The Toronto Maple Leafs: The Barrow Years, 1900-1902

Ed Barrow (SABR-Rucker Archive)

 

The Toronto franchise of the International League was one of the strongest and had one of the longest tenures—from 1895 (when the league was called the Eastern League) until 1967. Ed Barrow had a lengthy, esteemed career as a baseball executive that ultimately landed him in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. This article tells the story of a relatively short period of time, 1900 through 1902, when the paths of this strong franchise and this storied baseball executive crossed.1 It is a story of the leadership of a brash young manager (and de facto general manager) who was learning the ropes of assembling a baseball team, skills he would put to good use when he later turned the forlorn New York Yankees franchise into one of the greatest powerhouses in the sport.

This article builds on the earlier work of Jane Finnan Dorward which discussed Barrow’s time in Toronto.2 However, this article focuses particularly on the personal qualities of Barrow as a leader and sports entrepreneur, and will demonstrate how Barrow developed those leadership and entrepreneurial qualities at a time when baseball was transforming itself from a gentleman’s recreational game into a money-making business, and how Barrow was preparing himself for his future success on the major-league stage. The story will begin with a discussion of Ed Barrow and the contributions he made to the Toronto baseball team, followed by the introduction of Charlie Maddock, a lower-profile, but important, actor on the Toronto baseball scene. The third section describes the turbulent environment facing a baseball manager in the early 1900s. This sets the stage to describe the Toronto team’s fortunes, 1900–02, when Barrow was manager. The article concludes with an analysis of how Barrow developed and applied the leadership and entrepreneurial skills in Toronto that he would eventually employ with the Yankees.

THE ROLE OF ED BARROW

Edward Grant Barrow was born into a poor family in Springfield, Illinois, in 1868.3 His family moved to Nebraska to homestead, but his father’s health was not up to the back-breaking labor, so the family relocated to Des Moines, Iowa. Ed left high school at about age 15 to take on a number of different jobs to support himself and contribute to the family.4

He never played baseball professionally, but he had aspirations until he injured his arm in amateur ball.5 He was something of a serial entrepreneur (not always successful) before settling into baseball. He and his brother bought a huge quantity of soap and moved to Pittsburgh, to make their fortune.6 They sold virtually nothing.7 He could have been more successful had he remained part of a fleeting partnership he had with Harry Stevens, who ultimately became the premier concessionaire for most baseball stadiums as well as other entertainment venues, but Barrow chose baseball.8

When he took over the Toronto Baseball Team in 1900, he was still learning his trade, but at 32 years old, he was already an experienced baseball executive. He had managed the Wheeling (West Virginia) Nailers in 1895, and the Paterson (New Jersey) Baseball Club in 1896, and spent three years (1897–99) as president of the Atlantic League.9

When the Atlantic League folded at the end of the 1899 season, Barrow was looking for his next job in baseball. A friend put him in contact with Arthur Irwin, a Canadian who had managed the Toronto team in 1898 and still owned a 25% interest in the team. Barrow’s description of how he was hired as manager is really quite simple: “He [Irwin] sold me on the idea of buying his interest and becoming manager.”10 This seems to have been a fairly normal way of doing business at the time.11 However this transpired, the fact is that at the beginning of the 1900 season, Barrow was manager and part-owner of the Toronto baseball team.

In 1900, the job of managing a minor-league baseball team was quite different from what we think of today. In many cases, the manager was the only full-time, permanent employee of the organization. Some teams did have business managers, and Toronto hired a business manager in 1905, but there is no mention of a business manager at this point.12 Barrow was responsible for anything that the part-time president, treasurer, or other members of the board did not want to take on. This included scouting, recruiting, and signing players; managing day-to-day business affairs; ensuring the quality of the stadium; making travel arrangements; functioning as athletic trainer; and on-field leadership.

Barrow showed throughout his career that he was the sort of proactive leader who questioned the status quo and was always seeking ways to do things better. Many changes occurred in the Toronto franchise during the relatively short time Barrow was there. From a distance of 120 years, it is difficult to determine exactly what role Barrow played in these changes, but, as a manager with a predisposition to activism, it seems certain that Barrow would have played a fairly significant role in anything that happened on his watch.

Change in the ownership structure. When Barrow arrived in late 1899, the majority owners of the team were Lawrence (Lol) Solman and the Toronto Ferry Company.13 Relationships here get a bit murky; Solman is sometimes described as a director or the manager of the ferry company.14 It was fairly common at this time for transit companies to own baseball franchises, which provided riders for the company’s vehicles.15 Solman had a similar motivation because he owned a hotel, amusement park, vaudeville theater, and other interests on the Toronto islands, where the team played its games at Hanlan’s Point.16

By the end of the 1900 season, Solman and the Toronto Ferry Company wanted out of the business, so Barrow, who already owned a 25% interest in the team, secured an option to purchase. It was suggested that he was working with interests in Buffalo to bring Toronto into Ban Johnson’s newly christened American League, but obviously this never happened.17

Barrow seems to have taken a leadership role in securing local investors who would purchase the club.18 On November 20, 1900, “[t]he largest and most enthusiastic baseball meeting held in years in Toronto took place.” The outcome of the meeting was the creation of a joint-stock company called the Toronto Baseball and Athletic Association. At this meeting, the approximately 50 shareholders selected a board of directors and corporate officers and began the steps necessary to purchase the Toronto franchise from Solman and the ferry company for $6,000.19 The newspaper account is unclear, but presumably the shareholders were purchasing a 75% interest in the club, since Barrow’s 25% remained intact.

At this meeting, the group selected Ed Mack as President, a position he held until November 1902.20 Mack was a high-profile baseball fan who owned a tailor shop in downtown Toronto. It is difficult to determine how large or successful his operation was, but he had a small advertisement in the Toronto Daily Star virtually every day. During the 1900 season, he ran a promotion that involved awarding the player with the highest home batting average his choice of a top coat or a suit of clothes.

As a result of the change in ownership, the team would be governed by a small group of directors, but major decisions would be made by a meeting of all 50 stockholders. Barrow was surely aware that the large number of shareholders meant that his 25% interest put him in a very strong position.

Construction of Diamond Park. When the Toronto team was founded in 1895, it played at a field at Queen and Broadview that would later be known as Sunlight Park. It moved to Hanlan’s Point for the 1897 season when it was owned by Solman and the ferry company. This meshed nicely with their business interests.

However, when the ownership changed after the 1900 season, it was a foregone conclusion that the team would play in a stadium on the mainland because it would be more accessible. There were constant complaints about the quality of the ferry service to the islands. Barrow had built ballparks previously when he managed in Wheeling and Paterson, and he seems to have taken complete control of the decision-making process in Toronto, which would become somewhat convoluted.21 His first attempt was to negotiate with the city for the use of a city-controlled site.22 When this failed, he looked more broadly. The newspaper accounts of the decision-making process are incomplete and confusing.23 The Toronto Street Railway wanted to avoid entering a competition, but it seems that it was willing to offer a rent-free location “‘within 12 minutes ride’ of Yonge and King streets.”24 When it was pointed out that this could be as far away as Bloor Street, the Star regarded this as “corner lots in the cow pastures.”25 Thus, this “offer” was not given serious consideration.

Barrow and Mack finally arranged to lease a property close to downtown at the southeast corner of Liberty Street and Fraser Avenue, which would suggest that the park was located immediately south of the southwest corner of what is now Lamport Stadium.26 Construction soon began with the understanding that the stadium would be ready by Opening Day of the 1901 season.27 The estimated cost of $10,000 “to put the grounds in shape” required another trip to the money market for Barrow, who seemed to have full responsibility for all aspects of fund-raising and construction.28

As sometimes happens in these cases, construction was not completed in time for the start of the 1901 season, so the team had to play its first 13 games on the road. Since the Leafs had been scheduled to open the season at home, this required other teams to adjust their travel schedules.29 However, when the stadium did open, a local journalist rose to great rhetorical heights:

’Twas a great opening. President Ed Mack, the fashion plate of baseball society, and his co-directors expanded their chests and smiled gigantic smiles with joyful rapidity as they observed the 5,000 spectators crowd into the stands …

The street parade, which preceded all this, was a gorgeous spectacle, and it awoke the populace down-town to the fact that something was happening out west about Fraser avenue [sic], and they immediately set sail for the new ball grounds …

When all of the 5,000 had been properly seated in the commodious stands and had concluded their rapturous admiration of the grounds, Easter (sic) League President Powers…took his seat in the box of honor … 30

The team continued to play at this venue until 1907. A group of businessmen including Solman, took over the team in 1905 and moved it back to the island for the 1908 season. The team returned to Diamond Park briefly in 1909 when the island park burned down.31 Diamond Park was demolished in 1911 to make way for a factory.

The Toronto Maple Leafs are born. Throughout most of its existence, the name of this team was the Maple Leafs. This has led people to project backward to the idea that it always bore that name, but the name was officially used for the first time in the 1902 season. On April 5, 1902, the Toronto Daily Star carried a short story announcing that the team would now be known as the Maple Leafs because “this name would appeal strongly to Torontonians, and Canadians generally.”32 The previously-used “T” on the players’ uniforms would be replaced by a maple leaf on the left breast. A follow-up note a few days later assured readers that “The name ‘The Maple Leafs’ for the Torontos has made a big hit.”33 The new name merited a one-sentence mention in the Globe.34

It is not clear why the team adopted this label at this time. The name Maple Leafs was not new. The 1894 Guelph Maple Leafs baseball team won the national championship, and the name was so closely associated with Guelph that newspapers confidently used just the name to refer to the Guelph team. The name was also used by a Hamilton baseball team, a hockey team in Port Dalhousie, Ontario (now a part of St. Catharines), and a football team in Carrberry, Manitoba.35 It was also used by teams in curling and lacrosse. The use of the name by the baseball team predated the Toronto Maple Leafs hockey team by a quarter-century.36

Team names and nicknames were not universally used in newspapers at this point, so the moniker did not catch on immediately. A review of newspaper stories about the team for the 1902 season found an occasional reference to Maple Leafs, but the team was usually called the Toronto baseball team with an occasional reference to Canucks, Torontos, or Barrowites. This was likely a matter of style in that nicknames were simply not used very much at this time, but it also had to do with practicalities. So many teams in so many different sports used the Maple Leafs moniker that journalists had to be cautious about ambiguities. Even the advertising that was paid for by the team did not include the Maple Leaf appellation. However, the name did eventually catch on. By 1908, Maple Leafs and other team names were used more frequently.

There is no mention that the idea came from Barrow. However, it seems that very little happened around this team that did not go through Barrow, and this is the sort of thing that would appeal to Barrow’s style.

The Love Interest. Good baseball stories always seem to have a love interest—Annie Savoy in Bull Durham and the troubled relationship of Roy Hobbs and Memo Paris in The Natural—and this is no exception. Barrow describes his situation in Toronto in 1902: “I was happy in Toronto, and also I met a young lady, Frances Elizabeth Taylor. I was in no hurry to leave.”37 As charming as it sounds, there was a small problem—both Barrow and Taylor were already married to other people at the time.

Barrow married Alice Calhoun in 1898 in New York City. She was a performer, probably a dancer, and little is known about her.38 Barrow does not mention her in his autobiography, and she does not seem to have been highly visible in the baseball part of his life. In May 1901, their only child died shortly after birth. Alice seems never to have recovered from this tragedy and they drifted apart.39

Frances (Fannie) Taylor married Harry N. Briggs on September 19, 1900, in Toronto. He was described as “travelling representative of Messrs. Dick, Ridout & Company,” a paper bag manufacturing company. It seems to have been a high society wedding. The Globe commented, “They were the recipients of many beautiful and costly presents.”40 Not much else is known about the groom.

Understandably, Barrow’s relationship with Fannie is not well documented. He always referred to her by her maiden name, because she almost surely would have taken her husband’s name when they married. He mentioned that he was pleased to return to Toronto in 1906 for a second stint as manager because it would bring him closer to Fannie.41 Also in 1906, Fannie gave birth to a daughter, Audrey. Barrow does not mention this in his autobiography, but his biographer, Daniel R. Levitt, comments that Barrow treated Audrey as his own daughter.42

Barrow had another stint as manager of the Maple Leafs in 1906, but it was disastrous and he did not complete the season with the team. Instead, he decided to forsake baseball, at least temporarily, in order to purchase and manage a hotel in Toronto from 1906 until 1909.43

There is no evidence that Barrow ever divorced Alice, but she died in April 1911, by which time Fannie was also free of marital bonds. In his autobiography Barrow describes that he “…finally broke down Fannie Elizabeth Taylor.”44 (Alice’s death is not mentioned.) Ed and Fannie were married in Buffalo on January 3, 1912, in a church not far from the baseball stadium.45

Ed and Fannie seem to have had a very positive relationship over the remainder of their lives together. She is mentioned fondly, if not often, in his autobiography. However, it is unclear how much of a role she played in his life. There is only one picture of her in his autobiography, sitting with the wives of Joe McCarthy and Lou Gehrig, probably in Yankee Stadium in the 1930s. There is no photograph of Ed and Fannie together in the book, although there are numerous ones of Ed with baseball personalities and the requisite photo of him with his baseball scout and good friend, Paul Krichell, holding fish they had caught on one of their trips to Canada. Levitt notes that his office in Yankee Stadium was lined with pictures related to his baseball career, but does not mention any family pictures.46 Barrow seems to have been the stereotypical man who is married to his job, with little room for other relationships.

THE ROLE OF CHARLIE MADDOCK

The other person who played an instrumental role in the Toronto baseball team at this time is Charlie Maddock.47 He provided a counterpoint to Barrow; Maddock was a competent, low-key baseball guy who never took on the mantle of leadership or sports entrepreneur in the way that Barrow did. There is little biographical information about him. By 1900, he had been active on the baseball scene in southern Ontario for about 30 years as a player and manager. He was a catcher and, later in his career, a second baseman on some great Guelph Maple Leafs teams.48 He was managing Toronto’s earlier entry in the International Association in 1890 when the league folded, taking all the teams with it.49

The Globe exonerated Maddock of any guilt in the collapse and described how his loyal players stayed on in Toronto after they were paid off to play a game to benefit Maddock.50 Shortly after the demise of the Toronto team, he was offered a job as manager of the Syracuse club in the American Association.51 Later, he was instrumental in obtaining the franchise for the new Toronto team when it was awarded in 1894 for the 1895 season. He was described at that point as having “a modest exterior” but being a “stern disciplinarian.”52 He managed the team for part of its first season until he was relieved of his duties.53 He seems to have been something of a raconteur. On one rainy day, he entertained the young players with stories of how he had played on a team that once scored 113 runs in one game, and on another occasion a mere 78.54

At this time, teams did not typically have coaches to assist the manager, but he seems to have been a presence around the team. He umpired practice games before the season started.55 When Diamond Park was built, he was named superintendent of the grounds, and received high praise for his work.56,57

Beyond his work with this franchise, his name was frequently mentioned in the sports pages as an umpire of local games and in other capacities.58 In sum, he seems to have been an elder statesman with fairly deep roots in the Toronto baseball community.

By any measure, he was a great baseball guy, and had an important, if unclear, relationship with the team. However, his role was always second to Barrow’s leadership role, and his personality contrasted with Barrow’s in ways that will be discussed later.

THE BASEBALL ENVIRONMENT IN THE EARLY 1900S

The early 1900s was a difficult time to run a professional baseball team.59 Organized baseball was digesting a great many changes in a short time period. The Eastern League was a beacon of comparative stability; it had operated at the high minor-league level with small blips since 1884. It consisted of eight teams based in the northeastern United States plus, sometimes, Montreal and Toronto. Almost every year saw turnover in the eight cities represented, but the league itself was quite stable. However, it was affected by the turmoil around it.

After the 1899 season, the National League contracted from 12 to eight teams. This left many players without major-league jobs and four cities without major-league teams. In 1901, Ban Johnson decided to move the American League to major-league status on a par with the National League. These changes meant that the number of major-league teams competing for players had gone from 12 in 1899 to eight in 1900 and back up to 16 in 1901. The fluctuating number of major-league players had an obvious impact on the high tiers of the minor leagues. Then, in 1902 an “outlaw” league called the American Association came on the scene and needed to attract players from the existing leagues.60 It bore the “outlaw” designation because it did not abide by the existing agreements between the major and minor leagues governing player movement among teams.61

The Eastern League was caught in a situation where it was losing some of its best players to both the American League and the American Association. This turmoil was exacerbated by some confusion about the status of player contracts.62 The general idea was that teams would usually, but not always, recognize the current contract of a player, but not the reserve clause. In other words, teams would generally not try to steal a player who was under a current contract with another team, but they would not recognize the reserve aspect of that contract, so that when a contract expired, poaching the player was acceptable.63 However, even this fairly lax convention was not strictly followed, and there were numerous examples of players jumping from one team to another even while under contract. This was particularly problematic for teams in the high minor leagues which were forced to fend off raids by other leagues, while engaging in their own raids to replace players they were losing. This was the complex environment that Barrow and other team executives had to navigate in the early 1900s.

It was not easy to build a team over several years when there was so much turmoil. However, Barrow prided himself on having a good eye for baseball talent and being well-connected among baseball executives. He would need these skills to assemble a competitive team in Toronto in 1900.

BARROW WORKS HIS MAGIC

Table 1 illustrates the fortunes of the Toronto team before, during, and after Barrow’s tenure. The 1899 team that Barrow inherited when he became manager in 1900 was the personification of mediocrity—it finished in fourth place in an eight-team league with a .500 record. However, the team improved significantly over his three-year tenure. After slipping a bit in his first year, the team jumped from sixth to second, and in 1902, he completed the job when the team won the league championship. How did Barrow accomplish this progression?

 

Table 2 provides an indication of the problem that Barrow faced. It lists the players who played the most games at each position for the years before, during, and after his time as manager. In his first year as manager in 1900, two of eight non-pitching position players from the previous year returned, so he had to recruit players for the other six positions. In 1901 he did much better with five returning players. In the year of his ultimate success, 1902, he began the season with only two returning players.

 

Table 2. Continuity of Position Players

 

Table 3 provides similar information for pitchers, but the story is pretty much the same. In most years he had to re-staff the pitching corps. In particular, in 1902 he had only one returning pitcher, Lou Bruce, and this requires some explanation since he is not listed in the 1901 column. Bruce was an extraordinary player who pitched in addition to playing almost every day that he did not pitch at either shortstop or in the outfield. He did pitch some games in 1901, although Baseball Reference does not list him as a pitcher and does not provide his pitching record.

 

Table 3. Continuity of Pitchers

 

Barrow obviously had a difficult time in the 1900 season as indicated by the worsened won-loss record. However, he was willing to experiment with bringing in new players. He was criticized in the local media because by July he had used a total of 31 players in an era when the standard roster was 15 players.64

There were some good players on the 1900 team. The most outstanding player both on and off the field was clearly Lou Bruce. He played in Toronto for five years, usually with a batting average over .300 and with a cumulative pitching record of 34–9.65 He had a short, and much less successful, career in the majors with the Philadelphia Athletics. He had degrees in dentistry from the University of Pennsylvania and in theology from Syracuse University, and he worked as both a dentist and a Methodist minister. He was a proud member of the Mohawk tribe and spent much of his life advocating for First Nation causes. His pleasant personality made him a popular figure wherever he went.66

One of the benefits of the corporate restructuring that Barrow engineered after the 1900 season was that he had more money to spend on players going into 1901.70 This was welcome because the change in the American League’s status increased the level of competition for players. He was able to land pitcher Nick Altrock and second baseman Frank Bonner, and to keep third baseman Bob Schaub.71 Altrock had one outstanding year with Toronto on his way to an extended major-league career with the White Sox and Nationals, including a stellar World Series with the 1906 White Sox. His career WAR was 9.2.72 Bonner’s .340 batting average was a strong contribution to Toronto, but it was pretty much the height of his 13-year career which included six years in the majors. Barrow assembled a very good hitting team supported by Altrock and other good pitchers. He and his backers must have been pleased that the team moved from sixth place to a more respectable second place. However, as indicated in Tables 2 and 3, many of these players moved on at the end of the 1901 season, making it necessary for him to start over in 1902.

After the 1901 season, Mack challenged Barrow’s leadership and suggested that replacing Barrow with a player/manager would save money. This seems an odd stance to take with a manager who has just moved a team from sixth to second place in one year. However, there was some idea that Mack was motivated by a personal grudge. The directors supported Mack by a vote of 3–2, but that decision was overridden by a 58–29 vote of the stockholders, and Barrow remained as manager, although his relationship with Mack was surely damaged.73

Profits were down in the 1901 season, and there were limited funds to attract and retain players for 1902. This problem was exacerbated by the tumultuous situation among the various leagues described above. Tables 2 and 3 indicate that Barrow lost six of the eight position players and retained only one pitcher. This did not augur well for 1902.

THE 1902 CHAMPION SEASON

The season started with the players meeting Barrow at the Grand Union Hotel in Toronto on April 8, 1902.74 Two Canadians were among those reporting, although neither made the team.75 Barrow had assembled a good team by following his usual methods of playing a bit fast and loose with contracting rules.76

Most of the teams in the Eastern League played preseason practice games (as they were called) with each other, which involved travelling around the Northeast—not a pleasant experience in April. With the recent construction of Diamond Park and other expenses, the team was facing a cash crunch. Barrow elected to keep his charges at home, where they played various local teams such as the University of Toronto, the Crescents, and the Night Owls.77 The Toronto team usually won by a large margin, so it is questionable how much real practice they were getting. However, occasionally an opposing player was given a tryout by the Toronto team, much to the delight of the local media.78

When the season started, the Maple Leafs got off to a weak start. Figure 1 tracks the won-loss averages over the entire season for Toronto and Buffalo, the runner-up.

 

Figure 1. 1902 Pennant Race—Buffalo and Toronto

 

After a weak start Toronto pulled substantially ahead of Buffalo in June, but the situation reversed in July as the surging Buffalo team overtook the hometowners. In August it looked as though Toronto had a comfortable lead until Buffalo started on a long, steady increase, which fell just short of overtaking Toronto at the end of the season. The headline in the Star reported that Toronto “won by a good margin,” but the Maple Leafs were fortunate that the season ended before Buffalo could overtake them. Toronto needed to win both games of a double-header on the last day of the season to out-distance Buffalo by a half-game. Even then, Buffalo supporters could point out that Buffalo was victimized by playing seven more games than Toronto. This was the result of rained out games not made up and tie games (caused by darkness or a team needing to make train connections), which did not count in the standings.

 

Toronto had played in the Eastern League since 1895, and this was its first championship. This was cause for great excitement among the Toronto faithful. Barrow was popular, and the locals wanted to tie him down for a future stint as manager, so he was given a contract extension and a significant pay increase. Attendance for the season was 130,000 over 57 home dates for an average of 2,300 per game. This was quite an achievement for a minor-league team, and was better than two National League teams (though only half of what Buffalo drew). It generated a profit of $3,692, which gave the club enough confidence to buy the stadium property, which it had previously been leasing.79

Table 5 lists the non-pitchers who appeared in the most games at every position. Table 6 lists the main pitchers. This information indicates that Barrow did a good job of putting together a group of solid players who had good, if not outstanding, careers. Outfielder Jimmy Bannon and pitchers Buttons Briggs and Jake Thielman, who was only with the team for part of the season, 80 went on to short but respectable major-league careers. All of the other players were career minor leaguers.

 

 

BARROW AS LEADER AND SPORTS ENTREPRENEUR

When Barrow came to Toronto for the 1900 season, he was a fairly young baseball manager on his way up. He served his three years in the high minors in Toronto, but was ticketed for greater things. His next job was managing the Detroit Tigers, and over time, he became manager of the 1918 World Series champion Red Sox, and in 1920 went on to be business manager of the Yankees, where he stayed until 1945. During his Yankees tenure, the team won 14 American League pennants and 10 World Series. He was clearly an effective leader and entrepreneur.

However, baseball was changing in another way. Baseball originated as a gentleman’s game played for recreational purposes, and for the entertainment of the players. Over time, baseball was becoming a money-making business, and in order to meet that imperative, baseball followed the broader societal trend of the 1900s in developing a highly structured organization with specialization of labor, and businessmen-entrepreneurs in charge.82 Charlie Maddock and Ed Barrow provide examples of how different people adapted, or did not adapt, to this change.

Charlie Maddock had played the game very well, and moved up to manage several teams. He stayed involved in all aspects of the game by being a groundskeeper at Diamond Park, umpiring community games, and sometimes playing the role of raconteur in the clubhouse. He really knew the game and seems to have been well-respected by all those involved. However, he never moved to the next level.

Barrow never played professional baseball, but he moved into baseball after failing at some other business ventures because he was interested in the game and because the opportunity presented itself. Barrow was clearly a good baseball man. He took over a mediocre team in Toronto and led it to a league championship, and he did this while working in a very turbulent environment. But beyond that, he understood the business side of baseball in ways that Maddock did not. Barrow took the initiative in reorganizing the ownership structure of the Toronto team. He recognized that the team could make more money playing on the mainland, so he built a stadium close to the center of town. He branded the team as Maple Leafs in order to appeal to the patriotism of local residents.

Barrow also exhibited the political skills required of an organizational man. Levitt’s biography of Barrow is generally positive, but Levitt does suggest that Barrow sometimes exhibited a lack of political skills.83 Of course, Barrow did lose some battles, as would be expected of anyone who had a habit of being dissatisfied with the status quo. However, he did demonstrate political skills on several occasions. He was instrumental in managing the purchase of the Toronto club in 1900 by over 50 shareholders. This involved raising the money for the initial purchase of the club, as well as some operating funds, and the money necessary to build a new stadium. He did all of this in a city (and country) in which he had arrived only recently. When Mack attempted to unseat him as manager, Barrow lost the first battle with the directors, but won a resounding victory with the totality of the shareholders.

Barrow’s political skills extended to an ability to meet and cultivate relationships with the right people. When he was a young upstart in Pittsburgh, he met Al Buckenberger, an old baseball hand and manager of the Pittsburgh team. He won the confidence of Harry Stevens, who went on to be one of the best-known names in baseball.84 When the Atlantic League folded, he had the right contacts to land a job managing a team in the high minors. He seems to have had significant political skills that extended to making the right contacts at the right time, and employing those contacts in beneficial ways.

Smythe “recognized the value of a market.” Barrow came to the foreign city of Toronto and expanded the ownership base of the team to include influential businessmen like Ed Mack and a large number of other investors who would surely be effective ambassadors for the team. This community ownership broadened the appeal of the fledgling team among the general population.

Second, Barrow followed Smythe’s maxim that “It’s all about the talent.” Barrow was quite successful in bringing players to Toronto who would improve the quality of the team and ultimately win a league championship. In fact, Barrow rebuilt and improved the quality of the team every year. He was able to do this because he was a superior judge of talent, and because he had contacts throughout the baseball world.

Third, Smythe is credited with the genius of changing the name of his hockey team from the St. Pat’s to the more Canadian Maple Leafs. In fact, the foreigner Barrow had beat him to this idea by a full quarter century.

Finally, Smythe recognized the importance of an attractive venue when he built Maple Leaf Gardens. Barrow’s Diamond Park lacked the architectural grandeur of the “cash box on Carlton Street”—as Maple Leafs Gardens became known—but it was recognized as a comfortable, modern venue in its time that was easily accessible to patrons. He established the venue at a central location on the mainland and avoided the temptation of the “cow pasture” land on remote Bloor Street.

These are examples of the ways in which Barrow was honing his skills in Toronto that he would demonstrate later in his lengthy baseball career. In New York he recognized the pride New Yorkers famously hold for their city. He built on it by assembling excellent teams, and built a venue as grandiose as the personalities that played there, which would become one of the most iconic venues in sports.

CONCLUSION

This has been the story of the intersection of one of the longest-running and most successful franchises in minor-league baseball with a young man on the rise who was learning skills that would make him one of the most renowned leaders and entrepreneurs in sports. Barrow established his credentials as a good baseball man who could take over a mediocre team and turn it into a league champion. He also recognized that baseball was moving beyond its recreational roots to become a business. He developed the political skills needed to work with a governing board, the financial skills needed to assemble funding for operations and for major projects, and the marketing skills needed to attract patrons to the ballpark. He was a model of the sports entrepreneur of the twentieth century. 

DAVID SIEGEL has been a member of SABR since 2006. After 40 years as a professor of political science and administrator at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ontario, he has turned his attention to researching and writing about baseball.

 

Notes

1. Barrow returned to Toronto for a brief stint as manager during the 1906 season, but this was disastrous for both Barrow and the team.

2. Jane Finnan Dorward, “Ed Barrow’s Toronto Years,” in Jane Finnan Dorward, ed., Dominionball: Baseball Above the 49th (Cleveland: The Society for American Baseball Research Inc., 2005), 101–108.

3. Daniel R. Levitt, Ed Barrow: The Bulldog Who Built the Yankees’ First Dynasty (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2008), 10.

4. Edward Grant Barrow with James M. Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball (New York: Coward-McCann, Inc., 1951), 11, 13.

5. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 14.

6. Spelled Pittsburg at the time.

7. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 2008, 15.

8. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 28, 48.

9. Baseball Reference https://www.baseball-reference.com/bullpen/Ed_Barrow, accessed, June 23, 2023.

10. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 49.

11. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 38–9.

12. Untitled, Toronto Daily Star, July 30, 1900, 6; “Stars in Bad Way,” Democrat and Chronicle (Rochester, NY), April 25,1901, 15; Untitled, Buffalo Express, December 2, 1901, 9; “Baseball.” The Globe, February 11, 1905, 21.

13. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 50.

14. “New Arrangements by the Ferry Co.,” The Globe, April 22,1903, 4; “At Lakeside Home,” The Globe, May 30, 1903, 24.

15. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 37.

16. The Toronto islands are a much-loved group of islands that form Toronto harbour. They are mostly parkland with a fancy yacht club and some privately owned cottages; motor vehicles are prohibited. Torontonians see the short ferry ride to the islands as a welcome escape from the hustle and bustle of city life. Hanlan’s Point is revered by baseball fans as the locus of Babe Ruth’s first home run in a regular season game. In more recent times, the beach at Hanlan’s Point has become a gay meeting place, and is the only municipally sanctioned clothing-optional beach in the city. Times change.

17. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 41.

18. “Toronto Ball Club Affairs,” The Globe, September 28, 1900, 8; Levitt, Ed Barrow, 41.

19. “Baseball Club Changes Hands,” Toronto Daily Star, November 21, 1900, 6.

20. “Baseball Club Changes Hands,” Toronto Daily Star, November 21, 1900, 6.

21. Dorward, “Ed Barrow’s Toronto Years,” 102.

22. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 43.

23. “Baseball Club Changes Hands,” Toronto Daily Star, November 21, 1900, 6; “Officers of the New Ball Club,” Toronto Daily Star, November 22, 1900, 8; “Getting Grounds on the City Side,” Toronto Daily Star, December 8, 1900, 7.

24. “Baseball Club Changes Hands,” Toronto Daily Star, November 21, 1900, 6.

25. “Officers of the New Ball Club,” Toronto Daily Star, November 22, 1900, 8.

26. “Deal for Grounds Ratified,” The Globe, March 6, 1901, 10; Levitt, Ed Barrow, 43, 50.

27. “Deal for Grounds Ratified,” The Globe, March 6, 1901, 10.

28. “Liners,” The Globe, March 26, 1901, 10.

29. “Baseball, The Globe, April 16, 1901, 10.

30. “Toronto Beaten in the Opening Game,” Toronto Daily Star, May 11, 1901, 15.

31. “Ball Club To Play At Diamond Park.” Toronto Daily Star. August 13, 1909, 9.

32. “Will Be Called the Maple Leafs,” Toronto Daily Star, April 5, 1902, 8.

33. “Baseball Brevities” Toronto Daily Star, April 8, 1902, 8.

34. “Liners,” The Globe, April 7, 1902, 10.

35. “Cornwall Goals Inches Too High,” Toronto Daily Star, February 13, 1902, 8; “Football Paragraphs,” Toronto Daily Star, April 4, 1902, 8.

36. Kevin Shea and Jason Wilson, The Toronto Maple Leafs Hockey Club: The Official Centennial Publication (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 2016), 33.

37. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 52; Levitt, Ed Barrow, 70.

38. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 35.

39. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 44.

40. “Social and Personal,” The Globe, September 20, 1900, 12; “A Marriage at St. Enoch’s To-day,” Toronto Daily Star, September 19, 1900, 5.

41. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 61.

42. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 84.

43. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 71–2.

44. Barrow with Kahn, My Fifty Years in Baseball, 76.

45. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 84.

46. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 325.

47. William C. Maddock. His name was also sometimes spelled Maddocks in the Toronto newspapers.

48. Louis Cauz, Baseball’s Back in Town (Toronto: A Controlled Media Publication, 1977), 23.

49. “Liners,” The Globe, April 11, 1902, 10.

50. “The American Curlers,” The Globe, July 10, 1890, 6.

51. “Baseball,” The Globe, July 14, 1890, 6.

52. Daily Mail and Empire, April 15, 1895, 2.

53. David Siegel, “Professional Baseball Comes to Toronto to Stay: The Toronto Baseball Club in the Eastern League, 1895,” in Andrew North, ed., Our Game, Too (Phoenix, AZ: Society for American Baseball Research, Inc., 2022), 184–93.

54. “An Off Day for the Ball Players,” Toronto Daily Star, August 6, 1902, 8.

55. “Maple Leafs in a Practice Game,” Toronto Daily Star, April 12, 1902, 8; “Scott and Brennan at Work,” Toronto Daily Star, April 29, 1902, 8.

56. “Liners,” the Globe, March 12, 1901, 12; “Diamond Park in Fine Condition,” Toronto Daily Star, April 2, 1902, 8.

57. “Friday, Opening Day,” The Globe, May 8, 1901, 10.

58. “Baseball Brevities,” Toronto Daily Star, April 21, 1902, 8; “Varsity Beat St Michael’s,” The Globe, April 30, 1900, 12; “Other Saturday Games,” The Globe, July 8, 1901, 7.

59. Dorward, “Ed Barrow’s Toronto Years,” 102.

60. Harold Seymour and Dorothy Seymour Mills, Baseball: The Early Years (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960), 315 and passim.; Bill O’Neal, The American Association: A Baseball History 1902–1991 (Austin, TX: Eakin Press, 1991), 3: Neil J. Sullivan, The Minors: The Struggles and the Triumph of Baseball’s Poor Relations from 1876 to the Present (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1990), chapters 2 and 3.

61. Robert Obojski, Bush League: A History of Minor League Baseball (New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.), 10; Sullivan, The Minors, 18, 38, 44.

62. Obojski, Bush League, 13 ff.

63. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 42.

64. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 39.

65. Baseball-Reference, https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=bruce-001lou, accessed, February 5, 2025.

66. Rory Costello, “Lou Bruce,” SABR BioProject https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/lou-bruce/, accessed, February 5, 2025.

67. Chris Rainey, “Harry Bemis,” SABR BioProject. https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/harry-bemis/, accessed, February 5, 2025.

68. Harry Bemis, https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=bemis-001har, accessed, October 26, 2023.

69. Charlie Carr, https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=carr–001cha, accessed, October 26, 2023.

70. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 42.

71. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 43.

72. Nick Altrock, https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=altroc001nic, accessed, October 26, 2023.

73. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 47.

74. “Toronto Team Reports.” The Globe, April 9, 1902, 10.

75. “The News of Sport” The Globe, April 9, 1902, 10.

76. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 48–9.

77. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 49.

78. “Frank Scott Has Signed,” The Globe, April 25, 1902, 10.

79. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 50.

80. Jake Thielman, https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=thielm001joh, accessed, October 27, 2023.

81. John L. Allen, “Professional Sport,” in Matthew J. Robinson, Mary A. Hums, R. Brian Crow, and Dennis R. Phillips, eds., Profiles of Sport Industry Professionals (Gaithersburg, MD: Aspen Publishers, Inc., 2001), 119–30.

82. Peter Levine, A.G. Spalding and the Rise of Baseball (New York: Oxford University Press, 1985) describes this evolution and how Spalding was able to make the transition from player to baseball executive to sporting goods entrepreneur. See also: Levitt, Ed Barrow, 3–4.

83. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 43, 45–6.

84. Levitt, Ed Barrow, 19.

85. Julie Stevens, “Conn Smythe: the complexity and contradiction of a hockey entrepreneur” Sport in Society, vol. 23, no. 9 (2020), 1474–5. https://doi.org/10.1080/17430437.2020.1723242.