I’ve never seen anyone stand out head and shoulders the way Felipe did,” said catcher Joe Torre. “I’ve never seen anyone hit so consistently well all season long,” added Henry Aaron. Alou parried such talk: “If a team isn’t going right, what can one man do to help? I think this stuff about leading a team, I wonder if that is really possible.” But it was not just his ballplaying. Gene Oliver, a white teammate who lost his first base job to Alou, said, “He is the kind of man you hope your kid will grow up to be.”17

Alou struggled in 1967, suffering from bone chips in his elbow and falling to .274 with just 15 home runs. He recovered to hit .317 in 1968 (a year that saw league averages plummet to .243), playing in the All-Star game again. His batting average was third highest in the league, and he tied Pete Rose for the lead with 210 hits. After three years of moving around the diamond, Alou played 156 times in center field under new manager Lum Harris.

Alou got off to a great start in 1969, hitting well over .300 through May. On June 2 he broke a finger and missed two weeks after he was hit by a pitch thrown by the Cardinals’ Chuck Taylor. During his absence the Braves acquired Tony González from San Diego, and when Alou returned the two platooned in center field. During the Braves’ successful drive for the division title, and the subsequent playoff loss to the Mets, Alou got little playing time. For the season he hit just .282 with five home runs. With an outfield surplus, Atlanta dealt the 34-year-old to Oakland for pitcher Jim Nash over the winter.

No longer a star player, in 1970 Alou was the elder statesman on a young A’s team filled with up and coming stars. He hit .271 in 154 games. Just a few days into the 1971 season, Oakland dealt Alou to the Yankees for two young pitchers, making room for Joe Rudi in left field. Alou played most of the next three years in New York, hitting .289, .278 and finally .236, moving between the outfield and first base all three seasons. He played 19 games for Montreal in September 1973, and got three at bats for Milwaukee the next April before drawing his final release. Felipe was sad, saying he would “have to get used to the life of a man who can’t play baseball.”18

Alou joined the Montreal Expos organization as an instructor in 1976, but suffered the tragedy of his life in 1976 when his oldest boy, Felipe Jr., an aspiring ballplayer, jumped into a shallow pool and drowned. Alou was so broken up he did not work at all that season, and could not talk about the tragedy for many years. He rejoined the Expos the next year, and spent the next seventeen years as a minor league manager (with a few stints as a major league coach). In the minors, he piloted West Palm Beach, Memphis, Denver, Wichita, and Indianapolis, earning a reputation as a serious and respected teacher of young players. He apparently was offered the job in 1985 to manage the San Francisco Giants but turned it down out of loyalty to the Expos.

In the winter months, Felipe transitioned from player to manager of his longtime team, the Leones del Escogido in the Dominican Republic. Alou managed the club to four league championships (1980-81, 1981-82; 1989-90, 1991-92). Previously, he had also won two Venezuelan titles as skipper of the Caracas Leones (1977-78, 1979-80). In the mid-1980s, he managed Caguas in the Puerto Rican Winter League as well.

The genuinely devoted Alou, who did not drink or smoke or socialize much, has been married four times and has fathered eleven children. As a young man he married María Beltré, from his hometown, and the couple had four children: Felipe Jr., María, José and Moisés. He and Beverley Martin, from Atlanta, had three girls: Christia, Cheri, and Jennifer. His third wife was Elsa Brens, from the Dominican, and the couple had Felipe José and Luis Emilio. In 1985, he married Lucie Gagnon, a French-Canadian, and had two more children, Valerie and Felipe Jr.

“People ask how a man who likes to be home with his family gets married four times,” Alou said in 1995. “All the evils that go on in life, the evils of the life of a traveling ballplayer, I wasn’t immune to that. But I loved all my wives and children. … I’ve been a lucky man. I had two children in my 50’s, and God gave us other Felipes.”19 Among his children, José and Felipe José became minor league players, and Moisés made it to the Majors.

In 1986 Alou returned to manage at Single-A West Palm Beach, and remained there for six years, an eternity for a minor-league manager. In 1992 he returned to the major leagues as the bench coach for manager Tom Runnells. After a sluggish start (17-20), general manager Dan Duquette fired Runnells and hired Alou to finish the season. The young team responded with a 70-55 record to finish a strong second to the Pittsburgh Pirates. The 57-year-old Alou’s job was secure. “The biggest mistake I’ve made in my career,” said Duquette, “was not recognizing his ability then to be a terrific major league manager. He’s one of the best in the game.”20 He was the first of his countrymen to manage a big-league team.

Alou took over a Montreal club filled with young talent, including Larry Walker, Marquis Grissom, Delino DeShields and Wil Cordero. One of the team’s best relief pitchers was Mel Rojas, who was Felipe’s nephew (the son of his half-brother). The team’s left fielder was 25-year-old Moisés Alou, Felipe’s son. Moisés had not grown up with Felipe (his parents had divorced when Moisés was two), but they talked frequently and saw each other occasionally over the winter months. “I was the happiest kid in the world,” Moisés recalled. “He was the most famous player, maybe the most famous person, on the island, and he was my father.“21 Alou was a good young player who developed rapidly under his father’s tutelage, turning into a six-time All-Star and one of the better hitters in the National League.

The Expos finished 94-68 in 1993, just three games behind the first-place Phillies. Over the off-season, Duquette traded second baseman DeShields to Los Angeles for 21-year-old pitcher Pedro Martínez, a Dominican who joined Ken Hill and Jeff Fassero to give Alou one of the league’s best starting staffs. The fortified club soared to the best record in baseball in 1994, a great team that could hit, field, run and pitch. Unfortunately for Alou and his team, the season was ended in early August by a player’s strike, and the club was not able to continue its quest for a championship. The club’s 74-40 pace, if maintained over the full schedule, would have yielded 105 wins, the most since the 1986 Mets. Alou was named the National League Manager of the Year.

Compounding the tragedy, the team’s ownership was not willing to spend the necessary money to keep the team intact. Before the 1995 season got underway, the Expos had lost Walker, Grissom, Hill, and John Wetteland. Alou’s club fell all the way to last place in 1995, before clawing their way back to 88 wins and second place in 1996. But soon Cordero and Fassero departed, followed by Moisés Alou and Pedro Martínez. As the club continued to develop good players (Vladimir Guerrero, Rondell White, Orlando Cabrera, and Javier Vázquez arrived in the late 1990s), the club’s five straight fourth-place finishes did not harm Alou’s reputation as a manager. It was understood that Alou was doing a fine job with his youngsters, but that the team was not willing to keep them once they attained the seniority that allowed them to earn big money. After another mediocre start in 2001 (21-32), Alou finally was released as manager after nine years.

He spent 2002 as the bench coach for the Tigers (working under Luis Pujols, who had been Alou’s bench coach in Montreal). After the 2002 season Alou returned to San Francisco to manage the Giants. Under Dusty Baker, the club had reached the World Series in 2002, but after the season Baker left the club in a contract dispute, joining the Chicago Cubs. The 67-year-old Alou took over.

The Giants’ team and personality was dominated by the late-career Barry Bonds, who had set the single-season home run record in 2001 and whose days were now filled with home runs, bases on balls and (ever increasingly) steroid allegations. Alou’s first club won 100 games, an improvement on the World Series team that had won 95 and the NL wild card. Unfortunately, the 2003 club was upset in playoffs by the young Florida Marlins. Bonds missed 30 games but managed to hit .341 with 45 home runs and 148 walks. The next season Bonds walked a record 232 times and won the batting title, but the club fell to 91 wins, and then to 75 wins in 2005 with Bonds hurt. Moisés Alou rejoined his father in 2005, and had two pretty good seasons with the Giants. After the 2006 season, the 71-year-old Felipe Alou was released from his job as manager.

Alou remained a beloved figure in San Francisco, and was offered a job as a special assistant to general manager Brian Sabean. “I am truly overjoyed to have Felipe remain with the Giants organization,” said Sabean. “As he was during his four years as our manager, Felipe will continue to be a huge asset to the ballclub going forward.”22 Alou has worked as a major-league scout, and minor-league instructor, helping Sabean on player evaluation. In 2010 Alou received his first championship ring after the Giants defeated the Rangers in the World Series.

In 2012 he was beginning his sixth season in this position, 57 years after signing his first contract with the Giants. He had begun his career as a stranger in a strange land, but had become one of baseball’s most respected men. A three-time All-Star turned into an award-winning manager, who helped many of the game’s greatest stars as they began their careers. But he remains most famous as the eldest in one of baseball’s greatest families, the brother and father to fellow All-Stars. Very few men have left a greater mark on baseball than Felipe Rojas Alou.

Last revised: May 1, 2012

Sources

Thanks to Rory Costello for his help, especially for his straightening out my understanding of Felipe Rojas Alou’s name.

Notes

1 Michael Farber, “Diamond Heirs,” Sports Illustrated, June 19, 1985.

2 Rob Ruck, Raceball—How the Major Leagues Colonized the Black and Latin Game (Boston: Beacon Press, 2011), 164.

3 Rob Ruck, Raceball, 154.

4 Felipe Alou with Herm Weiskopf, My Life and Baseball (Waco, Texas: Word Books, 1967), 1-13.

5 Alou and Weiskopf, My Life and Baseball, 14-17.

6 Alou and Weiskopf, My Life and Baseball, 18-21.

7 Steve Bitker, The Original San Francisco Giants: The Giants of ’58 (Sports Publishing, Inc., 2001), 68.

8 The Sporting News, May 16, 1956, 37.

9 Steve Bitker, The Original San Francisco Giants, 68.

10 Steve Bitker, The Original San Francisco Giants, 66.

11 Steve Bitker, The Original San Francisco Giants, 69.

12 Steve Bitker, The Original San Francisco Giants, 70.

13 Bob Stevens, “Felipe Suggests Latins Have Rep in Frick’s Office,” The Sporting News, March 16, 1963: 11.

14 Felipe Alou with Arnold Hano, “Latin-American Ballplayers Need a Bill of Rights,” Sport, November 1963: 21.

15 Rob Ruck, Raceball, 164.

16 Rob Ruck, Raceball, 164.

17 John Devaney, “Felipe Alou: The Gentle Howitzer,” Sport, June 1967, 63.

18 Lou Chapman, “Brewers Salute Tom Murphy as Bullpen Savior,” The Sporting News, May 18, 1974, 9.

19 Michael Farber, “Diamond Heirs.”

20 Michael Farber, “Diamond Heirs.”

21 Michael Farber, “Diamond Heirs.”

22 Associated Press, “Alou returns to Giants as special assistant,” ESPN.com, http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/wire?section=mlb&id=2721755, accessed February 27, 2012.

While Weaver racked up wins in the Charm City, Altobelli ’s managerial success on the big-league level was considerably less. The former big-league first baseman (1955; 1957; 1961) piloted the San Francisco Giants for two-plus seasons (1977-1979); those clubs went .485 for him. As different as night and day in personality and managing styles, Weaver and Altobelli did share one accomplishment: each won exactly one World Series championship in Baltimore. Altobelli’s came in 1983, his first season at the Baltimore helm – but as in San Francisco, he didn’t make it to the end of his third.

Joseph Salvatore Altobelli was born on May 26, 1932, in Detroit, Michigan. He was the second-youngest of Michele and Antoniette Altobelli’s seven children. Michele and Antoniette had emigrated from Italy. Michele worked as a cashier and later as a supervisor for the Detroit Railway system.1

Joe attended Eastern High School in Detroit, where he participated in baseball, football, and basketball. He was an All-City selection in all three sports.

As a junior, Altobelli, a left-handed pitcher, hurled a no-hitter against Cass Tech, striking out 13 and walking two in a lopsided 18-0 win.2 The next year, he struck out 20 batters over nine innings in a game against Denby High School. However, darkness came, and the game ended in a 2-2 tie.3 In his next start, he pitched a one-hitter against Wright High School in a 5-2 victory.4

Cleveland Indians scout Nap Ross signed Altobelli to his first professional contract, with their San Diego affiliate on August 1, 1950. However, he began his pro career with Class D Daytona Beach in 1951. Altobelli’s pitching days were behind him: he played first base and some outfield in his professional career.

Altobelli gave a good account of himself in his initial professional season. He was fourth in the Florida State League in batting average (.341) and second in hits (204). The lefty swinger also set a league record with a 36-game hitting streak.5 

Only two players on the Daytona Beach club reached the major leagues. The other prospect was also Italian, hailing from the Bronx, New York: Rocky Colavito. Altobelli and Colavito roomed together during their first season in an owner-occupied house that was rented to ballplayers. “We thought it was a good idea to split our money by living together because we didn’t have much of it in those days,” said Altobelli 6

On May 3, 1952, Altobelli married the former Patsy Wooten. Joe and Patsy had six children: four sons (Michael, Mark, Jerry. and Joseph) and two daughters (Jody and Jackie).

Altobelli’s journey made stops in Class A Reading in 1952 and 1953, followed by Class AAA Indianapolis in 1954. “The Indians haven’t had a good Italian ballplayer in ages,” wrote the Cleveland Plain Dealer’s Gordon Cobbledick, “but the drought will end soon if Rocky Colavito and Joe Altobelli of the Indianapolis farm club keep up their current pace. Colavito, a 20-year-old outfielder, is leading the American Association in home runs. Altobelli, a first baseman, is one of the league’s top five hitters.”7   

The Tribe became American League champions in 1954. After a disappointing exit from the World Series, expectations were high in 1955. One trouble spot in the Indians lineup was first base. Manager Al Lopez used Bill Glynn, Al Rosen and finally Vic Wertz to solidify the first sacker position. Although Lopez eventually settled on Wertz, he was an outfielder and never played first base until he got to Cleveland. For this reason, Altobelli made the Indians roster out of spring training.

Before the Indians broke camp, Plain Dealer beat writer Harry Jones wrote the following: “Joe Altobelli isn’t going to open the season at first base, but if he learns to hit at all he will soon have the job. It is a pleasure watching someone who knows how to play the position. Shifty, agile and sure-handed, Altobelli dug two low throws out of the dirt today that others may not have stopped.”8

Cleveland farmed Altobelli back to Indianapolis on May 11, 1955. Playing mostly in a utility role, he had hit .217 in 23 major-league at-bats. He returned to Cleveland twice more during the season, ending the year with the Tribe.

One of Altobelli’s greatest memories occurred at the end of the 1955 season. Cleveland finished the season with a three-game series at Detroit. Altobelli started the second game of a doubleheader on September 24. With family and friends looking on at Briggs Stadium, Altobelli smacked the first home run of his career. For good measure, Altobelli hit number two the next day in the season’s finale.

Altobelli spent the entire 1956 season in Indianapolis. He batted just .254 but led the club in RBIs (81) and was second in home runs (19). In 1957, Altobelli broke camp with the Indians. He appeared in 83 games for Cleveland, mostly as a substitute first baseman or a defensive replacement for Wertz. Altobelli batted .207 with no home runs and nine RBIs.

After another season at Indianapolis in 1958, Cleveland sold Altobelli to Toronto of the Class AAA International League (IL) on January 13, 1959. On April 1, 1960, Altobelli was on the move again, traded to the Los Angeles Dodgers for infielder Clyde Parris. The Dodgers optioned Altobelli to their IL club, Montreal. In 1960, he had career highs in home runs (31) and RBIs (105) for the last place Royals (62-92). 

The Washington Senators relocated to Minneapolis for the 1961 season, becoming the Minnesota Twins. Los Angeles dealt Altobelli and pitcher Ed Palmquist to the Twins for outfielder Ernie Oravetz on May 10. Altobelli split the season between the Twins and their IL affiliate, Syracuse. Even though he played in just 41 games at the top level, Altobelli produced his most home runs (3) and RBIs (14), as well as his highest average (.221) in the majors.

The Twins released Altobelli at the end of the season and he was picked up by the Dodgers again. After spending the 1962 season at Omaha of the Triple-A American Association, Altobelli was released again and signed with another IL club, the Rochester (New York) Red Wings.

The Red Wings were the top farm team of the Baltimore Orioles, and although Altobelli would not return to the majors, he found a lifelong home in Rochester. A popular characterization for many players is the label “4A”: too good for the minors but not quite good enough to stick in the big leagues.

Altobelli played first base and some outfield for Rochester for four seasons (1963-1966). In 1964, the Red Wings won the Governor’s Cup for winning the league’s playoffs. Altobelli slugged three home runs and drove in 11 runs in 10 playoff games.9   

Rochester fans took a liking to Altobelli because of his power hitting and fine defense at first base. The Orioles selected him to manage their Rookie League team in 1966. Bluefield (West Virginia) of the Appalachian League was the first stop of a long managerial career. In 1967, the Bluefield Orioles (42-25) won the pennant. “That was a rewarding year,” said Altobelli. “I enjoy managing and I wanted to start at the bottom. It’s got to be the best way. Funny thing about players I knew. They had a bad year, they didn’t like the manager. They had a good year, they thought the manager was a heck of a guy.”10  

Like good players, good managers are promoted as well. Altobelli climbed the managerial ladder to Stockton of the Class A California League in 1968, and then to Dallas of the Class AA Texas League in 1969 and 1970.

He returned to his adopted home of Rochester in 1971 to lead the Red Wings. Baltimore’s top minor-league team had a surplus of offensive talent, led by Don Baylor, Bobby Grich, Terry Crowley, and Rich Coggins. Altobelli guided the Wings to an 86-54 record, and they captured the Governor’s Cup. Rochester went on to defeat Denver (champions of the American Association) in seven games in the Little World Series. “I hate to single out individuals,” said Altobelli, who was named the IL Manager of the Year in 1971. “All had a part in making us a winner. Team effort is a tired phrase, but that’s what it was.”11

Rochester was bounced from the playoffs the next two years but reclaimed the league championship in 1974. Altobelli guided the Red Wings to an 88-56 record during the regular season. For his efforts, he was named Manager of the Year by the IL and The Sporting News. “The guys on this team feel that winning for another manager is fine, but winning for Joe is great.” said Rochester catcher Jim Hutto.12

Altobelli had two more winning seasons in 1975 and 1976 at Rochester, improving his overall record as the Red Wings’ skipper to 502-351. Despite his success, he was still a virtual unknown in the big leagues and especially on the West Coast. Thus, it was surprising to many when on October 7, 1976, San Francisco Giants owner Bob Lurie selected Altobelli as his new manager to replace Bill Rigney. “Joe expected that,” said Lurie. “He predicted to me that the attitude immediately would be ‘Who he?’ And it was.”13  

In 1977, the Giants improved by one game (75-87) from 1976. On April 7, 1978, they sent seven players and $300,000 to the Oakland A’s for pitcher Vida Blue. The former Cy Young Award winner in 1971, Blue led the American League with 19 losses in 1977. However, he was revitalized by from the move across the bay, going 18-10 with a 2.79 ERA to lead a fine pitching staff that also featured Bob Knepper (17-11, 2.63), and John Montefusco (11-9, 3.81). On July 31, the Giants (63-43) led Cincinnati (62-43) by a half game and Los Angeles (61-44) by 1½ games in a very competitive NL West race. However, a 26-29 record over the final two months of the season landed San Francisco (89-73) in third place.

Still, Altobelli was chosen as the 1978 National League Manager of the Year by both the Associated Press (AP) and United Press International (UPI). “I’m very honored, but I feel our success was an organizational thing,” said Altobelli. “Spec Richardson (general manager) did such a good making the trades which helped our club. The front office did a great job, starting with (owners) Bob Lurie and Bud Herseth.”14 

Expectations were high for the Giants in 1979. However, Altobelli soon realized that managers on one-year contracts have little control over players with multi-year deals. As often happens, when losses mount, managers tend to lose their players. The Giants, in third place with a 52-55 record at the end of July, went 8-19 in August. Lurie and Richardson determined the team was not getting any better; Altobelli was fired on September 6. Third base coach Dave Bristol replaced him.

“I was like a football coach who has a whole team of quarterbacks,” said Altobelli. “They all wanted to call their own plays. If a manager is going to get the ax, he wants to be sure it was his gameplan that failed and not someone else’s.”15 Ironically, Altobelli passed the credit around when he was Manager of the Year in 1978. One year later, he alone took the blame for the team’s failure.

“Joe’s big mistake was treating players like men,” said Bill Madlock. “You can’t do that. Everyone knows players are asses.”16

“I didn’t want to talk to anyone because I was afraid of what I might say,” said Altobelli. “I’d been in baseball for 29 years, and never been fired. But I had always prided myself on being a teacher. I didn’t want to start bad-mouthing any of the players. It’s the guys with problems who really need the most help. Besides, if I started placing blame elsewhere, I was just putting myself on a path of self-destruction.”17

The New York Yankees hired Altobelli to manage the Columbus Clippers, their IL affiliate, in 1980. After the Clippers won the pennant with a record of 83-57, they topped Richmond and then Toledo to win the Governor’s Cup. Altobelli was once again named the IL Manager of the Year.

Altobelli was promoted to the Yankees, serving as the third base coach on the staffs of Bob Lemon, Gene Michael, and Clyde King from 1981-1982.  

In Baltimore, Earl Weaver retired after the 1982 season. After 15 years at the helm, Weaver went to Miami to pursue other interests and Altobelli was named to succeed him. Although Weaver,  still employed by the Orioles as a consultant, campaigned for longtime organization man Cal Ripken Sr. to replace him, he supported the front office’s choice of Altobelli. “The kids who came up from there (Rochester) executed all the plays the way I wanted,” said Weaver. “You didn’t have to reteach them anything. It was important to me that Alto sent them up right.”18   

Many of the current Oriole players had played for Altobelli at Rochester, including Eddie Murray, Dennis Martinez, Mike Flanagan, Rich Dauer, and Scott McGregor.

In 1983, McGregor (18-7, 3.18 ERA), Flanagan (12-4, 3,30 ERA), Storm Davis (13-7, 3.59 ERA), and rookie Mike Boddicker (16-8, 2.77 ERA) formed a formidable starting rotation for the O’s. Tippy Martinez (9-3, 2.35 ERA, 21 saves) was a reliable back end of the bullpen pitcher.

Cal Ripken Jr. led the league in hits (211), runs (121), and doubles (47) to earn AL MVP honors. He also hit 27 homers, drove in 102 runs and batted .318. Murray (33, 111, .306) and Ken Singleton (18, 84, .276) also had fine offensive seasons, providing power and hitting for average. Gary Roenicke added 19 home runs and drove in 64 runs.

When hired, Altobelli said his only goal was to win one more game than any other team in the AL East. It was a competitive division. Milwaukee was the defending AL pennant winner. New York had gone to the World Series in 1981. Third-place Boston had won 89. Detroit would win it all in 1984. They all also had to deal with up-and-coming Toronto. The Blue Jays were building a formidable club that would claim a division title in 1985.

On June 30, the Orioles were 40-33, tied with Detroit for second place, two games behind Toronto. The O’s soared into first with a 17-4 stretch from July 10-31. An 18-12 August strengthened their hold on the lead. Baltimore coasted to the division title, going 20-11 in September to win by six games.

Boddicker was the surprise of the pitching staff. He posted a 5-1 record with a 2.49 ERA in August. “Joe stuck with me,” said Boddicker. “I pitched a shutout my first time. But I struggled for a while after that. I was 1-2, 4-4 (with a 4.02 ERA after his first 10 starts). I’ve got to credit him.”19     

The Orioles were opposed the ALCS by the Chicago White Sox. Under manager Tony La Russa the Sox were making their first postseason appearance since 1959. There was plenty of excitement on the Southside.

Behind Cy Young Award winner LaMarr Hoyt, Chicago won Game One, 2-1. Boddicker evened the series the next day, pitching a complete-game shutout, striking out 14. “You see a rookie come into a situation like that and pitch a shutout while striking out 14,” said Altobelli,” and you’ve got to rate maybe the best you’ve ever seen. We needed that game so badly.”20   

The Orioles won the next two games to take the pennant. They met the Philadelphia Phillies in the World Series. As in the ALCS, Baltimore lost the first game, 2-1, to a Cy Young Award winner, this time the NL’s John Denny. Then the Orioles proceeded to sweep the next four games to win the franchise’s third world championship. In the clincher, McGregor pitched a five-hit shutout to lead the way. Murray clubbed two home runs, driving in three runs. Rick Dempsey, voted the series MVP, also homered.

La Russa was covering the World Series for a Chicago television station. “The thing that struck me most was Joe Altobelli standing there in front of the media, crediting everyone – players, coaches, general managers, owner – but himself.”21     

All season Altobelli was compared to Weaver. Now that he’d won a championship, maybe Earl’s shadow would be eclipsed. Altobelli was not expecting it, noting that the Orioles won 94 games in 1982, and he just wanted to keep the O’s train moving. Altobelli was not as dramatic or attention-seeking as Weaver. He went about his business in a different way and got winning results. “It’s like when my wife gets loud in an argument. I tell her. ‘Just because you’re loud, it doesn’t mean you’re right.’”22

Although the aging Orioles were a respectable 85-77 in 1984, Detroit began the season on a torrid pace. Through the first two months, the Tigers were 37-9. Only Toronto had a chance to catch Detroit, but they eventually faded, joining the rest of the division.

The following year, Orioles owner Edward Bennett Williams was itching to have Weaver return to the dugout. Weaver, who was in need of some cash flow, also was wanting to get back into the Orioles fold. On June 13, 1985, Altobelli was fired when the O’s got off to a 29-26 record. Baltimore Sun columnist Bob Maisel wrote, “For one thing, the whole organization is starting to resemble a Maryland division of the Yankees. Sign some free agents (Fred Lynn, Lee Lacy) for a lot of money, and if you don’t win right away, fire the manager and bring back Billy (Martin). Or in this case, Earl. Next year you start over with another manager, and if things don’t go well, bring Billy-Earl back again.”23   

Altobelli spent the next two years in the Yankees organization, first as a bench coach for Lou Piniella in 1986. In 1987 he took over as the organization’s minor-league director. From 1988-1991, Altobelli served as the hitting coach for the Chicago Cubs, first for Don Zimmer and then Jim Essian. After Zimmer was fired, Altobelli managed one last time on May 21, 1991, before Essian took over. The Cubs lost to the Mets, 8-6, with Altobelli getting ejected in the fifth inning.

After the 1991 season, Altobelli returned to Rochester, like he did every year. His career record as a major-league manager was 437-407 for a .518 winning percentage.

Altobelli served as the Red Wings’ general manager from 1992-1995. Then he moved into an advisory capacity under his replacement, Dan Mason. Altobelli made his own transition to the broadcasting booth, calling games from 1998 to 2008.

Altobelli always came back to Rochester. To him, it was his home. To the Red Wings fan base, Altobelli was “Mr. Baseball.” “He [Bob Lurie] couldn’t understand why I wanted to live in Rochester,” said Altobelli. “But I never felt comfortable in San Francisco. It was a cold place in more ways than one. It never felt like home. It gets cold here in the winter, but I always feel warm. I was in uniform in pro ball 41 years, and Rochester is the one place I always felt that my family and I belonged. I’d never been to a place I’ve enjoyed so much.”24    

The movie “Bull Durham” – the story of an over-the-hill player trying to get to the major leagues while mentoring a younger player – was released in 1988. According to the writer/director, former Orioles farmhand Ron Shelton, the part of Crash Davis, played by Kevin Costner, was created in part because of Altobelli. “The idea of a cynical career player (Costner) who is forced to become a mentor of the wild, young up-and-comer (Tim Robbins) was based on some stories Joe Altobelli told me.

“It seems when Joe was 36 and already had his cup of coffee (his chance for the major league career) he was told by his manager to room with a kid named Steve Dalkowski, who was just signed.”25   

Altobelli was honored for his service to the Red Wings. In 2008, he was inducted into the International League Hall of Fame. In 2010, a statue of him was erected outside of Frontier Field, Rochester’s home ballpark.

In November 2017, Altobelli suffered a stroke and went to live in a rehabilitation facility. He passed away on March 3, 2021. He was preceded in death on November 6, 2003, by Patsy, his wife of 52 years. Altobelli was survived by his six children, 20 grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren.

“Joe, with his easygoing leadership style was very helpful to that team (1983 Orioles),” said Cal Ripken Jr. “There wasn’t any angst, any pressure. He was a calm, confident leader, and one who knew the ups and downs of the season and pushed through them without overreacting or underreacting.”26    

Acknowledgments

The biography was reviewed by Malcolm Allen and Rory Costello and fact-checked by Dan Schoenholz.

Photo credit: Joe Altobelli, Trading Card Database.

Sources

In addition to sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted www.baseball-reference.com

Notes

1 1940 United States Census, ancestry.com, accessed November 1, 2024

2 H.H. Barcus, “Southpaw Tosses No-Hit Game,” Detroit News, May 14, 1949: 1f.

3 George Puscas, “Eastern Ace Fans 20, But Barely Gets 2-2 Deadlock,” Detroit Free Press, May 6, 1950: 17. 

4 H. H. Barcus, “Pitching Alone Keeps Eastern High in Metro League Race,” Detroit News, May 17, 1950: 65.

5 Baltimore Orioles news release, Joseph Salvatore Altobelli, November 1982. Retrieved from the players Hall of Fame Clip File, October 20, 2024.   

6 Mark Sommer, Rocky Colavito: Cleveland’s Iconic Slugger, Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland (2019), 35.

7 Gordon Cobbledick, “Plain Dealing,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 22, 1954: 25.

8 Harry Jones, “Batting Around,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 2, 1955: 26.

9 Al C. Weber, “Second Division to Int Title In 15 Days – Red Wing Record,” The Sporting News, October 10, 1964: 45.

10 George Beahon, “‘Kid’ Skipper Named Joe,” Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, September 14, 1967: D1.

11 Al Weber, “Orioles’ Hands-Off Policy Helped Wings’ Title Drive,” The Sporting News, September 18, 1971: 35. 

12 “Hutto Shares Praise in Red Wing Clincher,” The Sporting News, September 21, 1974: 34.

13 Bob Stevens, “Giant Surprise – Altobelli Manager,” San Francisco Chronicle, October 8, 1976: 51.

14 “Altobelli says ’78 success an organizational matter,” San Francisco Examiner, October 25, 1978: 49.

15 John Curtis, “Joe Altobelli was a teacher when the Giants didn’t need one, “San Francisco Examiner, December 30, 1979: C7.

16 Nick Peters, “Lavelle a Bit Touchy Over Critics’ Barbs,” The Sporting News, November 17, 1979: 60.

17 Alan Goldstein, “Altobelli paid his dues in bushes and in ‘Frisco,” Baltimore Sun, October 18, 1983: C5.

18 Kent Baker, “Altobelli takes over as Orioles manager,” Baltimore Sun, November 13, 1982: 13.

19 Happy Fine, “Mike Boddicker: He Paid His Dues in Rochester,” Baseball Digest, December 1984: 31.

20 Fine, “Mike Boddicker.”

21 Peter Gammons, “Punishment Should Fit the Crime,” The Sporting News, November 7, 1983: 42.

22 Tony Paul, “Joe Altobelli, Detroit prep star who managed Baltimore to 1983 World Series, Title, dies at 88,” Detroit News, March 4, 2021:  Joe Altobelli, Detroit prep star who managed Orioles, dies at 88 (detroitnews.com)  Accessed November 24, 2024.

23 Bob Maisel. “Altobelli firing lacked usual Oriole class,” Baltimore Sun, June 14, 1985: 13C.

24 Sal Malorana, “Joe Altobelli loved Rochester, and we loved him back,” Democrat and Chronicle, March 4, 2021: 9A.

25 Jack Garner, “Red Wings’ Altobelli Inspired ‘Bull Durham’,” Democrat and Chronicle, March 26, 1992: 1A.

26 Justin Murphy and Sean Lahman, “Rochester sports icon ‘Mr. Baseball’ dies at 88,” Democrat and Chronicle, March 4, 2021: 6A.

Born in Bridgewater, South Dakota, on February 22, 1934, to LeRoy and Shirley Anderson, George relocated with his family in 1942 to Southern California, where his father and grandparents found wartime work in the shipyards. LeRoy played some semipro baseball and passed his love of the game on his son. Young George became a batboy for the University of Southern California’s Trojans baseball team, coached by Raoul “Rod” Dedeaux, an early influence in Anderson’s baseball life.

During his childhood Anderson played a lot of sandlot ball. In 1951 his American Legion team won a national championship at Briggs Stadium in Detroit (later renamed Tiger Stadium), the place where Anderson later managed the Tigers. His Dorsey High School team won 42 consecutive games, and Anderson was named an all-city player in his junior and senior years. Despite passing up a school closer to home and having to take two buses to get to Dorsey, Anderson chose it for its baseball program.

While still in high school, Anderson worked a summer job loading lumber on boxcars. In the evenings he played with a semipro team. He graduated from Dorsey High in 1953 and Dedeaux offered him a partial baseball scholarship to USC. Anderson never went to college, though, because a Brooklyn Dodgers scout he had met years earlier on the sandlots, Lefty Phillips, offered him $250 a month to play for the Dodgers’ Santa Barbara team in the Class C California League. Anderson’s parents knew and trusted Lefty, who by the time Anderson graduated from high school had moved up from sandlot scouting to scouting for the Dodgers. Anderson called Lefty “the sharpest baseball man I ever met.”

Phillips knew Anderson’s limitations and told him that to make it in baseball he would have to work very hard. Anderson was only 5-feet-9 and weighed just 170 pounds, but his determination and will to win gave him an edge. Anderson’s boyhood friend Billy Consolo signed his first major-league contract that same year, with the Boston Red Sox. Consolo was one of baseball’s bonus babies, with the rule at the time requiring the team providing the bonus to keep him on its major-league roster for two seasons. Anderson’s signing gave him a steady income, even if it wasn’t as a bonus baby, and he bought an engagement ring for his childhood sweetheart, Carol Valle. The two had known each other since the fifth grade and began dating in high school. They married in October 1953, at the end of Anderson’s first minor-league season as shortstop for the Santa Barbara Dodgers. He played in 141 games and hit for a .263 average.

The playing manager at Santa Barbara was George Scherger, a man Anderson would later invite to coach for him in Cincinnati. Anderson described Scherger as a man who wanted to win badly. Whenever the team lost, there would be extra practice the next day. This drive influenced Anderson, who adopted it when he became a manager himself.

Anderson moved around in the Brooklyn minor-league system, playing in Pueblo, Colorado, Fort Worth, Los Angeles in the Pacific Coast League, and Montreal in the International League. In Pueblo he hit .296 in 1954. In 1955 he moved up to Double A with the Texas League’s Fort Worth Cats. Tommy Holmes was the manager. (The team produced several future big-league managers. Anderson; Dick Williams, who was Anderson’s opposing manager in the 1972 and 1984 World Series, managed in the majors for 21 seasons, and joined Anderson in the Hall of Fame in 2008; Danny Ozark, who managed the Philadelphia Phillies and San Francisco Giants; Norm Sherry, who managed the California Angels and coached on several major-league teams; and Maury Wills, who managed two years in Seattle.)

Anderson received his nickname in Fort Worth. A radio announcer dubbed him Sparky because of his feistiness. It was a trait that sometimes got him into trouble. He wanted to win so badly that he could not tolerate anything that got in the way.

In 1958 the Dodgers put Anderson on their 40-man roster. He later remembered, “I had no right to think I could break in with a club that had [Gil] Hodges, [Charlie] Neal, Don Zimmer, Junior Gilliam, Dick Gray, [Carl] Furillo, Duke Snider, Gino Cimoli, Norm Larker, and Johnny Roseboro — and with a pitching staff built around Sandy Koufax, Don Drysdale, and Johnny Podres. I simply didn’t belong in that kind of company.” Sparky was sent back down to Montreal. Dodgers Manager Walter Alston broke the news of his demotion to him at a time when most managers left this duty to the traveling secretary. This impressed Sparky, who as a manager followed that example. He was told that the Philadelphia Phillies had expressed an interest in him, and since they had an International League farm team in Miami, they would be able to get a look at him.

Sparky played reasonably well in Montreal, batting .269 and stealing 21 bases for the Royals. He even hit two home runs. (“That’s what’s so good about not hitting many. You remember them all,” he said.) He was named the club’s most valuable player and finished second in the running for the league MVP. He did indeed catch the eye of the Phillies, who traded for him and made him their starting second baseman.

Sparky’s first day in the big leagues came on Opening Day of 1959 against Cincinnati at Philadelphia’s Connie Mack Stadium. In the eighth inning, he singled home what became the winning run in a 2-1 game. He received his first media barrage afterward. In his autobiography The Main Spark, he wrote that there was no more media attention for him until August that year. He played in 152 games, but batted only .218 and drove in only 34 runs. It was to be the only year he played in the big leagues.

That year he noticed a difference in the routine compared with the Dodgers’ big-league spring camp. The Dodgers operated on a set schedule, discipline that Sparky would come to value. In Philadelphia no one kept track of when players rolled in for practice, and often there would be no coaches around, according to Sparky’s account. The Phillies that year were a last-place team, as they had been the year before. Sparky said he would never forget the thunderous boos the hometown crowd greeted the Phillies with as they took the field on Opening Day. There was definitely not an attitude of winning in Philadelphia, and Sparky had been raised in an organization with the opposite outlook.

Sparky later said, “I realized you can’t be in a game as a professional unless winning and losing are everything, your whole life.”

During 1960s spring training, when he didn’t make it into many games, Sparky knew he would not stay with the team. He had hoped he would be traded to another major-league team, but instead was sold to Toronto. With one child and another on the way, Sparky was about to quit. Toronto’s owner, Jack Kent Cooke, offered him $10,000 to play, $2,000 more than he had made in Philadelphia. Because he had bills to pay, he accepted. Cooke told him he planned to sell him to a major-league club, but Sparky did not believe it would happen. He called the 1960 season a turning point in his career. He decided to start observing baseball strategies with the idea of one day becoming a manager. After four more years in the minors, all with the Maple Leafs, he landed his first managerial job, in Toronto in 1964. He uttered what would be the beginning of many boasts that he would later regret by saying, “If I can’t win with this club, I ought to be fired.”

Anderson’s temper made him a prophet. He was fired at the end of the season and soon realized that jobs for managers who could not control their emotions during the games were few. By his own admission, he was lucky to get his next job, with the St. Louis Cardinals’ farm club in Rock Hill, South Carolina, in 1965 because the Cardinals were desperate to find a manager just before spring training. Bob Howsam was the Cardinals’ general manager; the association proved to be advantageous a few years later. In 1968, when Howsam was the GM of the Cincinnati Reds, Sparky was hired to manage the Reds’ minor-league club in Asheville, North Carolina.

Anderson could not make ends meet during his minor-league managing career, so he took various odd jobs, including a factory job, a stocking job at Sears, and some offseason gigs selling used cars.

Then, after five years as a minor-league manager, Anderson landed a major-league coaching job with the San Diego Padres in 1969. At the end of the season, he resigned to accept a job coaching with the California Angels under his old mentor Lefty Phillips. But he never took that job.

While the ink was still drying on Anderson’s contact with the Angels, California general manager Dick Walsh received a phone call from Bob Howsam, the Reds’ GM, requesting permission to speak with Sparky about managing in Cincinnati. It was Walsh who broke the news to Sparky.

Sparky’s hiring prompted Cincinnati newspapers to declare: “Sparky Who?” He was only 35 years old and unknown to the public.

One of Anderson’s first moves as Reds manager was to make Pete Rose the team’s captain. Because Willie Mays was so well received in San Francisco as the Giants’ captain, Anderson thought Rose could serve the same role in Cincinnati. Rose was very popular, a hometown boy, and the top player on the team. With Rose delivering the lineup to the umpire before the game, perhaps people would not focus on “Sparky Who?”

Anderson inherited a talented team and remarked to his coach, George Scherger, that it would win the division by 10 games. These types of statements were often seen as exaggerations, and Sparky himself admitted that he was overconfident, but the fact remained that the 1970 Reds were an excellent team. Catcher Johnny Bench was on the verge of a breakout career season. Tommy Helms, Lee May, Tony Perez, Bernie Carbo, and Bobby Tolan joined Rose on that team. The Reds had finished in third place in 1969, winning 89 games, and they were primed to be winners. The 1970 team brought in rookie shortstop Dave Concepcion and pitchers Don Gullett and Pedro Borbon. In July of that year the team moved from aging Crosley Field into the new Riverfront Stadium and began to play on artificial turf.

The Reds won 102 games in Anderson’s major-league managerial debut season, a record that gave them the National League West Division championship over the Los Angeles Dodgers by 14½ games. The Reds swept the Pittsburgh Pirates in the best-of-five National League Championship Series to take the pennant and meet the Baltimore Orioles in the World Series. The Reds fell to the Orioles in five games, but it was a stunning first year for Anderson.

Anderson brought his work ethic with him to Cincinnati, and some players called his spring training a “slave camp.” GM Howsam insisted on a clean-cut look for the team: no facial hair, no long hair, and suit jackets for traveling, which Anderson supported and enforced. He believed that mannerisms and dress carried over into a kind of self-discipline that helped his players work together as a team.

But probably more central to Sparky’s success as a manager was the way he cared about his players. He allowed them to question him, and even encouraged it. He said, “I know there are managers who would never allow themselves to be put on this level with their own ballplayers, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s a form of communication.”

The following season was not a good one; the Reds finished below .500 and in fifth place. The following offseason brought the “Big Deal.” The Reds traded Lee May, Tommy Helms, and utility man Jimmy Stewart to the Houston Astros for Joe Morgan, Denis Menke, Jack Billingham, Cesar Geronimo, and Ed Armbrister. Cincinnati made the trade to gain speed at first and third base, essential for playing on Astroturf.

Besides being known as Sparky, Anderson was called Captain Hook because he never hesitated to pull a pitcher out of the game. The Big Red Machine was not blessed with superior starting pitching, and in an age when complete games were still common, Anderson’s tendency to replace pitchers during a game drew notice. He said, however, that he could always sense when a pitcher was just about to lose his effectiveness. His players realized that while he cared for players as individuals, he would not cater to one man. Second baseman Joe Morgan said, “In his passion for winning, he will not ever put the feelings of any individual above the team.”

The Reds returned as pennant winners in 1972 and faced the Pirates again. This time the NLCS went five games with the Reds coming out on top. The finish was so exciting that before the World Series against the Oakland A’s, Anderson made a statement he later regretted. He told the press that the two best teams in baseball had already played a series (Cincinnati and Pittsburgh) and that the World Series would be anticlimactic. Although he said what he really thought, the statement fired up the Oakland team. After the Reds lost the first two games, Anderson realized how much he had underestimated his opponents. The Reds lost to Oakland in seven games, but the Big Red Machine was building momentum.

In 1973 the Reds again won their division, but lost to the New York Mets in the League Championship Series, three games to two. In 1974, the Reds finished second behind the Los Angeles Dodgers, despite winning 98 games.

The Reds teams of 1975 and ’76 secured the label of dynasty and have been considered two of the best of all time. In 1975 they took first place early in June and never relinquished it. Pitcher Don Gullett was on his way to a remarkable season when he fractured his thumb. Without their star pitcher, the rest of the staff had to pick up the slack. Because the Reds’ bullpen was strong, the Captain Hook strategy was key. And with hitters like Morgan, Rose, George Foster, and Ken Griffey Sr. batting over .300 and Bench and Perez driving in more than 100 runs, the Big Red Machine usually outscored their opponents anyway. The Reds finished the season 20 games ahead of the second-place Dodgers with 108 wins, and swept Pittsburgh in the NLCS.

The 1975 World Series has gone down as one of the greatest ever. As the Series opened, Sparky began feeling the pressure. He was more cautious this time about feeling overconfident. The Boston Red Sox were the American League champs after sweeping the Oakland A’s in the ALCS. The opening game was an eye-opener for the Big Red Machine when they faced the pitching mastery of Luis Tiant and lost 6-0. After winning the next game in a tight match, the Reds won Game Three in extra innings. Tiant pitched the Red Sox to another victory in Game Four, but the Reds came back to win Game Five. When the Series returned to Boston, rain delayed play for 72 hours. Game Six, however, proved to be worth waiting for — the game that many, including Sparky himself, say was the single best game in World Series history.

Captain Hook pulled pitcher Gary Nolan after two innings, trailing 3-0. The Reds got to Tiant this time and evened the score in the fifth. By the eighth inning, leading 6-3, the Reds were thinking the championship was in the bag. After Pedro Borbon put two runners on, he got the hook and was replaced by Rawly Eastwick, who got two batters out. Then Bernie Carbo, a former Red, came in to pinch-hit. Carbo had already had a pinch homer in the Series, and Sparky didn’t figure he had another in him. But on a 2-2 count, Carbo drove the ball over the center-field wall to tie the game. After the Reds were retired in order in the ninth, the Red Sox loaded the bases with nobody out — but were unable to score. In the 10th inning, Red Sox outfielder Dwight Evans made a spectacular catch on a line drive by Morgan, robbing him of a possible home run and then doubling up Griffey off first base. The Reds threatened in the 12th, but didn’t score. In the bottom of the 12th, Pat Darcy, the Reds’ eighth pitcher in the game, came in to face catcher Carlton Fisk, who hit a high fly ball to deep left field. As Fisk ran to first base, he — and everyone else in the park — wondered if the ball would stay fair. Fisk jumped up and down waving his arms toward fair territory in what has become an iconic image. It was a homer, barely, hitting the foul pole. The Red Sox won, sending the Series to a deciding Game Seven. Sparky later said, “How can a manager of a losing team call it the greatest game ever played? Well, winning or losing, a man can’t lie to himself.”

Game Seven was a come-from-behind affair with the Reds finally coming out on top, 4-3, and winning their first world championship under Anderson. Sparky was unprepared for the media blitz that continued to follow him into the next season and the expectation of winning another championship, but he soon learned to make the media his friend and to encourage his players to do so also. Pete Rose said, “He didn’t make an enemy out of the press. He used it. And he taught us how to use it.” Later, Lance Parrish echoed this sentiment in Detroit: “Sparky let us know it wasn’t fair to treat the media any differently that we would treat anyone else. They had a job to do.”

Pete Rose and Joe Morgan led the league in several offensive categories in 1976, and while the Reds had no big winning pitchers, they did have seven pitchers who won at least 11 games each. After their 102-win regular season, the Reds did not lose a postseason game, sweeping the Philadelphia Phillies and then the New York Yankees in the World Series.

During that World Series, a reporter asked Anderson to compare his catcher to Yankees backstop Thurman Munson. Sparky said, “Don’t ever embarrass nobody by comparing him to Johnny Bench.” Sparky meant it as a general statement. When he returned home to California, he wrote Munson a letter of apology.

In 1977 the Reds finished second behind the Dodgers, and although 1978 was a better year, they finished second again. The Big Red Machine was being dismantled. Bob Howsam retired after the season. Winning was expected in Cincinnati, and Anderson was fired late that year. He was upset about how it happened. The Reds had just finished a tour in Japan, and management did not want to fire Sparky before that had been completed. But it was late, and most major-league clubs had already chosen their managers for the coming season. The firing was unpopular with the fans in Cincinnati and with the players. Joe Morgan said, “Sparky’s firing was wrong and to this day, I don’t understand it.” It was a blow that Sparky didn’t see coming.

Anderson was about to sign a long-term contract to manage the Chicago Cubs in 1979 when Detroit Tigers general manager Jim Campbell got wind of the deal. He contacted Sparky, who realized that the team was filled with young players. Anderson had enjoyed mentoring young players in his minor-league days.

At the press conference announcing his hiring, Anderson made another of his infamous predictions, saying the team would win a world championship in five years.

With talent like Alan Trammell, Lou Whitaker, Kirk Gibson, Lance Parrish, Jack Morris, and Dan Petry, Sparky was confident. He also realized that discipline and conduct as a professional would have to be taught. Kirk Gibson later said, “He wanted me to learn the game of baseball and learn how to treat people right. It took four to five years to get through to me.”

As he did in Cincinnati, Anderson kept an open-door policy. Players were encouraged to speak their minds, but Sparky had the final say. He called the team “rougher than a three-day beard.” He started with fundamentals, drilling the players until their skills became routine. He insisted on coats and ties for traveling, saying, “If you carry yourself proudly, you look like a pro.”

In 1981 the Tigers surprised the American League by making an East Division pennant run during the second half of the strike-split season. In 1983 the team began to show its potential by winning 92 games. The next season was magical.

The 1984 Tigers led their division wire to wire, starting off by winning nine straight games, and then going an unbelievable 35-5 to leave their opponents in the dust in what became a 104-win season. What Sparky had in Detroit, which he had never had in Cincinnati, was two superior starting pitchers to lead his rotation, Jack Morris, who pitched a no-hitter in April, and Dan Petry. Reliever Guillermo Hernandez, acquired in a trade in March, was an All-Star while winning the American League Cy Young and Most Valuable Player Awards.

But pitching was not the team’s only strength. Trammell led the team in batting with a .314 average. Parrish was an All-Star that year, won the second of three straight Gold Gloves, and hit 33 home runs.

When the team clinched the division championship, Anderson felt vindicated. He remembered thinking, “No one will ever question me again.” No matter what happened in the postseason, the best team, he said, was the one that had won 104 games in the regular season and wore a big “D” on its uniforms.

The Tigers swept the Kansas City Royals in the AL Championship Series. Sparky took a team to the World Series for the fifth time in his career, this time against a National League club, the San Diego Padres. The first game was close, with Detroit winning, 3-2. After the game, Lou Whitaker complimented his manager: “When Sparky came to us from Cincinnati, he brought us back to fundamentals. We had a lot to learn and it’s paying off.” The Tigers lost Game Two, but that was the only game they would lose, and they became world champions before the hometown crowd.

After the Series, Sparky’s wife wanted him to quit. He thought about it. It had been a tough year. He was proud of the team and happy for the city of Detroit, but for five years he had struggled with trying to prove Cincinnati wrong for firing him, and with the success of Detroit that year, the pressure he put on himself became almost unbearable. He had to get back to the business of baseball and to enjoying the game again. He couldn’t do that if he quit.

There would be no back-to-back championships for Anderson in Detroit. In 1985 and again in 1986 the team finished third. The 1987 Tigers were not expected to do much better and early in May were in last place. Anderson chose that time to make another prediction, saying his team would be in the race by the end of the season. The Tigers started putting together some win streaks. Before a season-ending series in Detroit against the Toronto Blue Jays, the Tigers were one game behind Toronto. Detroit finished with a flourish, winning three straight one-run games to clinch the AL East title, although the Tigers lost to Minnesota in five games in a best-of-seven ALCS.

The team that year had no outstanding talent save for Alan Trammell, who finished second in the voting for Most Valuable Player. Anderson said, “We had no business running with the big boys. It was pure determination.” Pitcher Jack Morris said, “In 1984, we probably had the best club I ever played on in Detroit. In ’87 we were less talented but typical overachievers. We didn’t realize we weren’t that good.”

Sparky’s efforts with the team that year won him the American League Manager of the Year award. He said, “When I look back on that year, I still feel a high. The guys on that team can be proud of themselves for the rest of their lives.”

In 1988 the team finished second behind the Red Sox, but 1989 saw the Tigers lose 103 games. For a man who wanted to win more than anything else, it was a horrible year. Anderson was also experiencing personal problems as his daughter was undergoing a painful divorce in California and he felt guilty about his own absence from the family.

Anderson, who believed that because baseball had blessed him he had a responsibility to give back to the community, was always participating in charity events. In May of that year he attended an event at Children’s Hospital and afterward grew so fatigued that Tigers president Jim Campbell sent him home to California to rest. When Sparky left Detroit, he believed he wouldn’t manage again. He blamed himself for Detroit’s terrible year, but with the team he had and the injuries they suffered, even Sparky Anderson could not coax a winner. He was finally able to give up his obsession for winning after spending 17 days away from the team. He said, “My greatest gift today is knowing I have a tomorrow.”

Anderson continued to manage mediocre teams in Detroit through 1995. That season, during spring training, he drew a lot of attention for refusing to manage replacement players during a player strike. But he said later that that was not the whole story. He knew that management would never open the season with replacement players; it was a ruse. “I managed 25 years at that time in the major leagues, and I was no joke. I wasn’t going to be part of a joke. That was the biggest travesty I have ever seen in my career.”

Sparky was granted a leave of absence and returned to manage that year when, as he predicted, the strike was settled and replacement players were dismissed. While rumor said he was forced out of the game, Anderson had been considering retiring for some time. He left as one of baseball’s winningest managers, fifth all-time as of 2010. He was the first manager to win the World Series in both leagues. In 1984 and 1987 he won the American League Manager of the Year award. He was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2000.

Anderson’s return visits to Detroit were not all that frequent in retirement. He stayed away from the final game at Tiger Stadium in 1999. But he turned up in uniform at the Tigers’ spring training home in Lakeland in 2003 to give support to new Detroit manager Alan Trammell, one of his protégés. Sparky also showed up at the 25th anniversary gathering of the 1984 Tigers championship team in Comerica Park in Detroit. Tigers teammates noted Anderson looked frail.

After the 2010 World Series had ended, Anderson’s family said that Sparky was in hospice care as he was suffering from the effects of dementia. On November 4, two days after the family’s announcement, Anderson died at age 76.

An earlier version of this biography appeared in “Detroit Tigers 1984: What A Start! What A Finish!” (SABR, 2012), edited by Mark Pattison and David Raglin and SABR’s “The Great Eight: The 1975 Cincinnati Reds” (University of Nebraska Press, 2014), edited by Mark Armour.

Sources

Anderson, Sparky, with Dan Ewald. They Call Me Sparky. Sleeping Bear Press. 1998.

Anderson, Sparky. Bless You Boys: Diary of the Detroit Tigers’ 1984 Season. Contemporary Books. 1984.

Anderson, Sparky, and Si Burick. The Main Spark: Sparky Anderson and the Cincinnati Reds. Doubleday & Company, Inc. 1978.

Pattison, Mark. “Excerpts From CNS Newsmaker Interview with Sparky Anderson” Catholic News Service, August 29, 1996.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_Detroit_Tigers_season

Yuhasz, Dennis. “Sparky Anderson Biography,” http://baseball-almanac.com.

The most improbable and quite possibly the least appreciated success story has been Anderson’s tenure as coach of the Gophers since 1982. While the winning Gopher baseball tradition was started by Siebert and to some extent McCormick (the first two Minnesota Big Ten titles in baseball were won under McCormick in 1933 and 1935), Anderson deserves accolades for continuing the excellence in Gopher baseball for another generation in the face of increased obstacles and competition.

John Robert Anderson was born on May 16, 1955, in Hibbing, Minnesota, on the Mesabi Iron Range, an area known more for its hockey tradition and as the boyhood home of Hall-of-Fame basketball star Kevin McHale and troubadour Bob Dylan, than it is for any baseball tradition. Anderson grew up in a typical Iron Range family in the nearby communities of Nashwauk and Keewatin with his parents, LeRoy Arthur and Mary Ann (Devich) Anderson; an older brother, Michael; and two sisters, Barbara and Cynthia. His father worked for the M. A. Hanna Mining Company for 35 years, and his mother ran the household. Like many American boys John dreamed of a career in major-league baseball.

As a youngster, Anderson may not have known how long his odds were on making it to the major leagues. Outside of several individuals born in Duluth and the surrounding area, Roger Maris, born in Hibbing, is the only major-league baseball player born in northeast Minnesota.¹ The Maras family (Roger did not change the spelling of his last name until after he was in professional baseball) moved to North Dakota when Roger was young, and that state proudly claims the 1960 and 1961 American League Most Valuable Player (MVP) as its native son. Because of the late and often cold and snowy springs and short summers, few major-league scouts venture to northeast Minnesota, and few players have a chance to develop. A player might have a better chance of a major-league career if he was born in Guam than in northeastern Minnesota.  

Nonetheless, growing up on the Iron Range in the 1950s and 1960s was much like anywhere else in the United States in that sports were a big part of a boy’s life. Sports were played for the fun of it at first and for school and community pride as one grew older. Being on the high-school varsity was a realistic and obtainable goal that most could achieve. While many did go on to college, that was years in the future, and few gave any thought of a professional career in any sport. That meant sports were played in season: football in the fall, basketball or hockey in the winter, and baseball in the spring. 

John Anderson was a typical small-town athlete who played football, basketball, and baseball in high school and played a little hockey while growing up. In the fall of 1972, during Anderson’s senior year, the Nashwauk-Keewatin Spartans football team won four games, lost two, and tied one in the Arrowhead Conference. The highlights of the season were a 68-19 pasting of Buhl and shutout wins over Deer River and Babbitt. The lowlight was a 42-0 thrashing by the Mountain Iron Red Raiders, the eventual Class B state champions. The 5-foot-11, 180-pound Anderson was named to the All-Arrowhead Conference team as a defensive lineman.

Nashwauk-Keewatin’s 1972-1973 basketball season was fairly successful as the Spartans went 13-6 in the regular season. While not a starter, Anderson saw considerable playing time. He scored eight points in a District 28 tournament game against Hill City and five points a few days later in a win against Deer River. Anderson’s season was interrupted when he was suspended from the basketball team for a time for being spotted at the neighborhood ice rink. A rink rat at heart, Anderson loved hockey more than any other sport at the time and longed to play. Unfortunately, Nashwauk-Keewatin was too small a school to field a hockey team that could compete in the tough Iron Range Conference or against other Region Seven foes, and he had to concentrate on basketball in the winter months. Nashwauk-Keewatin’s season ended with a 15-7 won-lost record when Coach Bob McDonald’s undefeated (and eventual Class A state champions) Chisholm Bluestreaks clobbered them 58-34 in the District 28 title game. Anderson contributed three points in the loss. 

The highlight of Anderson’s high-school sports career came in the spring of his senior year when he threw a no-hitter against Greenway High School of Coleraine at Nashwauk on May 3, 1973. A home run by Dave Bevacqua was the only run in a 1-0 win for the Spartans. But the story of the day was Anderson’s pitching. Two runners reached base for Greenway on a walk and a hit batter, and Anderson struck out four batters in the seven-inning contest. Anderson recalled that the greatest satisfaction from his no-hitter was the bragging rights he gained that day. Many of his summer baseball friends and teammates wore the Greenway uniform. Nashwauk-Keewatin carried a 4-3 district record into the District 28 tournament but could not advance beyond the first round, falling to Deer River 5-2. Anderson gave up seven hits in the loss. Anderson’s senior class, numbering 91 students, had its commencement exercises soon after.

Anderson began his college career in the autumn of 1973 at nearby Hibbing State Junior College (now Hibbing Community College). He played football for the Cardinals that fall and, despite not having played any high-school hockey, made the hockey team as a defenseman. Much like a center in football, contributions from a defenseman in hockey can often be overlooked. Anderson was never mentioned in game accounts until the Cardinals had won the Minnesota State Junior College hockey tournament and advanced to the national tournament. Only then did Anderson appear in the team photograph and receive mention in an article on the team on the eve of the national tournament held in mid-March 1974 in Thief River Falls, Minnesota. Hibbing advanced to the final game but lost to a junior college from Canton, New York.

In the spring Anderson had no trouble making the baseball team, the first baseball team in the 75-year history of the school. The Cardinals won only a few games in their 18-game schedule, with Anderson accounting for a couple of the wins and several of the losses in a very unspectacular season.² Nonetheless, Anderson must have been encouraged enough to give Dick Siebert a call at the University of Minnesota. While receiving only an offer of a tryout with scores of others for the Gophers varsity, Anderson decided to transfer to the University of Minnesota for his sophomore year. Anderson realized then and there he had no future in hockey and decided to follow his true love of baseball and join several high-school teammates at Minnesota. Had Anderson picked any other school in the Upper Midwest, he would have had a much better chance to make the baseball team. His future and the history of the University of Minnesota baseball program would undoubtedly have been different.

Anderson’s hopes of making the Gophers’ varsity during tryouts in the fall of 1974 ended rather quickly. He was not among those asked back to continue workouts throughout the winter. The 1974 team had finished 25-13 and 11-5 in the Big Ten (tied for first), and Siebert felt his pitching staff was in fine shape with Ken Herbst, Steve Comer, Perry Bauer, Tom Wolcyn, and Dan Morgan slated for heavy workloads. Siebert said, “We had some pretty good arms and just didn’t have room for him. But you could see he wanted to pitch very badly.” Anderson didn’t give up his dream easily and immediately went to ask Siebert if there was any hope of another chance next year. He said he would do anything to be involved with Gophers baseball. Siebert’s answer was to offer Anderson a job as student manager, the lowest rung on the team totem pole. Anderson would have to become the team’s “gofer” if he was to retain any chance of ever becoming a Golden Gopher. Siebert explained that Anderson would have a chance to work out regularly under supervision and coaching, and that was his only chance to improve enough to make the team in future years. 

Anderson quickly accepted and was the first to arrive for the 2 p.m. practices and the last to leave after 6 p.m. Anderson became a batting-practice pitcher, batting-practice catcher, fungo hitter, and traveling secretary. On road trips he checked players on and off the team bus to make sure no one was left behind, left wakeup calls, distributed meal money, handled the equipment, and coached first base. “He’s been invaluable to us,” Siebert said in appraising Anderson’s performance. “His enthusiasm is tremendous and he’s learning a lot of baseball. And I’ve got complete confidence in him when he’s coaching first base.”

Anderson’s enthusiasm may have gone a bit too far during the Gophers’ road trip to Texas in the spring of 1975. While coaching first base, with a wad of tobacco in his mouth, he clapped loudly and shouted encouragement to the Minnesota batters. On several occasions Anderson stared at the opposing pitcher and shouted various baseball clichés as “Stick it in his ear,” “Knock the pitcher’s kneecap off,” and “You’re brutal, bush, you’re brutal.” George Thomas, the Gophers’ assistant coach, had to take Anderson aside and tell him to tone it down a little. Anderson replied, “That’s the way we always did it in Keewatin. We’d try and bother the other pitcher, do anything we could to distract him.” 

As for pitching, Anderson still had hopes. Quoted in a Minnesota Daily article by Charley Walters, Anderson said, “I think the thing I need most is a better motion. I have a tendency to throw too much with my arm and not enough with my body. A better motion will improve my fastball, and if that gets a little quicker, I know I’ll be able to pitch here. I just know I will.” Lindsay Hoyer, a catcher and Gophers co-captain agreed, saying, “He’s big and strong and his ball moves well. And most important, he throws strikes. We’re going to be losing a lot of players this year through graduation, and I have to consider John a prospect. He works too hard not to be.”

Unfortunately, Anderson never progressed much further as a pitcher. Minor arm and back injuries and intense competition kept his pitching career from advancing. He got into one game during the spring trip in 1975 and pitched one mop-up inning, giving up a few hits and a run. He remained involved with the 1976 and 1977 teams as their student manager. The 1976 team recorded a 38-11 record and advanced to the Rocky Mountain Regional at Tempe, Arizona, before being knocked out by Arizona State. The 1977 team dedicated itself to working as a team, not for individual statistics, and did a bit better, recording a 39-12 record. Finishing first in the Big Ten, the Gophers hosted the Mideast Regional and beat Florida and Central Michigan to advance to the College World Series in Omaha. Led by All-American shortstop Paul Molitor and second team All-American pitcher Dan Morgan, the Gophers jumped from number 15 to number 2 in the final college baseball poll on the eve of the College World Series. The high hopes of a fourth College World Series title for Dick Siebert (the others were in 1956, 1960, and 1964) were dashed when the Gophers fell to the pesky Diablos of California State, Los Angeles, beat Baylor by a run, and lost to Arizona State to finish sixth in the eight-team field.

Prior to the College World Series the team voted for its Most Valuable Player (MVP). Anderson recalls that the vote was taken on the bus on the way back from Iowa after the last game of the Big Ten schedule. Siebert had Anderson pass out and collect the ballots, and Anderson went back to his seat, thinking nothing of it, and rejoined his card game. A few moments later a flabbergasted Dick Siebert bellowed, “You jokers just voted the student manager as your MVP. Quit joking around and vote again.” Stuart Broomer, in his biography on Paul Molitor, claims the first vote was 22 to 1 with one vote for Molitor cast by John Anderson. Someone must have convinced the modest Anderson that since no one was going to change his vote, he might as well vote for himself to make it unanimous on the second ballot. Molitor explained the vote for Anderson to Broomer. “John Anderson embodied what we had in mind that season. He did everything except play. He was a groundskeeper, equipment man, assistant coach, and even a confidante for many of the players. He was very exceptional, so we decided he should get the award.” Anderson remains to this day as the only non-athlete to win a team’s Most Valuable Player Award in any sport at the University of Minnesota and quite possibly at any National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I school.

Of course, Anderson was as amazed as anyone to receive the MVP award. Anderson recalled that Siebert went in to athletic director Paul Giel to see if the MVP vote was legitimate and had Giel say, “Of course, the team can vote for anyone they like.” Anderson remembers a few days later, in the week of practice between the end of the Big Ten season and the start of NCAA regional play, that Siebert and sportswriter Jimmy Byrne of the Minneapolis Star got into a heated exchange about the MVP vote in the dugout. Anderson, who was standing nearby, was relieved to hear his coach defending the vote but nonetheless sheepishly slinked away.

Anderson graduated in the spring of 1977 with a bachelor’s degree in physical education and had every intention of landing a high-school teaching and coaching job. That is, until Anderson received a phone call from Siebert that summer, offering him a job. It was an unpaid job as a graduate assistant coach. Anderson quickly accepted, moved back to the Twin Cities, and survived on about on about $5,000 that year teaching a few classes and working temporary jobs. “My parents thought I was crazy,” Anderson recalled in an interview with Chris Coughlan-Smith in 1999. Anderson had secured a good-paying job with a Mesabi Range mining company, and Anderson’s father, an electrical engineer for the Hanna Mining Company, couldn’t understand his son giving that job up for an uncertain future. After Siebert died in December 1978, George Thomas became the head coach, and John Anderson became one of his part-time assistant coaches. Thomas had a successful three-year run as the Gophers’ baseball coach (95-40 in the 1979/1980/1981 seasons) but decided in 1981 that he would rather go back into the business world than remain as a part-time Gopher baseball coach.

Many expected Gopher athletic director Paul Giel to conduct a high-profile national search and hire a big-name baseball coach. Giel astonished many faithful Gophers fans when he named the 26-year-old Anderson the new Minnesota baseball coach in the summer of 1981. With little college and no professional playing experience and barely older than his players, Anderson was considered an extremely risky choice by many to carry on the Minnesota baseball tradition. Anderson had the backing of George Thomas, though, who said, “I saw in John an ability to get along with players. He was good at the public relations end of it [coaching] and the practice part of it. One time, I just said to myself, ‘Hey, this fella keeps getting better every year.’”

Anderson was well prepared to become a college coach. As he relates in the 1989 Gophers Baseball Media Guide when talking about Siebert, “Aside from my father, there is no other individual who played a more significant role in helping me develop and become a contributing individual as well as learn how to coach the game of baseball. . . . His [Siebert’s] amazing attention to detail, the little things that only those deeply involved in the game recognize, gave me an early indication of what the job entails. You cannot for one moment allow yourself or your players to be distracted or for that matter not be thinking one, two, or three innings ahead.”

Anderson remembered during Siebert’s last year that he wasn’t feeling well one day and stayed home during a home game. He instructed Anderson to keep the detailed scorebook and stop by with it at the Siebert home after the game. Compiling this scorebook while the game was going on was something Siebert had learned to do by watching Connie Mack during his years with the Philadelphia Athletics and helped him immensely in setting the defense and determining offensive moves. A petrified Anderson, hoping Siebert wouldn’t find fault with his scorekeeping, delivered the book to Siebert, who scanned the scorebook for a few moments, then looked up and said, “Fine.” A relieved Anderson knew he had passed his first test. Anderson maintains a similar scorebook to this day, something few college coaches do. Anderson says that Jerry Kindall, the now-retired coach of the University of Arizona Wildcats and a Siebert player and protégé, is the only other coach he knows who maintains a scorebook himself during a game.

Siebert also was a fabulous fungo hitter, and, while never becoming as an adept a fungo hitter as Siebert, Anderson had to take over these duties as Siebert’s health declined. Anderson noticed how efficiently practice was conducted, and infield and outfield routines today are exactly the same as in the Siebert era. A number of times in Siebert’s final year he had Anderson sit next to him in the dugout and tell him what happened on the field. Diabetes by that time had affected Siebert’s vision so severely that he couldn’t follow the ball. Possibly Siebert knew he wasn’t going to be around much longer and wanted to impart as much baseball knowledge to Anderson as he could.

Despite Anderson’s preparation, his first year as coach in 1982 was a challenge. Anderson admitted in a 2008 interview with Minneapolis Star Tribune reporter Michael Rand, “I was scared to death. I questioned whether I was cut out for it. I was haunted a little by the tradition and the history. I didn’t want to be responsible for screwing it up.” Herb Isakson, an assistant coach who also served under Siebert and Thomas, recalled in an interview with Minneapolis Star Tribune writer Nolan Zavoral, “I remember John’s first year. We had a veteran team, and one of them pulled a fire alarm, and there were some curfew violations, and they seemed out of control. We were on a bus trip in Texas, going into Houston. I vividly recall how John got up in the front of his bus and told them . . . not in a raised voice or anything . . . how because of his youth or his being a first-year coach, he didn’t want to give them the idea he would be pushed around.”

The 1982 team, featuring the Steinbach brothers from New Ulm, Tom, Terry, and Tim, and future major-league catcher Greg Olson, started the year with a 3-6-1 record in its spring Texas trip. The Gophers righted themselves with their usual slew of non-conference wins but struggled a bit in the Big Ten, losing six of eight games to Illinois and Iowa. Duane Banks, the Iowa Hawkeyes coach, crossed paths with Anderson after a doubleheader win by Iowa and said, “I’m going to do what Dick Siebert did for me when I was a young coach. I’m going to put my arm around you and tell you everything is going to be fine and that you’re going to be a good coach.” Banks had no idea at the time how right he was. The next weekend the Gophers won three of four at Wisconsin to finish the Big Ten season at 8-8 and barely qualify for the Big Ten postseason tournament at Champaign, Illinois. The Gophers beat Illinois twice on May 22 and Ohio State twice on May 23 to win the Big Ten title. At the Midwest Regional at Murfreesboro, Tennessee, the Gophers beat Oral Roberts University but lost to Oklahoma State and Middle Tennessee State and were eliminated from further NCAA postseason play. Anderson was honored as Big Ten Coach of the Year in his first season as head baseball coach at Minnesota.

But there are frustrations being a college coach. Scholarship and recruiting limitations, constant turnover of players with some leaving early for the professional ranks, and an uneven playing field that favors southern and western schools are just some of the hurdles Anderson has had to overcome. Anderson has countered by stressing the positives of a college education, getting the baseball alumni involved with an annual alumni-varsity game at the Metrodome, reorganizing the Dugout Club for loyal supporters, and establishing a tournament at the Metrodome in early March in which some of the top college teams in the country have competed.

One advantage Anderson has—and he has not been slow to use it—is the value of a college education. In a 1987 interview with Blaise Schweitzer in Minnesota, the University of Minnesota alumni magazine, Anderson said, “There were 20 guys drafted in the Big Ten last year. If one of the guys makes it to the big leagues and plays more than three years, he’ll beat all the percentages and all the odds.” He continued, “We should all have dreams, we should all have goals—but I think you have to sit down and look at reality also.” Anderson tells his players that a college degree is something they can use to find a job if a professional baseball career doesn’t pan out and warns his juniors about the large signing bonuses. Anderson stresses “the extra money will disappear quickly, but a college degree will not.” Anderson realizes that most of his players will never play an inning of baseball after college, and his major job is to prepare his young men for the rest of their lives.

Anderson, in an 1993 interview with Brian Osberg for Minnesota, said, “When you’re recruiting, you look for people who want to come to the ‘U’ and graduate and not just be eligible to play. I’ve been head coach for 12 years and I’ve found that you win with guys who want to be here, want to be disciplined and go to class. You need the same habits on the field as you do in the classroom.” Anderson says recruiting is the most challenging aspect of being a college-baseball coach and that one had better enjoy it if he wants to remain in the game. College baseball teams are allowed only 11.7 scholarships (as opposed to 85 for football; even women’s softball is allowed 13 scholarships), and determining who gets a full scholarship and who gets a partial scholarship or none at all is frustrating. He has to assign values to his players, and filling out his 35-man roster can be a difficult juggling act. Senior scholarship athletes leave, but often juniors are drafted by the major leagues, and he can’t give their scholarships (or portions of their scholarship) to incoming or current players until after that player has signed. Anderson says recruiting is the most important aspect of his job and the one on which he spends the most time. With instructional camps and tournaments held almost year-round, recruiting is a national activity engaged in by every Division I program in the country. The days when Dick Siebert could casually call up a Paul Molitor and say “You’re coming, right?” are long gone.

Anderson discussed his coaching philosophy with Schweitzer. Anderson believes the role of the coach is to take the pressure off the players, make the game fun, and create a relaxed atmosphere in which the players can succeed. Anderson believes in the quiet, behind-the-scenes forms of motivation. Baseball is a game of failure, and how players react to failure (one hopes only temporary failure) is critical. Yelling at players for messing up makes the entire team tense and players begin to see the game more as a job than a game. Anderson adds, “We’re trying to coach both from the neck up and from the neck down. I spend probably 70 percent of my time dealing with the mental makeup of the young men. The important thing in coaching is that you have to be able to identify what motivates a young man.”

Nolan Zavoral, in a 1988 article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune, wrote that while Anderson’s players never question his knowledge of the game, they nonetheless are sometimes amazed. Paul Weinberg tells how Anderson once tipped him off on what an Illinois pitcher was going to pitch, helping Weinberg to deliver a game-winning hit: “I’d heard he [Anderson] knew baseball, but I was surprised by how much he knew. I wondered how he got to know that much. I guess that proves you don’t have to play the game, as long as you’re around the right people.”

Anderson has used the Metrodome to strengthen the schedule for the Golden Gophers. Since 1985, the Gophers have hosted a three-day tournament in early March that has brought in some of the better college baseball programs in the country.³ Most years featured at least one team rated as one of the top 25 college teams in the country, with the 1991, 1993, and 1999 tournaments featuring the number-one rated team, Stanford, Georgia Tech, and Florida State, respectively. The strongest field probably was the 1990 tournament with number-two Wichita State, number-four Stanford, number-six Miami (Florida), and the Gophers crossing bats. Without the Metrodome, it is unlikely any of these schools would have ventured north to play the Gophers.

Another way the Gophers have tried to pass on the tradition of Gopher baseball was the pro-alumni game held in the Metrodome in February for 16 years from 1992 through 2007. The game brought back current professional ballplayers who had previously donned the maroon and gold to play the current varsity. Hall of Famers Dave Winfield and Paul Molitor as well as All-Stars Terry Steinbach, Dan Wilson, Denny Neagle, and many others have participated in this game, the proceeds of which went to the Dick Siebert Scholarship Endowment Fund. Anderson is quoted in the 2007 Gophers Baseball Media Guide saying, “I think this is probably the best thing we do all year, in terms of trying to pass the ‘tradition torch.’” Former Gophers star Robb Quinlan, in an article by Chris Couglan-Smith, said, “Over at Siebert Field you see the retired jersey numbers of Molitor and Winfield and you see all the guys come back for the pro-alumni game. You feel like you’re not just playing for yourself, but for all of those guys who’ve played here. They’re watching and cheering for us, and that’s a good feeling.” The 2007 game was the last game in the series, however, due to new NCAA regulations stating that the college baseball season cannot start until the last Friday in February. The pro-alumni game was held in early February before the professionals headed to spring training and the new regulation made continuation of the game impossible. For those keeping score, the alumni won five of the first seven games (one tie), but the current varsity stormed back to win seven of the final nine games to take the series 8-7 with one tie.

Another way to even the playing field for the Big Ten and other northeastern college conferences would be to extend the season a month or two into the summer. The NCAA has taken a baby step in declaring that no team can start playing games until late February, but the southern and western schools still hold a tremendous advantage in completing their allowed 56 games in 13 weeks (before any conference tournaments or NCAA play). Anderson said in the Coughlan-Smith interview, “If you had Michigan and Minnesota playing outside on a June afternoon, you couldn’t find enough seats. Baseball could be a revenue sport for us under the right kind of schedule.” As it is, the Big Ten schedule ends in mid-May, as soon as the weather starts getting nice, and the northern and eastern schools have a difficult time competing in NCAA play. Ohio State was the last northern or eastern team to win the NCAA title, in 1966, and college baseball has since become a regional sport favoring the southern and western schools.

Developing quality players in Minnesota and attracting them to the University of Minnesota has become increasingly difficult for John Anderson and his staff. NCAA regulations allow only four players from a college team on any one team in the summer baseball college leagues (such as the Minnesota/Wisconsin-based Northwoods League or the Cape Cod League in New England). This has made it much more difficult to oversee the development of players during the summer, and the days of a summer-league team of Gophers players playing together under Gophers coaches is a thing of the past. Until the early 1970s, freshmen weren’t eligible for varsity competition, and college teams fielded freshmen teams, which for all practical purposes served as junior-varsity teams. Junior-varsity teams continued for another eight to 10 years, but the expense of running these teams and gender-equity issues spelled the end of junior-varsity teams in the early 1980s. This meant that selecting a 35-man varsity became even tougher in that decisions would have to be made on a player without ever seeing him play against college competition.

Anderson realized after his first few years that he may have been more than a bit lucky, so he went in to talk with athletic director Paul Giel to discuss ways to ensure continued success for the baseball program. Anderson related in an interview with Chris Coughlan-Smith, “I told Paul Giel we weren’t going to be able to compete without more resources. I wasn’t interested in being the guy responsible for ruining the tradition of Gopher baseball.” Anderson had worked for Emery Air Freight for a number of years in the early 1980s as well as being a part-time Gophers head coach, and that situation could not continue if the Minnesota baseball program was going to flourish. Anderson was offered a national sales position with Emery Air Freight and had to make a decision about his future. As a first step, Giel found money to make Anderson the full-time coach, and Anderson was able to hire Rob Fornasiere of Normandale Community College as his first full-time assistant coach in September 1985. Fornasiere, who in 2008 completed his 23^rd year with the Gophers, concentrates on recruiting and scouting, individual and team defense, and coaching third base. Todd Oakes was hired as pitching coach for the 1999 season, succeeding Mike Dee, and has served 10 full years through 2008. Lee Swenson was hired before the 2000 season and concentrates on developing the Gopher catchers, coaching first base, and running the developmental camp. A stable coaching staff has certainly been one of the keys to the success of Gopher baseball.

Other frustrations of being a college coach are personal. John Anderson has not been immune. He accepted the Gophers’ head-coaching job over the phone 15 minutes before leaving on his honeymoon in the summer of 1981. While Anderson and Becky Gilmore tried to make their marriage work, it ended in divorce in 1988, after a two-year separation. In an interview with Minneapolis Star Tribune writer Nolan Zavoral in 1988, Anderson called the divorce “the most traumatic thing in my life,” adding, “The timing of the whole thing was wrong. I think she felt betrayed. To be a coach, well, it takes a tremendous amount of time, not 40 hours a week. During recruiting, you’re working 80, 90, sometimes 100 hours a week. How do you blame her for not enjoying it?” More than once Anderson considered quitting coaching and finding a job with saner work hours in order to save his marriage. But he realized soon enough that he loved coaching and that if he found another occupation, “I would have two problems, and one would be I’d be lying to myself.”

After several years of bachelorhood, Anderson married for the second time in 1993. John and Jan (Mitchell) Anderson have a daughter, Erin Elizabeth (born November 11, 1994), and make their home in Wayzata. 

Besides coaching at the University of Minnesota, John Anderson has had the honor of coaching national teams in international play. In the fall of 1989 he was named assistant coach for the U.S. senior national team that won the silver medal at the International Baseball Association President’s Cup tournament in Taiwan. In the summer of 1990 he was assistant coach on the United States team that traveled to Japan, Korea, and Cuba and participated in the Goodwill Games in Seattle and the World Championships in Edmonton, Alberta. In 1993 Anderson was the head coach of Team USA, which went 30-16 on a summer tour. That team also won the silver medal in the Intercontinental Cup in Parma, Italy, and went 8-1 in the world championships. Anderson, in an interview with Brian Osberg on the eve of the 1993 tournament, said, “I’m really excited about it. It will be a challenge in my coaching career. I remember the first time I put that USA uniform on. It sent a chill through my spine. Representing the whole country is special. I just hope the kids [on the team] will have the same feeling.”

In his free time, much like his mentor Dick Siebert, Anderson has worked for the advancement of baseball in Minnesota. He established and has overseen the Minnesota Baseball Instructional Schools for players aged nine to 18, held at the University of Minnesota during the summer. In the fall Anderson runs the Dick Siebert Fall League, a developmental league for high-school players. In 1990 Anderson was named president of the Minnesota Amateur Baseball Federation. In 2000, along with sports psychologist Rick Aberman, Anderson co-authored a book, Why Good Coaches Quit and How You Can Stay in the Game, published by University of Minnesota Press. The book evolved from Anderson’s own questions on how to become a more effective leader and coach and the desire to not write just another baseball book that would be quickly forgotten. The book goes beyond the X’s and O’s and centers on the mental aspect of sports coaching. The book is now in its second edition, and Anderson and Aberman give numerous speeches every year on topics covered in the book.

In January of 2008 Anderson was elected to the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. Those writing letters of recommendation, showing how highly regarded Anderson is among his peers, were former Minnesota Twins general manager Terry Ryan and Baseball Hall of Famer Paul Molitor. The long-time (now retired) coach at St. Olaf College, Jim Dimick, nominated Anderson. At age 53 (in 2008), Anderson could amass several hundred more wins but doesn’t believe he wants to be coaching when he is 65. However, Anderson does want an on-campus baseball stadium, with a much-improved grandstand and parking, to be part of his legacy. With the possibility of the Minnesota Vikings football team getting a new stadium and the Metrodome being replaced, a new on-campus baseball stadium is critical if baseball is going to continue as a major sport at the University of Minnesota.

Anderson foresees the facility being a center of amateur baseball in the state, with room for indoor batting and pitching practice under a bubble, locker rooms and meeting rooms in one complex, 3,000 seats for the fans, and a new entrance. The actual playing field would be sunk seven feet and moved slightly to the south and east of the current field. Anderson commented on what he still wants to accomplish in the January 2008 Michael Rand interview, “I think is takes 20 years to really get a sense of who you are. It’s all about relationships and developing people. I feel like the last seven or eight years, I’ve been a lot more effective as a coach and leader. I’d like to spend the next 10 or so years trying to utilize that maybe do some things here we haven’t done.” 

In reflecting on his career in a 1999 interview with Chris Couglan-Smith, Anderson said, “I never anticipated anything like this when I came here for college. I thought I’d be teaching high school. It’s interesting how life takes its twists and turns. I’ve seen presidents and athletic directors come and go. It’s been quite a ride.” Indeed, it has been quite a ride for a man from Minnesota’s baseball boondocks who, through hard work and dedication, has become one of the nation’s premier college baseball coaches. His career is proof that it is not where you are from but what you learn along the way that is truly important.

Note

A version of this biography appeared in the book Minnesotans in Baseball, edited by Stew Thornley (Nodin, 2009).

Sources

Research on Minnesota born major leaguers by Glenn Gostick reveals that William Cadreau, aka Chief Chouneau (Cloquet), Steve Foucault (Duluth), Spencer Harris (Duluth), Roger Maris (Hibbing), Ernie Nevers (Willow River), Bill Phyle (Duluth), Jerry Ujdur (Duluth), Rip Wade (Duluth) are the only individuals born in the northeastern part of the state. Several individuals were born in north-central or northern Minnesota, including Wes Westrum (Clearbrook), Kerry Taylor and Bryan Hickerson (Bemidji), Joe Bush (Brainerd), and Chief Bender (Crow Wing County).

Charley Walters, in his column in the Minnesota Daily, claims Anderson had a 4-1 won-loss record for a team that went 4-10. A quick check of the newspapers revealed at least three losses for Anderson (1-13 to Vermillion, 1-3 to Brainerd, and 4-10 to Vermillion) and one win (against Fergus Falls, 2-1, in the first game of a doubleheader in which Hibbing won the second game 9-4, in a game in which Anderson did not pitch).

The tournament in early March hosted by the Gophers in the Metrodome has had various names over the years depending on the major sponsor. For the first three years it was known as the Wheaties Tournament of Champions (1985-1987); it then became the Pillsbury Baseball Classic (1988-1990). It has also been known as the Oscar Mayer Baseball Classic (1991-1994), the Hormel Foods Baseball Classic (1995-2002), and the Dairy Queen Classic (2003-2008).

Augustoviz, Roman. “U Suffers through a Season to Forget,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 12, 2008. pages C1 and C8. Recap on the 2008 season, the only losing season in 27 years at Minnesota under Anderson’s tutelage.

Broomer, Stuart. Paul Molitor: Good Timing, Toronto: ECW Press, 1994. On page 19 is the quote from Molitor on Anderson’s MVP award in 1977. Similar quote in the Zavoral article.

Coughlan-Smith, Chris. “A Winning Proposition,” Minnesota: The Magazine of the University of Minnesota Alumni Association, April-March 1999. volume 98, number 4, pp. 44-45. This article is a good overview of Anderson’s career to that point and a number of quotes from Anderson and Robb Quinlan were taken from this article.

http://www.gophersports.com, the official website for University of Minnesota sports. Contains a fairly good biography of Anderson and some quotes from him and about him and the Gopher baseball program.

Hibbing Daily Tribune, various issues from 1972 through 1974 were read for information on Anderson’s sports career at Nashwauk-Keewatin High School and Hibbing Community College.

Osberg, Brian. “The Man in the Middle,” Minnesota: The Magazine of the University of Minnesota Alumni Association, May-June 1993. Volume 92. Number 5. page 53. Recruiting and Team USA quote found in this article.

Telephone interview with John Anderson on June 3, 2008. Recollections of his high school no-hitter; high school and Hibbing Community College sports career; the 1977 MVP voting, Siebert scorebook story; Siebert’s last year; recruiting pressures; and biographical information were some of the topics covered in this interview.

Rand, Michael. “No Time Like Present for Gophers’ Anderson,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, January 4, 2008. Information on Anderson’s election to the American Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame and the quote from Iowa coach Duane Banks is found in this article.

Schweitzer, Blaise. “Majors and the Minors,” Minnesota: The Magazine of the University of Minnesota Alumni Association, May-June 1987. Volume 86. number 5. pp. 43-44. Information on Anderson’s attitude about players staying in college and getting a degree and his coaching philosophy is found in this article.

University of Minnesota Baseball Media Guides, 1982-2008, various issues. Anderson’s statistical record was gleaned from perusing these volumes.

Walters, Charley. “Coaches, Players Laud Baseball Team’s Student Manager,” Minnesota Daily, April 9, 1975. Most of the information on Anderson’s college career as student manager was found in this article.

Zavoral, Nolan. “Gophers’ Anderson is Carrying on Siebert Tradition,” Minneapolis Star Tribune, May 15, 1988. Anderson talks about his first marriage, his relationship with Dick Siebert, and his first year as head coach (1982) in this article.

Adrian Constantine Anson, named after two towns in southern Michigan that his father admired, was born in a log cabin in Marshall (later Marshalltown), Iowa, on April 17, 1852. Adrian was the youngest son of Henry and Jeannette Rice Anson, and was the first pioneer child born in the town that his father had founded. Henry Anson, who was born in New York State and had drifted westward as a young adult, was a surveyor, land agent, and businessman who brought his wife and oldest son Sturgis to Iowa in a covered wagon. He found a promising valley in the center of the state, built a log cabin, and laid out a main street. Henry worked tirelessly to build and promote Marshalltown, and is recognized to this day as the patriarch of the city. Jeannette Anson was a sturdy pioneer housewife who died when Adrian was seven years of age, leaving behind an all-male household.

Adrian, whose family proudly claimed descent from the British naval hero Lord Anson, was a strong, strapping boy with reddish hair and a self-admitted aversion to schoolwork and chores. Not until his teenage years, when baseball fever swept through Marshalltown, did Adrian find an acceptable outlet for his energy and enthusiasm. He practiced diligently and earned a place on the town team, the Marshalltown Stars, at the age of 15. The Stars, with Henry Anson at third base, Adrian’s brother Sturgis in center field, and Adrian at second base, won the Iowa state championship in 1868.

Henry Anson enrolled his sons in a preparatory course at the College of Notre Dame for two years beginning in 1865, but Adrian was more interested in baseball and skating than in his studies. A later sojourn at the state college in Iowa City (now the University of Iowa) ended similarly. Young Adrian Anson wanted to play professional ball, and his break came in 1870 when the famous Rockford Forest City club and its star pitcher, Al Spalding, came to Marshalltown for a pair of games. The Forest City team won both matches, but the Anson clan played so impressively that the Rockford management sent contract offers to all three of the Ansons. Henry and Sturgis turned Rockford down, but Adrian accepted and joined the Forest City squad in the spring of 1871.

The 19-year-old Adrian, dubbed “The Marshalltown Infant,” batted .325 for Rockford and established himself as one of the stars of the new National Association. The last-place Rockford team disbanded at season’s end, but the pennant-winning Philadelphia Athletics quickly signed Adrian to a contract. He rewarded the Athletics with a .415 average in 1872, third best in the Association. He played third base for the Athletics that season, but spent the next three seasons shuttling from first to third base with occasional stops at second, shortstop, catcher, and the outfield. The hard-hitting utility man quickly became one of Philadelphia’s most popular athletes.

Boston Red Stockings manager Harry Wright had always dreamed of introducing baseball to England, his home country, and in 1874 Wright and his star pitcher Al Spalding organized a mid-season trip to England. The Red Stockings and the Philadelphia Athletics took a three-week respite from National Association play and sailed to the Old World, where they played both baseball and cricket for British crowds. Adrian Anson led all the players on both teams in batting during the tour, and, more importantly, began a friendship with Spalding. Both were young men from the Midwest, less than two years apart in age, and both had willed themselves to prominence in the baseball profession. Each found reasons to admire the other, and their relationship would play an important role in Anson’s life for the next 30 years.

During the 1875 season, Chicago club president William Hulbert signed four of Boston’s brightest stars, including pitcher Al Spalding, to play for his White Stockings in the new National League in 1876. Spalding recommended that Hulbert also sign two Philadelphia standouts, Ezra Sutton and Adrian Anson. Sutton and Anson reached agreements with Hulbert, though Sutton later reneged on his deal and returned to the Athletics. Anson moved to Chicago in early 1876, and the White Stockings, managed by Spalding and powered by Anson and batting champ Ross Barnes, won the first National League pennant that year.

On a personal note, Anson began dating Virginia Fiegal, daughter of a saloon owner, during his Philadelphia days. He met Virginia when he was 20 and she only 13 or 14, though this was not considered unusual at the time. Their relationship hit a roadblock after Adrian signed his contract with Chicago, when Virginia strongly objected to Adrian’s desire to leave Philadelphia. Anson was no contract-jumper, so he offered William Hulbert $1,000 to buy his way out of the agreement. Hulbert refused, and Anson, unwilling to break his contract and not wanting to lose Virginia, asked Virginia’s father for his daughter’s hand in marriage. Adrian and Virginia were wed in November 1876 and started a family that eventually produced four daughters, all of whom grew to adulthood, and three sons who died in infancy.

Adrian Anson, powerfully built at 6-feet-2 and over 200 pounds, was the biggest and strongest man in the game during the 1870s. Some reports state that he did not take a full swing at the plate; instead, he pushed his bat at the ball and relied upon his strong arms and wrists to produce line drives. An outstanding place hitter, Anson and the White Stockings worked an early version of the hit-and-run play to perfection. So good was Anson’s bat control that he struck out only once during the 1878 season and twice in 1879. He also served as Spalding’s assistant on the field, enthusiastically cheering his teammates and arguing with opponents and umpires. Anson had managed the Philadelphia Athletics for the last few weeks of the 1875 season, and looked forward to the day that he would succeed Spalding as leader of the White Stockings.

The Chicago team failed to repeat as champions under Spalding in 1877. Spalding then moved into the club presidency, but passed over Anson and appointed Bob Ferguson as his successor. Ferguson’s regime was a failure, and Spalding named Anson as captain and manager for the 1879 season. He was now “Cap” Anson, and in one of his first decisions, the former utility man planted himself at first base and remained there for the rest of his career. His 1879 team challenged for the pennant, but fell apart after Anson was sidelined due to illness in late August. However, Anson’s 1880 White Stockings, fortified by newcomers such as catcher Mike Kelly, pitcher Larry Corcoran, and outfielders George Gore and Abner Dalrymple, won the flag with a .798 winning percentage, the highest in league history.

Two more pennants followed in 1881 and 1882 as Anson, who won the batting title in 1881 with a .399 mark, cemented his stature as the hardest hitter and finest field general in the game. He used his foghorn voice and belligerent manner to rile opponents and frighten umpires, and made himself the focus of attention in nearly every game he played. His outbursts against the intimidated umpires earned him the title “King of Kickers.” His White Stockings followed Anson’s lead and played a hustling, battling brand of ball that won no friends in other league cities, but put Chicago on the top of the baseball world. As baseball grew in popularity, the handsome and highly successful Cap Anson became the sport’s first true national celebrity.

Regrettably, Anson used his stature to drive minority players from the game. An 1883 exhibition game in Toledo, Ohio, between the local team and the White Stockings nearly ended before it began when Anson angrily refused to take the field against Toledo’s African-American catcher, Moses Fleetwood Walker. Faced with the loss of gate receipts, Anson relented after a loud protest, but his bellicose attitude made Anson, wittingly or not, the acknowledged leader of the segregation forces already at work in the game. Other players and managers followed Anson’s lead, and similar incidents occurred with regularity for the rest of the decade. In 1887, Anson made headlines again when he refused to play an exhibition in Newark unless the local club removed its African-American battery, catcher Walker and pitcher George Stovey, from the field. Teams and leagues began to bar minorities from participation, and by the early 1890s, no black players remained in the professional ranks.

Chicago was the highest-scoring team in baseball, and Anson, as its cleanup hitter, was the leading run producer in the game. The Chicago Tribune introduced a new statistic, runs batted in, in 1880 and reported that Cap Anson led the league in this category by a healthy margin. The statistic was soon dropped, but later researchers have determined that Anson led the National League in RBIs eight times. He is credited with driving in more than 2,000 runs, behind only Henry Aaron and Babe Ruth on the all-time list despite the fact that National League teams played fewer than 100 games per season for much of Anson’s career.

Anson hit more than 12 homers in a season only once. He swatted 21 round-trippers in 1884 by taking advantage of the tiny Chicago ballpark, which featured a left-field fence only 180 feet from home plate (balls hit over the fence had been ruled as doubles in previous seasons). On August 5 and 6, 1884, Anson belted five homers in two games, a record that has been tied (by Stan Musial, among others) but never broken. However, Anson drove in most of his runs with sharp line drives that the barehanded infielders found nearly impossible to stop. Fielding gloves found their way into the National League by the mid-1880s, but Anson’s production continued uninterrupted. He batted .300 or better in each of his first 20 professional seasons, and by 1886 he was baseball’s all-time leader in games played, runs, hits, RBIs, and several other categories.

He was less successful as a fielder, leading the league in errors several times and setting the all-time career mark for miscues by a first baseman. However, Anson was fearless in stopping hard-thrown balls with his bare hands, and his size made him an excellent target for his infield mates. He was an integral part of the celebrated “Stonewall Infield” with third-baseman Tom Burns, shortstop Ed Williamson, and second-baseman Fred Pfeffer. This unit remained together for seven seasons, from 1883 to 1889, and formed the backbone of the Chicago defense.

Anson had been a teetotaler since his younger days, but his White Stockings were a hard-drinking crew that kept their captain up nights with their behavior. His 1883 and 1884 teams failed to win the pennant, partially due to off-the-field controversies, but in 1885 the White Stockings reclaimed their place at the top of the league. New pitcher John Clarkson posted a 53-16 record and led the team to the pennant after a spirited race against the New York Giants. However, Anson’s team played poorly in a postseason “World’s Series” against the St. Louis Browns of the American Association. The series ended, officially, in a tie after a disputed Browns victory caused no end of controversy. In 1886 Anson drove in 147 runs in 125 games and led the White Stockings to the pennant once again, but his charges lost the six-game World’s Series against the Browns when some of the Chicago players appeared to be inebriated on the field.

Spalding and Anson decided to break up the team, selling Mike Kelly to Boston for a then-record $10,000 and dropping veterans George Gore and Abner Dalrymple, among others. The 1887 squad was a better-behaved bunch, but finished in third place despite Anson’s outstanding performance at bat. The 35-year-old captain won the batting title with a career-best .421 in a year in which walks counted as hits (though later researchers removed the 60 walks from his hit totals, leaving his average at .347 and giving the title to Detroit’s Sam Thompson). In early 1888 Spalding sold John Clarkson, baseball’s best pitcher, to Boston for $10,000. Several new men tried, and failed, to fill Clarkson’s shoes, and the White Stockings finished second despite another batting championship by Anson.

After the 1888 season Spalding, owner of the sporting goods company that still bears his name, took the Chicago club and a team of National League all-stars on a ballplaying excursion around the world. Virginia Anson accompanied the party as Anson directed the White Stockings in New Zealand, Australia, Ceylon, Egypt, and the European continent. The trip lost money for its backers, including Anson, but it introduced baseball (and advertised Spalding’s business) to countries that had never seen the sport before. The six-month adventure was the high point of Cap Anson’s life, and takes up nearly half of Anson’s autobiography, published in 1900. At the conclusion of the trip, in April of 1889, Spalding signed Anson to an unprecedented 10-year contract as player and manager of the White Stockings.

By 1890, Anson was a stockholder in the Chicago ballclub, owning 13 percent of the team. A company man through and through, he bitterly criticized the Brotherhood of Professional Ball Players, whose members quit the National League en masse in early 1890 and formed the Players League. Anson, one of a handful of stars who refused to jump to the new league, hastily assembled a new group of youngsters (which the newspapers dubbed Anson’s Colts) and finished second that year. Spalding worked behind the scenes to undermine the rival circuit, while Anson led the charge in the newspapers, denouncing the jumpers as “traitors” and gleefully predicting the eventual failure of the upstart league. The new circuit collapsed after one season, but Anson’s role in the defeat angered many of his former players.

Some reporters called Anson “the man who saved the National League,” but many former Players Leaguers hated the Chicago captain for his attitude toward them. Such stars as Hugh Duffy and George Van Haltren refused to return to Chicago after the collapse of the rival circuit, costing Anson much-needed talent. In 1891, Anson’s Colts held first place until mid-September, but an 18-game winning streak vaulted Boston into the lead amid rumors that Boston opponents threw games to keep the pennant out of Anson’s hands. Chicago finished in second place, and Cap Anson believed for the rest of his life that he lost the championship through the machinations of his former Players League rivals.

Anson, after more than 20 years as a player, began to slow down. His average dipped below .300 for the first time in 1891, though he led the league once again in runs batted in with 120. He had never been a great fielder, but covered so little ground at first base that the pitcher and second baseman had to help out on balls hit to the right side. As stubborn as ever, Anson was the last bare-handed first baseman in the major leagues, finally donning a glove in 1892. At bat, Anson produced one last hurrah with a remarkable .388 average in 1894 at the age of 42, but his slowness on the basepaths bogged down the Chicago offense. As a manager, his increasing strictness and inflexibility angered his charges. He was baseball’s biggest celebrity, even enjoying a run as an actor on Broadway in a play called A Runaway Colt in December of 1895, but his Colts fell steadily in the standings.

His position as manager was weakened in 1891 when Al Spalding stepped down as team president. Anson might have been willing to retire from the field and accept the position, but Spalding, who retained controlling ownership in the team, appointed former Boston manager Jim Hart to the post. Anson held little regard for Hart, who had served Spalding as business manager of the round-the-world tour four years before, and the two men clashed often over personnel and disciplinary matters during the next several seasons.

Spalding and Hart reorganized the club in 1892, and Anson signed a new contract with the Chicago ballclub. This agreement retained Anson’s 13 percent stake in the team, but cut one year off his previous 10-year pact, though Anson claimed that he did not discover the discrepancy until later. At any rate, the new agreement expired on February 1, 1898. Anson, who by 1894 was the oldest player in the league, stubbornly kept himself in the lineup despite his dwindling production and his deteriorating relationships with Hart and the Chicago players. He batted .285 in 1897, a respectable figure today but well below the league average, and his Colts finished in ninth place. Spalding and Hart declined to renew his contract, and after 27 seasons, Cap Anson’s career was over. The 45-year-old Anson retired as baseball’s all-time leader in games played, times at bat, runs, hits, doubles, runs batted in, and wins as a manager.

Spalding offered to hold a testimonial benefit for Anson and raise $50,000 as a going-away gift, but Anson proudly turned it down, explaining that accepting such an offer would “stultify my manhood” and smacked of charity. The former Chicago captain then accepted a position as manager of the New York Giants, succeeding Bill Joyce, who had been sharply criticized by the national press for his part in an ugly on-field brawl. Giants owner Andrew Freedman promised Anson full control of the team, but continually interfered with personnel and management issues. He also ignored Anson’s request to trade or release Joyce, who remained on the team and retained the allegiance of many of the players. Anson led the Giants to a 9-13 record before Freedman fired him and reinstated Joyce after the controversy over the brawl died down.

After his humiliating exit from the Giants, Anson tried to obtain a Western League franchise and move it to the South Side of Chicago, but Spalding, whose approval for the move was necessary under to rules of the National Agreement, refused permission. This act ended the decades-long friendship between the two men. Anson then served as president of a revived American Association, which attempted to begin play in 1900 but folded due to financial pressures. After this defeat, Anson expressed his bitterness in his autobiography, A Ball Player’s Career. “Baseball as at present conducted is a gigantic monopoly,” stated Anson, “intolerant of opposition, and run on a grab-all-that-there-is-in-sight basis that is alienating its friends and disgusting the very public that has so long and cheerfully given to it the support that it has withheld from other forms of amusement.”

Cap Anson was finished with the National League, and although he lived for another two decades, he would never again hold any official position in organized ball. Instead, Anson opened a bowling and billiards emporium in downtown Chicago and served as a vice-president of the new American Bowling Congress. He captained a team that won the ABC five-man national title in 1904, making Anson one of the few men in history to win championships in more than one sport. He then turned his energies to what appeared to be a promising political career. Elected to a term as Chicago city clerk in 1905, Anson soon became embroiled in numerous controversies that he was, by personality and temperament, unable to overcome. He lost a bid for renomination, and his career in public office ended ignominiously. His bowling and billiards business floundered, and in late 1905 the cash-strapped Anson sold his remaining stock in the Chicago ballclub and severed his 29-year connection with the team.

He then devoted himself to semipro ball, investing most of his remaining money in his own team (called Anson’s Colts) and building his own ballpark on the South Side. This effort was a money-loser, and in desperation Anson donned a uniform in 1908 and played first base at the age of 56. He could still hit, but was nearly immobile in the field, and his Colts finished in the middle of the City League standings for three seasons. In those years, Anson played many games against the Chicago Leland Giants, the leading African-American team of the era, without apparent complaint. Anson, his finances stretched to the limit, sold his team after the 1909 season and returned to the stage. He created a monologue and performed it in vaudeville houses throughout the Midwest for the next few years.

Anson’s later life was filled with disappointment. The National League offered to provide a pension for the ex-ballplayer, but Anson stoutly refused all offers of assistance. He declared bankruptcy in 1910, and by 1913 he had lost his home and moved in with a daughter and son-in-law. Virginia Anson died in 1915 after a long illness, and the widowed ex-ballplayer resumed his stage career in a skit written by his friend Ring Lardner titled “First Aid for Father.” The skit starred Anson and his daughters Adele and Dorothy, and the Anson clan crisscrossed the nation, sharing bills with jugglers and animal acts in small town and big city alike. Vaudeville allowed Anson to support himself, but barely, and he retired, penniless, from the stage in 1921. He died on April 14, 1922, three days shy of his 70th birthday, and was buried in Oak Woods Cemetery in Chicago. The National League paid his funeral expenses. Seventeen years later, on May 2, 1939, Anson and his former friend and mentor Al Spalding were named to the Baseball Hall of Fame by a special committee.

A version of this biography is included in “Nuclear Powered Baseball: Articles Inspired by The Simpsons Episode Homer At the Bat” (SABR, 2016), edited by Emily Hawks and Bill Nowlin. For more information, click here.

Sources

Books

Anson, Adrian C. A Ball Player’s Career (Chicago: Era Publishing, 1900).

Brown, Warren. The Chicago Cubs (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1946).

Levine, Peter. A. G. Spalding and the Rise of Baseball: The Promise of American Sport (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985).

Spalding, Albert G. Base Ball: America’s National Game (New York: American Sports Publishing Company, 1911).

Zang, David W. Fleet Walker’s Divided Heart (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1995).

Newspapers and Magazines

Chicago Tribune, The Sporting News, Baseball Magazine, Sporting Life, and The New York Times for the 1870-1920 period.

At a time when America, along with the rest of the world, was struggling to cope with the worst depression in its history and the ominous rise of fascism in Europe, baseball provided some diversion from dark times. Appling started his major league career in 1930, just about the beginning of the Depression. The best word to describe Luke Appling is durability, a quality he showed throughout his baseball career and his life. He was emblematic of an America struggling through the Depression and digging into their psyches (perhaps unknowingly) to prepare for another world war. Appling endured and so did America.

“Old Aches and Pains,” as Appling was called, was arguably the greatest hypochondriac to ever play the game. Backaches, headaches, bad knees, eye problems would torment him-and then he’d go out and get three hits.

Lucious Benjamin Appling, born in High Point, North Carolina, on April 2, 1907, was clearly no slouch when he took the field. All of his medical complaints disappeared when game time came. He was so infirm that he managed to collect only 2,749 hits in a career that spanned twenty years, all with the Chicago White Sox. Appling never let a backache or headache get in the way of playing shortstop and getting in his licks as a hitter. He even complained about field conditions at Comiskey Park. “I swear that park must have been built on a junkyard,” he exclaimed. It turned out later he was right.

Appling attended Fulton High School in Atlanta and spent two years at Oglethorpe College. In 1930, when he was a sophomore at Oglethorpe, he signed with the Atlanta Crackers of the Southern Association. He hit the ball solidly for the Crackers, but his fielding at shortstop left something to be desired, as he committed 42 errors.

Late in the 1930 season the Atlanta Crackers were sold to the Chicago Cubs. But due to the intervention of Milt Stock, Appling joined the White Sox in a cash transaction that also involved an outfielder named Doug Taitt. Despite his fielding woes the White Sox bought his contract for $20,000. Appling made his debut for the White Sox at the end of the 1930 season. Appearing in six games, he committed four errors but also collected eight hits. He had a strong arm, but many of his throws ended up in the stands, sending fans scurrying out of the way.

The 1931 season was less than stellar for Appling. His fielding troubles still plagued him, and his hitting fell off. The White Sox tried to trade him, but there were no takers. White Sox manager Jimmy Dykes took Appling in hand and with great patience helped Appling polish his fielding skills and had him stop swinging for the fences.

Appling married Faye Dodd in 1932. They had two daughters (Linda and Carol) and one son (Luke III).

In 1932 the Pale Hose finished in seventh place behind the lowly St. Louis Browns. Appling batted .274 with ten triples and 63 runs batted in. He still was swinging for the fences and got himself out innumerable times through his lack of patience at the plate.

It all came together for Luke Appling in 1933, when he stopped trying to hit home runs, learned to use the entire field, and batted .328 for the season. Eight more years of .300 or better followed, and he improved enough to become an adequate fielder. He showed great range in the field, leading the American League in assists seven times. On the minus side he led the league in errors five times.

The apex of his career came in 1936. He won the American League batting title with a .388 batting average, the highest in the twentieth century by a shortstop. Luke also had a 27-game hitting streak that year. After winning the batting title, Appling was promised a $5,000 bonus, but General Manager Harry Grabiner reneged. In disgust Appling tore up his 1937 contract. Lou Comiskey, the owner, withstood Appling’s protests, and when Appling cooled down and was ready to play gave him a new contract. Unfortunately, it was for $2,500 less than he had wanted. In 1940 Appling, Rip Radcliff of the St. Louis Browns and Joe DiMaggio of the Yankees battled each other for the batting title with DiMaggio winning out.

The White Sox contended only once during Appling’s tenure at short. They lacked power, so Appling, a natural leadoff hitter, batted third in the lineup. Never a slugger, he did manage to drive in 1,117 runs during his career. Appling remembered that his teammates were not great baserunners. Player-manager Jimmy Dykes instituted an automatic fine for any baserunning blunders. The very next day Dykes was on second base when he became lost in thoughts about his managerial duties. He wandered off second base, wondering whether he should hit for the pitcher, and in a flash he was picked off. The players on the bench howled with delight and had some uncomplimentary words about the gaffe. When Dykes sheepishly returned to the bench he said, “All right say it, come on, I’ve got it coming,” but no one said a word. Later he asked Appling why they didn’t say anything. Appling replied, “They already said it before you got back to the dugout.”

Championships eluded the White Sox and the Cubs year after year. Ironically, the two greatest players in Chicago, Luke Appling and Ernie Banks, both shortstops, never played in a World Series.

Appling was a pitcher’s nightmare. He could and would foul off pitch after pitch until he got the one he wanted. Pitchers would get so frustrated they’d almost dare him to hit the blasted thing. Appling struck out only 528 times in his career and coaxed out 1,302 walks.

As one story goes, Appling once asked the tight-fisted business manager of the Sox for several balls to sign for friends. The business manager refused, citing the Depression and that each ball cost $2.75. Appling turned and walked out without a word. That afternoon in his first at bat he fouled off ten consecutive pitches into the stands. Turning to the club official in the owner’s box, he said, “That’s $27.50 and I’m just getting started.”

In 1938 the Sox had a chance to beat out the Yanks for the pennant. However, Appling suffered the only major injury of his career when he fractured his ankle, thereby hampering the chances of the club.

DiMaggio got a break during his 56-game hitting streak in 1941 when he hit a slow roller that bounced up on Luke. Joe was given a hit on the play to keep his streak going at 30 games.

Bill James in The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract named Luke Appling the best player of the 1943 season as Appling won his second batting title with a .328 average. Of course, 1943 was a war year and most of the stars were in the service.

Teammate Ted Lyons recalled Appling’s ability to foul off pitches until he got the one he wanted. Red Ruffing was pitching for the Yankees against the Sox on a miserably hot, humid day in Comiskey Park. Appling came up with two men on base and worked the count to 3-2. He then proceeded to foul off 12 pitches in a row. The profusely sweating Ruffing finally walked Appling and gave up a grand-slam homer to the next batter. Ruffing was in a cool shower immediately after. Pitchers considered themselves lucky if Appling got a hit early in the count.

Despite all his alleged ailments Appling was a good-natured person and popular with his teammates. The only White Sox player to win a batting championship until Frank Thomas, he was also voted the greatest White Sox living player by Chicago writers in 1969.

Appling entered the service in 1944 and returned to baseball late in 1945. At the time Appling entered the service his wife said, “The war will be over soon. Luke has never held a job for more than two weeks outside of baseball.” His hitting did not suffer when he returned in 1945. He batted .368 in his shortened season.

Appling was still playing ball at age 41, having been moved to third base from his shortstop position. Before a doubleheader in 1948 he complained of not being able to get his throwing arm loose. In the first game he lashed out three hits and with a supposedly crippled arm set an American League record with 10 assists. Before the nightcap he complained of severe pains in his legs and went out and did a sterling job.

In 1949 he batted .301 at the age of 42, but “Trader” Frank Lane, general manager of the White Sox, was committed to a youth movement, and Chico Carrasquel took over at shortstop. Appling helped Carrasquel adapt to the big leagues and at playing shortstop. Appling was asked to play first base, but after a few lackluster attempts he gave it up and filled in as a utility infielder. He played in 50 more games for the White Sox in 1950 and then retired. At the time of his retirement he held the American League records for most games played, assists, putouts and chances accepted by a shortstop. Appling also eclipsed the major league record for most games played at shortstop previously held by Rabbit Maranville. Maranville had played 2,153 games at short, and Appling exceeded that with 2,198. Luis Aparicio later eclipsed most of these records. Appling is still the club leader in runs, games played, hits, doubles, total bases, runs batted in, walks, and at bats; he’s also third in triples. In 1951 Appling was asked to manage the Memphis Chicks and surprised everyone including himself when he accepted.

The quality that emerges from Appling’s career and character is his durability. Maybe his ailment complaints were his way of exorcising the demons that baseball players (probably the most superstitious athletes to play sports) exhibited. Whatever his secret, his major league career spanned twenty years. Long after his retirement he showed he could still hit when in an appearance in a Cracker-Jack All-Star Old-Timers game in Washington, D.C., at the age of 75 he hit a homer off Warren Spahn. He said, “It was a good pitch and I just swung away.” The ball traveled only 250 feet as the fences were moved in for the old-timers game, but it’s still a good distance for a 75-year-old.

Appling managed in the minors for quite a few years, winning pennants for Memphis in the Southern Association and Indianapolis of the American Association. Named Minor League Manager of the Year in 1952, he still had only one chance managing in the majors, at Kansas City replacing Alvin Dark. He was not very successful as his team went 10-30 during his tenure. He also managed at Richmond and coached in the majors at Detroit, Cleveland, Baltimore, and Kansas City. He served as batting instructor for the Braves until 1990.

Appling died suddenly from an abdominal aneurysm on January 3, 1991, in Cumming, Georgia. His wife Fay; a brother Clyde; sisters Dela Campbell, Inez Jones, and Marie Shelton; his three children; and six grandchildren survived him. Appling is buried in Sawnee View Memorial Gardens, Mausoleum Chapel West in Cumming.

Luke Appling was in the mold of most Depression ballplayers-tough, somewhat hard-bitten, often with lean faces that showed the rugged times all Americans were enduring. Happy to be playing ball when so many others were standing on street corners selling apples or standing in line for soup, they brought some relief to a nation back on its heels. Appling along with others helped take people’s minds off the Depression if only for a few hours and made life a bit more bearable. It was the endurance of players like Luke Appling who carried baseball through these troubled times and sparkled even in a time of misery and foreboding as the sound of cleats on the dugout steps would soon be muffled by the hobnailed boots of oppressors.

Photo credit

Luke Appling takes batting practice before a game at Comiskey Park in 1940. (SABR-Rucker Archive)

Sources

Cataneo, David. Peanuts and Crackerjack. Nashville: Rutledge Hill Press, 1991

Creamer, Robert W. Baseball In 1941. New York: Penguin, 1991.

James, Bill. The New Bill James Baseball Historical Abstract. New York: The Free Press, 2001.

Luke Appling File at National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, Cooperstown, New York.

Nemec, David, and Saul Wisnea. Baseball: More Than One Hundred Fifty Years. Lincolnwood, Illinois: Publications International, 1997.