“You see, Mr. Gaffney, in 1794, when this law was passed, the communities were very small, consisting of little towns and villages where they had cock-fighting, dog-fighting, and other sports and games which no doubt did create a noise which disturbed the entire community. But conditions have changed since that time and I don’t believe they had any baseball games in 1794. You see we must view this subject in a sensible light. – Judge Frank Smith comments to Philadelphia City Solicitor Joseph Gaffney at a hearing in Philadelphia, August 19, 19261

Dating back to the nineteenth century, cities and towns were uncomfortable with baseball being played on what was, and is, to most Americans, the Sabbath, a day for rest and prayer. Laws impacted play in both the major leagues and the minor leagues. Battles over Sunday baseball continued into the twentieth century and many of us can still remember that when we were growing up, there was little if any Sunday night baseball, and that Pennsylvania law dictated that no inning could commence after 7:00 P.M. on Sundays.

During the early days of Organized baseball, several major-league teams would venture to remote beach locations for Sunday games. Philadelphia was no exception.

The Philadelphia Athletics of the American Association ventured to Gloucester Point in New Jersey to play on Sundays for three seasons after the Gloucester City Council approved the games on May 19, 1888.2 Of course, this met with some opposition. These words appeared in the Harrisburg Independent on June 27, 1888: “Sunday baseball and Sunday beer go hand in hand, the one being necessary to invigorate the other and both being of the character of a defilement of a day which all laws, divine and human, demand shall be kept holy.”3 By July 1888 there was talk of impeaching the mayor of Gloucester for failing to enforce laws against beer and baseball. Boats would ferry fans to the resort where not only was there a ballgame, but an opportunity to buy beer. As noted in the Philadelphia Inquirer, “Every Sunday evening, the ferry boats landing at Christian and South streets emit hundreds of drunken, quarreling, swearing discordant men and women, who create disturbances and street fights and generally wind up by obtaining a rest in the station house cells.”4 On September 1, 1889, Frank Fennelly, then playing with the Athletics, hit the 32nd of his 34 major-league homers at Gloucester Point.

Sunday-play bans in most major-league cities continued into the twentieth century. Only six of the 16 major-league teams played Sunday home games in 1902. During the first two decades of the twentieth century, one by one, the bans were lifted.

During the First World War, Connie Mack offered a suggestion that Shibe Park be used for Sunday games to benefit the war effort. The idea was to open the ballpark on Sundays for the 20,000 servicemen stationed in Philadelphia and have games between enlisted men and professional teams.5 But the idea met with opposition from the clergy. Reverend James M.S. Isenberg said, “I think it is a poor way to teach our young men to violate the Lord’s day when we believe our cause is right.”6 Nothing came of the effort and Sunday baseball did not come to Philadelphia in 1918.

However, in 1918, Washington hosted Sunday baseball for the first time, and in 1919 the three New York teams followed suit. The last two states holding out against Sunday baseball were those cradles of democracy, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.

In Philadelphia, the Athletics decided to rail against the state’s Blue Laws, enacted on April 22, 1794, and the first Sunday game was played at Shibe Park on August 22, 1926. Lefty Grove pitched the Athletics to a 3-2 win over the White Sox.

On August 19, the Thursday before the game, the pros and cons of Sunday baseball were argued at a hearing after Connie Mack sought an injunction preventing any interference by the authorities, including Mayor Freeland Kendrick. During the hearing, Charles G. Gartling, the Athletics’ counsel, argued that the police had no right to enter the grounds and break up a game. He maintained that the only recourse of the police would be to arrest the players the next day and fine them $4. A contrary view was expressed by Philadelphia City Solicitor Joseph P. Gaffney. Gaffney maintained that professional baseball games on Sunday constituted a breach of peace, and thus could be stopped by the police.7

Among those who gave testimony was Connie Mack. An impressive figure on the witness stand, he said that at the Sunday games he had witnessed in other cities, fans were better dressed and better behaved than crowds on other days. Hearing that, Gaffney came up with a hypothetical situation. “Suppose in the ninth inning, two men were out, three were on base, the home team two runs behind, and the batter hits a home run. Would the crowd lose his control and respect for Sunday?” Mack responded, “I can see the crowd just rising quietly and leaving.” The courtroom broke into laughter and the judge had to use his gavel.8

The injunction was issued by Judge Frank Smith, who held that “baseball does not tend to immorality or the corruption of youth” and added that baseball took a person “out into the open, who might otherwise spend his time to his own disadvantage.”9 The game was played in somewhat intemperate weather, but Mack was pleased that the fans had the opportunity to witness the event. He said, “The most severe critics and opponents of Sunday baseball, at the game, would, I am sure, be satisfied that the club gave everything it had for the enjoyment of a large number of people and, as a result, their feelings toward Sunday baseball would be changed. I wish all those who oppose Sunday baseball could have been here today. They would see that we are not causing a lessening in Church attendance.”10

As with much of the debate concerning Sunday baseball, there was some levity displayed in the reporting. This notice appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer on August 21, 1926: “(On August 20) Members of the Germantown Boys Club were guests of Cornelius McGillicuddy, that wicked advocate of Sunday baseball. The loud rooting disturbed the peace of an organ grinder with a monkey, who was working the east side of Twentieth Street between Lehigh and Somerset.”11

On Sunday, August 22, more than 12,000 fans braved the elements and saw the Athletics defeat the White Sox, 3-2, in 1 hour and 45 minutes. Rain had intermittently pelted Philadelphia for the week leading up to the game and most observers were surprised that the game was played at all. As noted by James C. Isaminger in the Philadelphia Inquirer, the game “was played under distressing weather conditions and started in an exasperating drizzle that threated at any minute to turn into such a fury of a storm as to quickly chase the players off the field. There was some luck left for the wicked Sunday exploiters of baseball for the ominous downpour never came, and rain stopped entirely by the middle of the game to be renewed later in the form of a scotch mist.”12 (In weather jargon, scotch mist is a light, steady drizzle.)

Injunction or not, the opponents of Sunday baseball in Philadelphia were not about to allow Sunday baseball to continue without a court battle. The game on August 22 was the only Sunday game scheduled and played in Philadelphia that season. Mayor Kendrick and City Solicitor Joseph Gaffney were openly opposed to Sunday baseball and noted that Judge Smith’s ruling came in a preliminary hearing. No arrests were made on Sunday because a Pennsylvania law enacted in 1705 made it illegal to arrest people on Sunday except for felony or breach of peace. The city officials vowed to seek a reversal of Judge Smith’s ruling and the clergy was adamant. Reverend William B. Forney of the Philadelphia Sabbath Association said, “Sunday’s game was the most outrageous thing put on in any civilized community. The crowds yelled and screamed enough to disgust any one. I was ashamed that such an exhibition could be held on the Sabbath.”13

The matter did wind up in the courts. On October 28 the Dauphin County Court ruled that professional Sunday baseball constituted “worldly entertainment” and was therefore illegal. On June 25, 1927, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, in a 5-to-2 decision upheld the ruling that professional baseball is a business and worldly entertainment and, as such, was in violation of the Blue Laws of 1794. Thus, Sunday baseball remained banned in Pennsylvania.14

After a referendum in 1928, the ban in Boston was lifted in 1929, leaving the three Pennsylvania teams as the only teams without Sunday baseball.

But the Blue Laws were not uniformly applied in Pennsylvania. Minor-league baseball was played on Sunday in various locations, but the courts would not allow Sunday baseball at the major-league level. In Philadelphia on Sunday June 14, 1931, the Penn Athletic Club hosted the Englewood (New Jersey) Athletic Club in a game at the Baker Bowl, the Phillies ballpark. It was a poorly played affair with seemingly as many errors as hits as the hosts won 14-12.15

Sunday baseball became an economic necessity, especially for the Athletics. During the court hearing in 1926, the Athletics president, John R. Shibe, had testified that the team could make an additional $20,000 per game on Sundays. Although they had been in the World Series from 1929 through 1931, their attendance slipped as the Depression worsened. It declined from 839,176 in 1929 to 721,636 in 1930 and 627,464 in 1931. In 1933, attendance was down to 297,138.

In 1931 a bill allowing Sunday baseball was introduced in the state legislature by South Philadelphia’s Stephen C. Denning, but the opposition remained strong. Despite the extraordinary measure of bringing one pro-Sunday-ball legislator, who had been ill, to the pivotal vote by ambulance, the measure failed to pass.

Connie Mack maintained that his Athletics, despite winning pennants from 1929 through 1931, were losing potential revenue by the absence of Sunday baseball, necessitating the selling of Al Simmons, Jimmy Dykes, and Mule Haas to the Chicago White Sox for $100,000 after the 1932 season.

But the forces against the 1794 Blue Laws had picked up momentum, and the bills enabling Sunday baseball and other types of recreation moved forward. No fewer than six anti-Blue Laws bills were introduced in the early ’30s. Rallies supporting the measures included a large gathering at the Elks Club, meeting at the behest of the Association for the Encouragement and Regulation of Sunday Sports and featuring Philadelphia Councilman W. W. Roper.

At the rally, James J. Walsh, managing secretary of the Market Street Merchants Association, tried to strike a conciliatory tone. He said, “Our country is getting diminishing returns from its youth, diminishing returns from its home life, diminishing returns from its laws, while restrictive and prohibitive legislation, or the demand for it, is ever mounting. The Blue Laws of Pennsylvania should be revised – and by such a revision we do not by any means intend a ‘wide-open city.’ A good baseball game on Sunday is not a crime; a good musical concert certainly should not be disallowed.”16

A public hearing on a bill sponsored by state Representative Louis Schwartz of Philadelphia was scheduled for January 31. This bill, limited in scope, allowed for the playing of baseball and other outdoor sports (excluding boxing, wrestling, hunting, and fishing) on Sundays between 2:00 P.M. and 6:00 P.M. The bill called for referendums to sanction these activities. Proponents of the legislation (including Roper, Walsh, Adolph Hirschburg of the American Federation of Labor, Edward A. Kelly, and Connie Mack) were heard as were opponents led by Reverend W.D. Forney of the Lords Day Alliance.17 Mack testified that it had been his experience that in seven American League cities, Sunday games were played with no disorder. He said, “If I felt for a moment that Sunday baseball was going to be detrimental to morals of people of Philadelphia, our gates would never open.”18

Councilman W.W. Roper’s testimony was compelling. He said, “The Pennsylvania Blue Laws of 1794 undoubtedly reflected the spirit of those times. Conditions today are totally different from what they were 150 years ago. Regulations designed for the primitive society of the eighteenth century cannot be inflicted upon us in this age without injury to the health and welfare of our people. Respect for law is somewhat like respect for an individual. Neither is given gratuitously – they must both be earned. And respect for law can only be earned through its appeal to the sense of justice. Today, a large majority of the people demand the right to enjoy orderly healthful recreation on their day of rest.”19

Dr. Robert Bagnell of the State Council of Churches countered by saying, “We are opposed to any effort to lessen the sanctity of the day or open it to the inroads of commercialism. Don’t let the camel get his nose under the tent. Once the camel gets inside the tent, Sunday motion pictures will follow.”20

The legislation was passed in the Pennsylvania House of Representatives, but was stalled in the Senate. Indeed, the bill was voted down on March 14. But proponents did not give up the fight. The bill was reconsidered in the Senate and amendments were added, the key one being a call for a statewide referendum the following November, killing the idea of Sunday baseball for 1933. On April 11, 1933, the amended bill was passed. After much deliberation, and at the urging of Connie Mack, Governor Gifford Pinchot signed the bill into law on April 25.21

“While the spectators uncorked some healthy American rooting, it was an orderly crowd, and not one untoward event marked the first game under the law sponsored by Representative Louis Schwartz, who watched the game from a box.” – Philadelphia Inquirer, April 8, 193422

In November of 1933, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh said “yes” to allowing Sunday baseball. The first legal Sunday baseball game in Philadelphia was played on April 8, 1934, as the Phillies took on the Athletics in an exhibition game at Shibe Park. A week later the teams opposed each other at the Baker Bowl. The Athletics hosted Washington in the first legal regular-season Sunday game on April 22. Before the game, as 20,306 spectators looked on, Connie Mack gave a silver loving cup to Representative Schwartz for his role in passing the enabling legislation.23 One week later, the Pittsburgh Pirates hosted Cincinnati and the Philadelphia Phillies hosted the Dodgers in the first National League Sunday games in those cities.

ALAN COHEN has been a SABR member since 2010. He serves as vice president-treasurer of the Connecticut Smoky Joe Wood Chapter, is a datacaster (MiLB First Pitch stringer) for the Hartford Yard Goats, the Double-A affiliate of the Colorado Rockies, and has been serving as head of SABR’s fact-checking committee since December 13, 2020. He attended Franklin and Marshall College and attended Opening Night at Connie Mack Stadium on April 14, 1967. His biographies, game stories, and essays have appeared in more than 60 SABR publications. Since his first Baseball Research Journal article appeared in 2013, Alan has continued to expand his research into the Hearst Sandlot Classic (1946-1965), from which 87 players advanced to the major leagues. He has four children, nine grandchildren, and one great-grandchild, and resides in Connecticut with wife Frances, their cats, Morty, Ava, and Zoe, and their dog Buddy.

SOURCES

For further reading on the subject of Sunday baseball, the author recommends:

Bevis, Charlie. Sunday Baseball: The Major Leagues’ Struggle to Play Baseball on the Lord’s Day, 1876-1934 (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland and Company, 2003).

DeMotte, Charles. Bat, Ball, and Bible: Baseball and Sunday Observance in New York (Washington: Potomac Books, 2013).

NOTES

1 “Court Will Decide if Sunday Baseball Is Breach of Peace,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 20, 1926: 7.

2 “Sunday Baseball Games at Gloucester,” New York Tribune, May 20, 1888: 2.

3 Harrisburg (Pennsylvania) Independent, June 27, 1888: 1.

4 “Still Defying the Law,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 2, 1888: 5.

5 “Sunday Baseball in Quaker City?” Reading Times, May 1, 1918: 11.

6 “Church Opposes Sunday Games,” Harrisburg Telegraph, May 3, 1918: 18.

7 “Court Will Decide if Sunday Baseball Is Breach of Peace,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 20, 1926: 1.

8 “Court Will Decide if Sunday Baseball Is Breach of Peace,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 20, 1926: 7.

9 “Court Restrains Police from Stopping Sunday Ball Game,” Sunday News (Lancaster, Pennsylvania), August 22, 1926: 2.

10 “First Sunday Major league Ball Game in Phila. Goes Over with a Bang,” Boston Herald, August 23, 1926: 6.

11 “Macaroons,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 21, 1926: 10.

12 James C. Isaminger, “Grove Hurls Mackmen to Victory in First Sunday Major Game Played Here,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 23, 1926: 16.

13 “Mayor to Continue Sunday Ball Fight,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 24, 1926: 2.

14 “Shibe Inspects Jersey Site for Sunday Games,” Philadelphia Inquirer, March 29, 1931: 6.

15 “Pennacs Biff Out Win Over Englewood Rival in Phillies’ Park Fuss,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 15, 1931: 13.

16 “Blue Law Foes Mass to Voice Protest,” Philadelphia Inquirer, January 31, 1933: 12.

17 John M. Cummings, “Early Report Scheduled on Sunday Sport,” Philadelphia Inquirer, January 31, 1933: 1.

18 Cummings, “Committee Votes for Legalization of Sunday Sport,” Philadelphia Inquirer, February 1, 1933: 1, 6, 7.

19 “Committee Votes for Legalization of Sunday Sport.”

20 “Committee Votes for Legalization of Sunday Sport.”

21 “Pinchot Approves Sunday Baseball Ballot by People,” Wilkes-Barre (Pennsylvania) Record, April 26, 1933: 1.

22 Isaminger, “Haslin and Allen Lead Phil Parade in Series Starter,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 9, 1934: 13.

23 Isaminger, “Infield Miscue, Schulte Clout, Send Down A’s,” Philadelphia Inquirer, April 23, 1934: 15.

B

The Negro National League was formed the following season and the Eastern Colored League came into existence three years later. The first Negro League game at Shibe Park, between the Kansas City Monarchs and Hilldale, took place on October 8, 1925. It was the fifth game of the Negro League World Series. The Monarchs had won the pennant in the Negro National League and Hilldale had prevailed in the Eastern Colored League. On October 8, Hilldale defeated the Monarchs. Rube Curry hurled scattered eight hits for the winners, who went up four games to one in the best of nine Series.3 Two days later, back at Shibe Park, Hilldale won, 5-2, to win the Series in six games.

Shibe Park did not become a regular venue for Negro League ball until World War II. The Philadelphia Stars, beginning in 1934, were an integral part of the Negro National League, but their games were played at the 44th and Parkside Ballpark.

After a 17-year absence, Negro League baseball returned to Shibe Park during the 1942 Negro League World Series and did so with the two top players in the Negro Leagues, Satchel Paige of the Monarchs and Josh Gibson of the Homestead Grays.

The fifth game of the Negro League World Series between the Homestead Grays and the Kansas City Monarchs was played at Shibe Park on September 29, 1942. The Monarchs had won the first three games of the Series and the fourth was ruled a “no-contest” after it was discovered that the Homestead Grays, in winning, had used ineligible players in the game. The Monarchs needed only one more win to clinch the title. Eight players from that game have made it to the Hall of Fame.

The Monarchs were led by star pitcher Satchel Paige4 and won the game 9-5 in front of 14,029 spectators. The Grays took a 5-2 lead after three innings. Paige entered the game with two on and two out in the fourth inning and the Grays did not score again. Paige allowed no hits while striking out seven and walking two over the game’s remaining 5⅓ innings. Why hadn’t Paige started the game? He was late after being arrested for speeding through Lancaster, Pennsylvania, en route from Pittsburgh.5

The Monarchs scored in the first inning when Bill Simms tripled and came home on a single by Newt Allen. The Grays tallied three runs in the bottom of the first inning. With two out, Howard Easterling walked, advanced to third on a two-base error and scored on an infield hit by Buck Leonard. Josh Gibson, who had reached on the error, scored along with Leonard on a double by Ray Brown. The Monarchs got one of the runs back in the third inning. Willard Brown reached on an error, went station to station on a single by Joe Greene and a bunt by Buck O’Neil, and scored when a grounder by Bonnie Serrell was misplayed. After the Grays scored a pair in the bottom of the third to take a 5-2 lead, the Monarchs got back into the game when Greene launched a two-run homer off John Wright in the fourth inning. They took the lead with a pair in the seventh and blew the game open with three in the eighth. Wright was the losing pitcher.6

With both the Phillies and Athletics using Shibe Park, there were few open dates, and there was a concern as to how many people of color would attend games on a weeknight in a predominantly White part of the city. During the years when the Stars played at Shibe Park, most of their home games were still played at Parkside. Shibe Park was used primarily on Monday and Tuesday nights. Quite often, the opposition was provided by the Kansas City Monarchs and Homestead Grays, and doubleheaders were common.

The first Philadelphia Stars appearance at Shibe Park occurred on June 21, 1943. The Monarchs’ Paige was matched up against Barney Brown of the Stars. Brown was backed up by a lineup that featured slugging first baseman Jim West, along with Henry Spearman, player-manager Homer Curry, Henry Kimbro, and outfielder Felton Snow. Pitchers Bill Byrd and Bob Clark were also available.7 The Stars won the game, 8-5, in front of 24,165 fans, which would be the biggest turnout ever to see Negro League ball at Shibe Park. Hitting stars for Philadelphia as they came from behind to win were Homer Curry with three hits, including a double, and center fielder Gene Benson with three singles.8 Benson played with the Stars from 1938 through 1948.

A September 8, 1943, encounter matched the Monarchs and the Homestead Grays. It was Paige vs. Gibson, the slugging catcher of the Grays. The Grays won the game 12-2 in front of 12,198 spectators. The only Monarchs runs came on a two-run homer by Willard Brown in the fourth inning off John Wright, who was otherwise flawless in the complete-game victory.9 It was the third homer in as many 1943 appearances at Shibe Park for Brown, whose talents were recognized by the Hall of Fame in 2006.

In a doubleheader on July 18, 1944, the Homestead Grays played the Baltimore Elite Giants in the opener and the Philadelphia Stars in the nightcap. In the opener, Josh Gibson homered in an 11-4 Grays win. It was his first homer in three visits to Shibe Park and he would go on to hit home runs in each of the big-league parks he played in. Roy Campanella of Baltimore had three hits in a losing cause. In the nightcap, the game was halted by curfew after 11 innings with the score tied 4-4. The attendance for the doubleheader was a season’s high 15,072.10

There was a three-team event on August 28, 1944. In the first game, the Philadelphia Stars faced the Birmingham Black Barons, and in the nightcap the winner of the first game faced Paige’s Monarchs. The doubleheader drew 13,136 fans, and they saw Birmingham win the opener 6-3. The Barons jumped off to the early lead when Lorenzo “Piper” Davis slammed a three-run homer and Earl Bumpus scattered nine hits in winning the game for Birmingham. In the second game, Paige and Hilton Smith combined to shut out the Barons 10-0. Paige pitched four innings, allowing only one hit. The hitting star for the Monarchs was Bonnie Serrell, who had four hits, including a first-inning homer, and became the first Negro League player to hit for the cycle at Shibe Park.11

On May 21, 1945, the Stars played the Grays in a Negro National League game at Shibe Park. With 10,021 fans looking on, the Grays won the game 7-1 as pitcher Roy Welmaker scattered eight hits and 19-year-old Dave Hoskins had three hits, including a triple.12 Seven years later, Hoskins broke the color barrier in the Texas League.

On June 18, 1945, the Kansas City Monarchs were back in town. Satchel Paige was still the big drawing card, but readers of the Philadelphia Inquirer learned that the Monarchs also featured a rookie shortstop who had played his college ball at UCLA: Jackie Robinson. The Stars, in a fairly one-sided game, defeated the Monarchs 5-1. A Monday night crowd of 10,412 watched the Stars get to Paige for five runs and seven hits over four innings, the key blows being a double by Frankie Austin and a triple by Marvin Williams. The Monarchs’ leading hitter was Robinson. He had a single and a double in his Shibe Park debut.13

Negro League baseball was also entertainment and on Wednesday, July 11, 1945, the Cincinnati Clowns came to town with their assortment of players short and tall. There were two games that night. In the opener the Stars played the Newark Eagles to begin the second half of the Negro National League season. Pitching for the Stars was Roy Partlow, and he was matched up against the Eagles’ youngster Don Newcombe. Although Newcombe was the winning pitcher in the 5-3 contest, Partlow struck out 10 Eagles. During the intermission the crowd of 11,408 was entertained by the antics of baseball clown Circus Eddie Hamman. After the intermission, the Stars went on to defeat the Clowns 9-1.14

The fourth game of the 1945 Negro League World Series was played at Shibe Park on September 20, 1945. The Homestead Grays, appearing in their eighth consecutive Series, took on the Cleveland Buckeyes. It was the Buckeyes’ first-ever appearance at Shibe Park. They were led by their center fielder, Sam Jethroe, who had led the league in batting in 1945. Having won the first three games of the Series, the Buckeyes closed things out on September 20. With Frank Carswell on the mound and Jethroe leading the offensive onslaught with three hits, the Buckeyes won 5-0, as an estimated 5,000 fans looked on, to break the Grays’ grasp on the Negro League title. The team, which called both Pittsburgh and Washington home, had won the Series in 1943 and 1944.15 After winning the game the Buckeyes took a bit of a break and came out on the field to play the Philadelphia Stars, winning 4-1 with seldom-used John Brown besting Roy Partlow.16

Negro League baseball returned to Shibe Park in 1946. Josh Gibson tripled during Homestead’s 5-2 win over the Stars in front of 10,751 fans on May 13. Ted Radcliffe was known as “Double-Duty,” and showed why in the game. Homestead’s second-string catcher, at age 43, came on in relief of pitcher Wilmer Fields with two runs in, two men on base, two out, and the tying run at the plate in the form of Homer Curry. With a 3-and-2 count, Radcliffe was summoned into the game and struck out Curry for the final out of the game.17

The Stars hosted the New York Black Yankees and Newark Eagles on May 31, 1946, and the 11,990 fans witnessed three homers. In the opener, Wes Dennis homered for the Stars and pitcher Barney Brown scattered six hits in the 7-2 win. In the nightcap, the Eagles, with Larry Doby and Johnny Davis providing long balls, won 9-2, with Leon Day taking care of the pitching duties.18

On August 12, 1946, in a first for the Negro Leagues, the Cincinnati Clowns traveled by air from Birmingham, Alabama, to Philadelphia to take on the Stars in the second game of a doubleheader at Shibe Park. In the first game, the Stars hosted the Newark Eagles. The Eagles won 6-2 as their keystone combination of Larry Doby and Monte Irvin each had an RBI double. In the nightcap, the game was stopped by curfew after nine innings with the score tied 7-7.19 Newark was back on September 3 to play in the nightcap of the final Negro League doubleheader of the season at Shibe Park. The Stars beat the Eagles 12-7. Three of the Eagles’ 13 hits, including a double and homer, were struck by Doby.20

On May 26, 1947, Doby stopped by with the Newark Eagles, and he began his 1947 season at Shibe Park the same way he had ended 1946. His eighth-inning three-run homer off Bill Byrd was the margin of victory as Newark defeated the Baltimore Elite Giants 3-2. In the second game that night, the Stars and New York Black Yankees were tied 2-2 when play was halted after the 12th inning.21 By the end of the season, Doby was with the Cleveland Indians, and he came back to Shibe Park on many occasions. He had five major-league homers there, the first coming on July 15, 1948.

On June 16, 1947, a crowd of 7,189 saw the New York Cubans defeat Baltimore in the opener, 3-1, and the Stars defeat the Grays 7-2 in the nightcap, with pitcher Eugene Smith homering and 21-year-old Harry Simpson going 3-for-3 with a double and a triple.22 On June 23 the Eagles were back in town and Larry Doby had two hits as the Eagles defeated the Cubans, 7-4, with three runs in the 11th inning. The Stars fell to Baltimore’s Bill Byrd, 3-1.23

On July 7 the Stars hosted the Monarchs. Kansas City, with Connie Johnson pitching and Hank Thompson homering, defeated the Stars 13-8 in a game that was stopped after six innings to allow the Monarchs to catch a train. Stars highlights included a homer by Mahlon Duckett and Bill Cash becoming the first Negro League player to have two homers in the same game at Shibe Park.24

On August 18 the opening game of a doubleheader featured the New York Cubans and Baltimore Elite Giants. Luis Tiant of the Cubans pitched nine innings as his team won 9-2. Joe Black took the loss for Baltimore. The Cubans’ attack included three hits from Minnie Miñoso. Junior Gilliam went 1-for-4 for Baltimore.25

Another Negro League World Series game was held at Shibe Park in 1947. The New York Cubans faced the Cleveland Buckeyes. Rafael Noble was the hitting star as the Cubans won on September 24 to take a 2-1 lead in the Series. His grand slam in the fifth inning off Eugene Bremmer (the first grand slam ever hit at a Negro League game at Shibe Park) powered his team to a 7-0 lead. and Dave Barnhill, except for a glitch in the eighth inning, overpowered the Buckeyes in pitching the complete-game win. The crowd was only 1,739.26 Attendance for the entire season at Shibe Park was down dramatically from 1946. For nine dates, the total was 50,211. The Cubans won the Series in five games. It was the next to last Negro League World Series.

In 1948 the Stars continued to appear at Shibe Park and there were still some talented players around who would in the coming years make it to the big leagues. Harry Simpson spent the season with the Stars, Monte Irvin with the Newark Eagles, Minnie Miñoso with the New York Cubans, and Luke Easter with the Homestead Grays. Each would be in Organized Baseball the next season, Irvin going to the Giants and Simpson, Miñoso, and Easter signing with the Cleveland Indians.

On August 9, 1948, Shibe Park witnessed an exhibition of greatness by Miñoso. The New York Cubans star homered and tripled in a 4-1 win. Miñoso, early in his major-league career, was traded from the Indians to the Chicago White Sox. Two of his major-league homers came at Shibe Park, the first on August 1, 1951.

The 1948 season was the last season for the Negro National League. In 1949, ten teams, including the Stars, were in the Negro American League. The Birmingham Black Barons, who had played in the last Negro League World Series, in 1948, losing to the Homestead Grays, had not visited Shibe Park in 1948, but they were in town on July 6, 1949, losing to the Baltimore Elite Giants 11-8. Birmingham’s lineup included a player who would go on to the best major-league career of the players who played Negro League ball at Shibe Park.

Center fielder Willie Mays was two months past his 18th birthday when he first played at Shibe Park. Two weeks before the Barons next returned to Shibe Park in 1950, Mays, who was batting .340 for the Barons, had been sold to the Giants. On July 12, 1950, Mays was at Trenton.27 He made his major-league debut at Shibe Park on May 25, 1951, and, won the 1951 National League Rookie of the Year Award. Over the course of his career, he hit 18 homers at Shibe Park. The Elite Giants also fielded two future big leaguers. Junior Gilliam and Joe Black signed with the Dodgers after the 1950 season. Black was the National League Rookie of the Year in 1952, going 15-4 with 15 saves. One year later, Gilliam joined the Dodgers and won the 1953 Rookie of the Year Award.

The Philadelphia Stars played through 1952 and appeared several times each year at Shibe Park, often hosting the Indianapolis Clowns. After the Stars folded, Shibe Park, renamed Connie Mack Stadium in 1953, continued to host exhibitions featuring the Clowns. The players in those years bore little resemblance to the great black players who had graced Shibe Park in the days when the legends of the Negro Leagues displayed their remarkable talent.

ALAN COHEN has been a SABR member since 2010. He serves as vice president-treasurer of the Connecticut Smoky Joe Wood Chapter, is a datacaster (MiLB First Pitch stringer) for the Hartford Yard Goats, the Double-A affiliate of the Colorado Rockies, and has been serving as head of SABR’s fact-checking committee since December 13, 2020. He attended Franklin and Marshall College and attended Opening Night at Connie Mack Stadium on April 14, 1967. His biographies, game stories, and essays have appeared in more than 60 SABR publications. Since his first Baseball Research Journal article appeared in 2013, Alan has continued to expand his research into the Hearst Sandlot Classic (1946-1965), from which 87 players advanced to the major leagues. He has four children, nine grandchildren, and one great-grandchild, and resides in Connecticut with wife Frances, their cats, Morty, Ava, and Zoe, and their dog Buddy.

SOURCES

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author also found these articles helpful:

“Gibson Homer Ace: Slammed One 514 Feet,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 30, 1944: 2S.

“Satchel Paige Faces Grays Here Tonight,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 29, 1942: 26.

“Play First Game in Cleveland Thursday; Grays are Favorites,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 15, 1945: 12.

Scheffer, William J. “15,000 See Grays Lose to Kansas [sic],” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 30, 1942: 35, 38.

Smith, Wendell. “Smitty’s Sports Spurts: Statistics Show How Kansas City Walloped Grays in World Series,” Pittsburgh Courier, October 10, 1942: 17.

NOTES

1 “Negro Nines Play on Shibe Grounds,” Evening Public Ledger (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania), September 8, 1919: 17.

2 “Bacharach Giants Crush Hilldale,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 9, 1919: 14 and “Bacharachs Win the Championship,” Chicago Defender, September 20, 1919: 11.

3 “Hilldale Defeats Kansas City Foes,” Philadelphia Inquirer, October 9, 1925: 27.

4 “Negro Series at Shibe Park: Homestead to Meet Kansas City Under Lights Sept. 29,” Chester (Pennsylvania) Times, September 18, 1942: 15.

5 Associated Press, “Kansas City Takes Negro Baseball Title,” Ottawa Citizen, September 30, 1942: 20.

6 William J. Scheffer, “15,000 See Grays Lose to Kansas,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 30, 1942: 35, 38.

7 “Paige to Hurl for Monarchs Against Phila. Stars Tonight,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 21, 1943: 22.

8 William J. Scheffer, “Phila. Stars Win Before 24,165,” tPhiladelphia Inquirer, June 22, 1943: 24.

9 Scheffer, “12,198 See Monarchs, Paige Lose,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 9, 1943: 25.

10 “Josh Gibson Gets His Shibe Park Home Run,” Allentown (Pennsylvania) Morning Call, July 19, 1944: 10.

11 “Paige Yields 1 Hit in Four Innings,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 29, 1944: 19.

12 Scheffer, “Grays Jar Stars Before 10,021,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 22, 1945: 21.

13 Scheffer, “Phila Stars Beat Kansas City, 5-1: Chase Paige in Fourth Before 10,412, Ricks Scatters Seven Hits,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 19, 1945: 17.

14 Scheffer, “11,408 See Stars Split Twin-Bill,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 12, 1945: 20.

15 “Cleveland Rules Baseball World,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 29, 1945: 12.

16 Scheffer, “Buckeyes Blank Grays, Win Title,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 21, 1945: 24.

17 “Grays Beat Stars, 5-2, Under Arcs,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 14, 1946: 24.

18 Scheffer, “Phila. Stars Split Before 11,990,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 1, 1946: 17.

19 Scheffer, “Stars Beaten by Newark, Tie Clowns,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 13, 1946: 25.

20 “Stars Win 12-7; Baltimore Victor,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 4, 1946: 37.

21 Scheffer, “Eagles Win, 3-2; Stars Tied, 2-2,” Philadelphia Inquirer, May 27, 1947: 32.

22 “Stars, Cubans Victors in Negro League,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 17, 1947: 25.

23 Scheffer, “Giants, Eagles Win Contests,” Philadelphia Inquirer, June 24, 1947: 25.

24 Scheffer, “Monarchs Beat Stars; Rain Halts 2d,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 8, 1947: 22.

25 Scheffer, “Stars Victors in 9th, 4-3; Cubans Win,” Philadelphia Inquirer, August 19, 1947: 25.

26 “Cubans Win 9-4, Take Series Lead,” Philadelphia Inquirer, September 25, 1947: 24.

27 “Barons, Monarchs Play Phila. Stars Here,” Philadelphia Inquirer, July 9, 1950: 12S.