Introduction: The Negro Leagues’ 1931 Homestead Grays: The Color of Greatness

The Negro Leagues’ 1931 Homestead Grays: The Color of Greatness is the ninth in a series of SABR Digital Library books about the great Negro League teams of the first half of the twentieth century.

As noted by Paul White whose history of the Grays is included in this book,

“The 1931 edition of the Homestead Grays might be the greatest collection of talent on one team in baseball history. They not only retained all-time greats like [Oscar] Charleston, [Josh] Gibson, and [Smokey] Joe Williams [from the previous year], but brought in future Hall of Famers Jud Wilson to play third base and Willie Foster to augment the pitching staff. They even briefly added Satchel Paige late in the season and still had a solid supporting cast that included Tubby Scales, Vic Harris, Lefty Williams, Ted Page, and Ted ‘Double Duty’ Radcliffe. This awesome collection of talent combined to post an overall record of 143-29-2 once all of their games against town teams, semipro squads, barnstorming squads, and organized Black professional teams are included.1 Though there was no Eastern World Series organized that season, Posey used his column in the Pittsburgh Courier to happily declare that the Grays were the ‘undisputed National Championship team’ of Black baseball, thanks to their season series victories over every team they played.”2

This book provides a detailed account of the 1931 Grays with biographies of the players and the team officials who led the team to its triumphant season. A complete season timeline, the story of Forbes Field – where the Grays played premier games against Negro League caliber competition, the cultural context of the time, and a look at the history of the Grays franchise are also included. Biographies range from those for the Posey brothers—Cumberland and See—to Homestead’s standout players—Smokey Joe Williams, Willie Foster, Josh Gibson, Jud Wilson, to name a few.

In addition to the players with biographies published in this book, it is important to draw attention to those who only appeared with the Grays in their contest against the O’Neil All Stars on October 3 in Cleveland. The 18-0 shellacking by Homestead happened in part thanks to the recruitment of John Henry Russell and Sam Streeter who had played for the Pittsburgh Crawfords that year. The Grays squad was depleted, as players began going their separate ways and these players offered a second baseman and starting pitcher to the Grays lineup.

• John Henry Russell: Russell was an Alabama native, born in Dolcito on February 24, 1898. He passed away in Cleveland, Ohio on December 4, 1972, at the age of 74. Primarily a second baseman, Russell appeared with a strong St. Louis Stars team in the 1920s, finishing his career in itinerant fashion with the Crawfords, Detroit Wolves, Grays, and Cleveland Red Sox. He had a career batting average of .282 accompanied by a .953 fielding percentage.
• Sam Streeter: Streeter was born in New Market, Alabama on September 17, 1900. He played 16 years in the Negro Leagues, mostly with the Pittsburgh Crawfords and Birmingham Black Barons, although he also appeared in three seasons for the Grays. In 16 seasons, the left-hander fashioned an ERA of 4.02, completing 131 of the 168 games he started against Negro League rivals. Streeter died in Pittsburgh on August 9, 1985 at the age of 84. Streeter’s biography can be seen at sabr.org

It is worth building on Paul White’s reference to Satchel Paige’s cameo appearance for the Grays in September. He had previously pitched for the Pittsburgh Crawford Giants in August against the Grays, helping his team win their only game of the three-game set between Pittsburgh and Homestead in 1931. A summary of that series is included in this book. Paige was then recruited to pitch for the Grays against the Baltimore Black Sox. In the first game of the doubleheader at Forbes Field on Saturday, September 26, he led the Grays to a 3-2 win over mound opponent Script Lee.3

One other player, identified in The Negro Leagues Book (1994), edited by Dick Clark and Larry Lester, may have appeared for the Grays in 1931. However, no information has yet been found on a “? Green” shown as an outfielder.4

A special acknowledgement is in order. First, Phil Dixon trail blazed the story of the 1931 Homestead Grays with his 2009 book.5 It is a hallmark for research into the history of the Negro Leagues. SABR is honored to publish its take on the 1931 Grays and in several cases, has been able to add details to the timeline Dixon established.

Thanks also to the Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh for the photographs used in this book. Charles “Teenie” Harris was a substantial African American figure in Pittsburgh in the mid-20th century. For the purposes of this book, it is important to note that a young Harris played for the Pittsburgh Crawford Giants in the late 1920s. He was highly connected in the Black community, and his photography became his byword, not only of African Americans, but the City of Pittsburgh in its rich entirety. The Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh took on stewardship of the more than 75,000 Harris photos in his archive in 2001 and proudly shares that collection at the museum and online. SABR’s book on the 1931 Homestead Grays is honored to include several of these photos to complement its compilation of essays.

This book and those in the series that have preceded it have been made possible by many SABR members who have collaboratively and diligently researched and written each article. A difficult task in compiling a book like this continues to be the collection of photos of as many as possible of those portrayed in it. Some of the more obscure players pose challenges and we are grateful for the efforts of those who have been able to help in finding visual representations.

We express our thanks to the tireless efforts of our fact-checker, Carl Riechers, and copy editors Len Levin and Adam Hopps. Carl and Len have served in these capacities in earlier books in the series and are consummate professionals at what they do. This is Adam’s first book and we welcome him aboard. And just to let everyone know, another book in this series is already in the works—the 1928 St. Louis Stars, another one of the greatest Negro League teams ever. We hope you enjoy yet another window on Black Baseball’s past: the 1931 Homestead Grays.

THOMAS KERN was born and raised in Southwest Pennsylvania. Listening to the mellifluous voices of Bob Prince and Jim Woods in his youth, how could one not become a lifelong Pirates fan? He now lives in Silver Spring, Maryland and sees the Pirates, Nationals, and Orioles as often as possible. He is a SABR member dating back to the mid-1980s. With a love and appreciation for Negro League Baseball in addition to the Pirates, he has written SABR bios for the 1979 Pirates and Clemente books and has completed bios for Leon Day, John Henry Lloyd, Willie Foster, Judy Johnson, Turkey Stearnes, Hilton Smith, Louis Santop, Andy Cooper, Double Duty Radcliffe, and others.

 

NOTES

1 “Homestead Grays,” MLB.com. Retrieved from https://www.mlb.com/history/negro-leagues/teams/homestead-grays.

2 Cum Posey, “Grays Undisputed Champs; Team Play Won-League Looms,” Pittsburgh Courier, October 10, 1931: A5.

3 “Grays Win Two, Play Tie,” Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph, September 27, 1931: 27.

4 Dick Clark and Larry Lester, eds., The Negro Leagues Book (Cleveland: Society for American Baseball Research, 1994), 137.

5 Phil S. Dixon, Phil Dixon’s American Baseball Chronicles, Great Teams: The 1931 Homestead Grays, Volume 1 (Xlibris, 2009), 105.