Ernest Wright

In an era when many African Americans lived in poverty and were treated as second-class citizens, Ernest Pearle Wright managed to rise and persevere as a successful businessman.  

Born on October 7, 1901, in Zanesville, Ohio, Ernest was the only child to mother Jessie (Forney) Wright and father Luther Wright, who died just a few years after Ernest was born. As a teenager, Ernest had become a good all-around athlete and a well above average pool player. Ernest put his pool-playing skills to use as he traveled throughout numerous cities in New York, Illinois, and Ohio hustling billiards.1 While in Chicago, Ernest met and married Emma Win in 1927 with whom he had a daughter, Eunice, two years earlier. By 1930, Ernie, Emma, and Eunice had moved to Syracuse, New York, where Ernie was listed in the Syracuse City Directories as selling tobacco and cigars while also running a poolroom. 

Sometime over the next five years, Ernie’s marriage to Emma went astray as Ernie became involved with a woman named Hannah Gray. The two had a child, Ernest P. Wright Jr., born in Syracuse on August 13, 1935.

With her son Ernest traveling the pool circuit, Jessie moved from West Virginia, where she had been a schoolteacher, to Erie, Pennsylvania, where she married William Pope on July 2, 1918.  A few years later, the Popes purchased a piece of real estate at 1318 French Street, initially their residence but soon to become known in Erie as the Pope Hotel.2 

Jessie Pope was a strong force within the Black community and became a founding officer of the Erie branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. By 1923 she was the president of the Erie branch. While husband William had many different jobs including railroad conductor, janitor, railroad watchman, and proprietor of the Commerce Street Garage, Jessie was listed as running the 15-room hotel, making her one of the few African American business owners of her era.3

Upon the repeal of the Prohibition Act in 1933, Jessie obtained a liquor license for the hotel and asked her son Ernest to move to Erie to help her manage the Pope Hotel. Ernie obliged.4 

Ernest Wright had an engaging personality and grand vision. He turned the Pope Hotel into a nightclub hotspot for Black culture and music, recruiting top entertainers to perform there, including jazz musicians Duke Ellington, Louis Armstrong and singer/actress Pearl Bailey.5

Unlike other clubs in town, the Pope Hotel distinguished itself by employing a live emcee, a regular band, and a female chorus line. And the hotel regularly welcomed both Black and White crowds.6 The hotel became a place where Whites and Blacks could put their prejudice aside to enjoy great entertainment.

The Pope Hotel wasn’t Ernie Wright’s only source of business. He was known to be involved in running an illegal gambling racket, which was the subject of police raids in the mid to late 1930s.7 Playing the numbers was a ubiquitous part of African American life. Popularized in Harlem in the 1920s, the numbers game gave African Americans the chance to supplement low wages and strive for economic security. Thousands of wagers would be placed on a daily number derived from US bank statistics or horse-race betting handles. “Hitting the number” could lead to a very high payout.  

While running his various businesses, Wright had an itch he was eager to scratch. He very much wanted to establish a Negro League baseball team. He knew he needed a partner with the skills to scout, recruit, and promote talent. Asking around, Wright was directed to Wilbur Hayes, a successful sports and entertainment promoter in the Cleveland area. Wright drove from Erie to Cleveland to meet Hayes at his shoeshine parlor. 

The initial meeting between the two men was described in the Cleveland Call & Post by sports editor Bob Williams: “Ernie Wright had driven up in a fine limousine and inquired – ‘Are you, Wilbur Hayes?’ How’d you like to start up a baseball club with me as a backer?” Hayes replied, “I’m a busy man – if you want the benefit of my baseball knowledge and experience, you’ll have to come back tomorrow.” Wright returned the following day and a deal between the pair was consummated.8 In 1941, with funds from Wright’s various business ventures, Wright and Hayes purchased a half-interest in the St Louis Stars, a Negro American League team that played games in Cleveland often enough that some newspapers would refer to the team as the St Louis-Cleveland Stars.9

The first season was a trial by fire for Wright. In July the Call & Post anointed him with the title of “Gamest Guy of the Year” for attempting to bankroll baseball’s comeback in Cleveland, which “has been taking a financial beating.”10

The first attempt for Wright was a ballgame he financed to be played between the Chicago Giants and Kansas City Monarchs, but it was canceled by rain. Wright then set up a game between the Cleveland White Sox and Kansas City Monarchs. The White Sox were a local semipro team that he took over from business manager Wesley Brooks. Wright purchased uniforms and baseball equipment for the team The matchup failed to draw a lot of fans who instead opted that day to go see famed heavyweight boxer Joe Louis at a horse show.11

Wright’s third try, a game between the Cleveland White Sox and Indianapolis Indians, was also not to be the charm. Fans were underwhelmed by previous White Sox showings, and few turned out. Wright had paid to bring in six players from the St. Louis Stars to fortify the White Sox. The strategy worked as the White Sox trounced Indianapolis in two games.12

At the winter meetings of 1941, 40-year-old Ernest Wright became the Negro League’s youngest owner as he was awarded the Cleveland Buckeyes franchise to begin play in the Negro American League in 1942. Wright installed Wilbur Hayes as the team’s general manager and William DeHart Hubbard, a former Olympic star and founder of the Cincinnati Tigers baseball team, as its secretary.13

For their first season, the Buckeyes split their home games between Cincinnati and Cleveland. Starting in 1943, Cleveland was its only home; the team played home games at League Park.14

Between 1922 and 1940, Cleveland had 10 different Negro League teams, only one of which lasted beyond a single season. Cracking the code to winning with the Buckeyes seemed like an impossible task. 

The 1942 Cincinnati-Cleveland Buckeyes played to great success.  The July 11th edition of the Atlanta Daily World proclaimed, “Cincinnati Buckeyes Hottest Team in Negro Baseball During 1942,” finishing in second place during the first half of the season, just behind the Kansas City Monarchs.15  Though no first- or second-half standings were published, seamheads.com lists their record as 50-27-2 in the Negro American League.

However, the 1942 season also brought the Buckeyes great tragedy. With the team bus broken, players had to carpool between road games. On September 7, 1942, some members of the Buckeyes were involved in a car crash that led to the deaths of catcher Ulysses “Buster” Brown and pitcher Raymond “Smoky” Owens as well as injuries to pitchers Alonzo Boone, Eugene Bremerton, Herman Watts, and general manager Hayes.16 The team spent the final two weeks of the season engaged in road contests, all of which they lost.

Besides running the Buckeyes, the partnership of Wright and Hayes began a professional basketball team, also named the Cleveland Buckeyes. Hayes leased the Old Elks’ Hall to be their home floor.17

The basketball squad did not last long. In December of 1944, Hayes released player Louis “Babe” Pressley, who went on to star for the Harlem Globetrotters.  Then another pivotal player, Duke Cumberland, left the team. In the end, Wright declared that “Cleveland is not basketball conscious” and ended his financial backing of the team.18  The team subsequently folded.

With their attention back on enriching the baseball Buckeyes, shrewd player signings and internal growth turned the team around in a positive way, culminating in the Buckeyes’ 1945 championship season. By this time, center fielder Sam Jethroe had developed into the league’s most valuable player. Wright and Hayes signed former Negro League All-Star catcher Quincy Trouppe to be player-manager. Other players on the 1945 team included pitcher Willie Grace, team captain and third baseman Parnell Woods, and right fielder Lloyd “Ducky” Davenport.  According to Call & Post sports editor Bob Williams, “With the exception of the World Champion Homestead Grays, the Bucks are reputed to be the highest-paid Negro Club in America.”19

The Buckeyes finished the 1945 season with a record of 62 wins,17 losses, and one tie. They were led by their pitchers, who had a combined ERA of 2.52. In the Negro League World Series, the Buckeyes clashed with the defending champion Homestead Grays, and did the unthinkable, sweeping the Grays and emerging as World Series champions. The Cleveland City Council passed a resolution commemorating the Buckeyes’ championship, and a banquet was held in their honor for the “glory and distinction” they brought to the city.20

The Buckeyes followed a middling 1946 season with a terrific 1947 in which they finished with 57 wins and 19 losses, earning themselves another trip to the Negro League World Series. This time, the Buckeyes fell to the New York Cubans in six games with one game being called a tie on account of rain.

It must have been a conflicting feeling for Ernest Wright when in 1947 Jackie Robinson broke the White major leagues’ color line. After all, Wright had always believed in the integration of Blacks and Whites, welcoming both into his nightclub at the Pope Hotel. In 1945 Wright became the first lifetime member of the Future Outlook League, a Cleveland-based civil rights organization founded to promote employment, equality, and mobility for young Blacks.21 But he was also a man of great business acumen who was becoming victimized by the flow of star Black ballplayers forgoing the Negro Leagues. 

In 1947, in his own town of Cleveland, Wright watched as Larry Doby became the first Black player to go directly from the Negro Leagues to the White major leagues, where he helped the Cleveland Indians become World Series champions in 1948. With Doby and superstar former Negro League pitcher Satchel Paige, the Cleveland Indians set a major-league attendance record of 2,620,627 in 1948.22 Meanwhile Negro League attendance was falling. Wright looked for ways to keep the Buckeyes afloat. At one point he attempted reverse integration, offering a White sandlot pitcher named Eddie Klep a tryout with the Buckeyes. Klep had stifled the Buckeyes hitters in an exhibition game the previous summer. The Buckeyes signed Klep, who became the first White player to train with a Negro League team.23 Klep’s signing, however, appeared to be mostly a publicity stunt as he appeared in just three games before being released.

Wright knew it was the “doom of the (Negro) League when [the major leagues] started dickering for our players,” but he tried to hold on as he moved the Buckeyes to Louisville for the 1949-50 season. The Louisville Buckeyes played their home games at Parkway Field, the home field of the Louisville Colonels of the American Association.24

Fortunes only got worse as the team went 8-29 in the first half of the season, followed by 7-22 in the second half. Wright lost money, and in 1950 handed over operations of the Buckeyes to Wilbur Hayes.25 Hayes moved the team back to Cleveland, where he was unable to reverse its fortunes. The Buckeyes were dissolved after the 1950 season.

With the demise of the Buckeyes, Wright’s attention focused back on the Pope Hotel, of which he was now the sole owner after the death of his mother in 1942.

In December of 1958, a fire blazed through the main floor of the Pope, destroying its rooms and the bar and grill areas. Though Wright saw this tragedy as an opportunity to renovate the hotel, the insurance covered only 44 percent of the loss; hence, the first floor was never rebuilt and the upstairs never renovated.26

By the 1960s, nightspot entertainment was declining, and the Pope Hotel now staged live entertainment only on the weekends. And by the 1970s, attendance at the Pope and in general was in complete free fall. When it came to revenues, it didn’t help matters that Wright had a heart of gold. In addition to putting the performers up at the hotel, he would often lend people money and welcome friends like Sam Jethroe to stay there free of charge. In some cases, patrons took advantage of Wright by neglecting to pay their bill.27

By the early 1970s, rooms at the Pope Hotel had declined both in quality and as a source of income for Wright. In 1973 the city Bureau of Housing cited the hotel for violations including exposed wires in the bathroom and electrical outlets without faceplates. Doors and windows needed repairs, and the paint was peeling.28 

Those employed by Ernest Wright spoke highly of him and residents of Erie referred to him as “Boss.” Wright was lauded by Mayor Louis J. Tullio for “managing and promoting good will and camaraderie at the Pope Hotel.”29

Wright was an affable conversationalist whose socialization skills helped make the Pope Hotel a success for a while, but he was also careless when it came to his financial practices which may have been the final straw that broke the back of the hotel. Financial records from the 1960s and ’70s indicate certified letters and final notices sent by the Internal Revenue Service demanding payment of taxes. In 1964 a balance of $248.68 was found in arrears, while in 1971 the amount was $1,108.12. In 1974, a federal judgment was entered against Wright for failure to pay $1,483.14 in income tax.30

Wright and his wife, Hannah, had three sons, Ernest Pearle Wright Jr., Charles Earl Wright, and William Wright. There were two daughters, Eunice, from his first marriage, and Dorothy. When Wright’s health began to decline, he enlisted Ernest Jr. and Charles to help run the hotel. Ernest Jr., who had a degree in in business administration and business management from Howard Univeersity, was unable to prevent the hotel’s demise. Profit and loss statements in 1973 showed a deficit in one of every three months. On March 3, 1977, Ernest Wright Sr. turned the Pope Hotel over to his son Charles, who was a bartender and bouncer at the hotel. He loved being around people and never saw his time at the Pope as work. However, the persistent financial problems never ceased and in early 1978 Wright made the tough decision to close the hotel.31 It was later torn down.

Ernest Pearle Wright died on April 11, 1985, at the age of 84, having accomplished his dream of being a Black owner of a successful Negro League baseball team as well as a husband, a father, and someone fondly regarded by his peers and loved ones, including his children who survived him.32 Wright is buried at the Erie Cemetery.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted seamheads.com and Baseball-Reference.com. The author thanks Heber MacWilliams, who shared his research notes on Ernest Pearle Wright, including census records and Wright’s World War II registration card, on which he listed his birthday as October 7, 1901, which is in contrast to what is mentioned in his obituary and on the website of the Erie Cemetery, both of which list his birth year as 1900. The author also thanks Steven Mooradian, processing archivist at the Hagen History Center, Erie, Pennsylvania, for providing documentation on Ernest Wright and the Pope Hotel.

Notes

1 Phillip Nykyforuk, “The Pope Hotel 1928-1978,” Journal of Erie Studies, Vol 16 Issue 2 (Fall 1987), 23.

2 Nykyforuk, 23.

3 Nykyforuk, 23.

4 Nykyforuk, 23.

5 Nykyforuk, 23.

6 Nykyforuk, 23.

7 “Numbers Sellers Is Fined in Court,” Erie Daily Times, November 11, 1937.

8 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call & Post, September 29, 1945: 7B.

9 Al Sweeny, “Hayes-Wright Purchase Interest in St. Louis Stars,” Cleveland Call & Post, July 5, 1941: 9A.

10 Al Sweeny, “Gamest Guy of the Year,” Cleveland Call & Post, July 19, 1941: 9A.

11 Dr. Anastasia Curwood, “From Magazine: A Look at the World War II-Era All-Black Horse Shows,” The Chronicle of the Horse, https://www.chronofhorse.com/article/from-the-magazine-a-look-back-at-the-world-war-ii-era-all-black-horse-shows/. Accessed August 23, 2024. The appeal of Black horse riding and showmanship increased exponentially when heavyweight champion Joe Louis became a prominent rider and owner. Louis built a combination boxing and equestrian training center in Utica, New York. Tickets to his horse shows were almost as hot a commodity as those for a Detroit Tigers World Series game.

12 Al Sweeny, “Gamest Guy of the Year.”

13 “Buckeyes Get Franchise in the Negro American League,” Cleveland Call & Post, January 3, 1942: 9A.

14 “Buckeye Franchise Moved to Cleveland by N.A.L.,” Cleveland Call & Post, January 9, 1943: 10.

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

16 “Buckeye Players Die in Crash,” Cleveland Call & Post, September 12, 1942: 1.

17 “Buckeyes to Play in Basketball Loop,” Cleveland Call & Post, October 17, 1942: 10.

18 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call & Post, December 16, 1944: 7B.

19 Bob Williams, “Sports Rambler,” Cleveland Call & Post, January 2, 1945: 6B.

20 Bob Williams, “Posey Nominates Jackson for Negro Baseball Commissioner,” Cleveland Call & Post, October 6, 1945: 6B.

21 “Ernest Wright Is First 1945 Life Member of F.O.L.,” Cleveland Call & Post, October 20, 1945: 9A.

22 Japheth Knopp, “Baseball’s Integration Spells the End of the Negro Leagues,” https://sabr.org/research/article/baseballs-integration-spells-the-end-of-the-negro-leagues/; Accessed August 17, 2024.

23 Cleveland Jackson, “Ernie Wright Does ‘Rickey’ in Reverse; Gives White Sandlot Pitcher a Tryout,” Cleveland Call & Post, January 4, 1947: 1B.

24 “Buckeyes Move to Louisville, Ky.,” Cleveland Call & Post, February 12, 1949: 6B.

25 “Ernie Wright Out, Wilbur Hayes In as Operator of Buckeyes Franchise,” Cleveland Call and Post, February 18, 1950: 1B.

26 Nykyforuk, 30.

27 Nykyforuk, 26-27.

28 Nykyforuk, 27.

29 Nykyforuk, 29.

30 Nykyforuk, 31.

31 Nykyforuk, 32-33.

32 Erie Times-News, November 23, 1986: 5K.