THE COURT HOUSE
This is that theater the muse loves best.
All dramas ever dreamed are acted here.
The roles are done in earnest, none in jest.
Hero and dupe and villain all appear.
Here falsehood skulks behind an honest mask,
And witless truth lets fall a saving word,
As the blind goddess tends her patient task
And in the hush the shears of fate are heard.
Here the slow-shod avengers keep their date;
Here innocence uncoils her snow-white bloom;
From here the untrapped swindle walks elate,
And stolid murder goes to meet his doom.
O stage more stark than ever Shakespeare knew
What peacock playhouse will contend with you?

Wendell Philips Stafford, the composer of “The Court House,” was a federal judge in Washington, D.C., for almost twenty-seven years. One of the thousands of trials Judge Stafford presided over was a 1919 antitrust suit brought against Organized Baseball (O.B.) by the Baltimore club of the defunct Federal League — a suit that threatened to loosen O.B.’s monopolistic hold on the national pastime.

Antitrust litigation is rarely colorful or dramatic enough to be the stuff of poetry, and it is doubtful that Judge Stafford had Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore vs. National League in mind when he wrote his verse. But a reading of the testimony given in the two-week-long trial does bring to mind a number of the poem’s phrases. There were few if any heroes to be seen, but “dupe and villain” were well represented in Judge Stafford’s courtroom. Certainly “falsehood skulk[ing] behind an honest mask” was present in abundance at the trial, as well as “untrapped swindle.”

But more than anything, the evidence presented by the Federal Baseball litigants tells the story of a “stolid murder” — the murder of O.B.’s last serious competitor, the short-lived Federal League.

THE FEDERAL LEAGUE WAR

Late nineteenth century professional baseball was plagued by wars between the established National League and a succession of upstart leagues. The American Association war of 1882, the Union Association war of 1884, the Players League war of 1890, the American League war of 1900 — all these bitter conflicts resulted in huge losses for almost everyone involved, not to mention widespread public disenchantment with the professional game.

More than two decades of strife ended in 1903, when the National League and the American League signed a peace treaty. American League President Ban Johnson testified at the Federal Baseball trial that the purpose of the peace treaty was to restore “normal conditions” to professional baseball.

Q. Then your purpose was to eliminate competition between the two leagues for players?

A. … I don’t think we cared for competition at all.

Later that year, the two major leagues and several minor leagues adopted the “National Agreement,” which provided for mutual respect for player contracts, reserve lists, and territorial rights. It also established a “National Commission,” consisting of the major league presidents and a third man selected by them, to rule the sport.

Peace — or, to put it another way, the lack of competition between the two leagues — brought prosperity. Attendance and profits reached unprecedented heights, and the World Series added greatly to the public interest in the pennant races. That prosperity attracted the attention of potential rivals. In 1913, several wealthy businessmen organized the Federal League of Professional Baseball Clubs. Prior to the start of the 1914 season, Federal League President James Gilmore asked Ban Johnson if O.B. would allow the Federal League to operate under the National Agreement as a third major league. Johnson told Gilmore that “there was not room for three major leagues.”

The Federal League owners declared war. They quickly erected brand-new stadiums in seven of the league’s eight cities: Baltimore, Brooklyn, Buffalo, Chicago, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Pittsburgh, and St. Louis. They also declared that the reserve clause in O.B.’s standard player contract was unenforceable, and began to sign up players under reserve by existing major and minor league clubs.

THE RESERVE CLAUSE

Lawyers for the Federal Baseball Club of Baltimore hoped to persuade the jury that the purpose of the “right of reservation,” a key feature of the National Agreement, was to enable O.B. “to eliminate the possibility of competition by establishing an absolute monopoly” over the supply of professional baseball players.

Much of the National Agreement and many of the rules and regulations issued by the National Commission dealt with the right of reservation, which National Commission chairman and Cincinnati Reds president August “Garry” Herrmann described as “absolutely necessary” to O.B. For example, Article 8, Section 1 of the National Agreement provided that: “[N]o non-reserve contract shall be entered into by any club operating under the National Agreement until permission to do so has been first obtained …. “ Article 6, Section 1 of that document stated that no club could “negotiate for the purchase or lease of the property” — that is, players — “of another club without first securing the consent of such club.” The title of a team to its “property” lapsed only when a team released a player or failed to include the player’s name on the reserve list it was required to submit at the end of each season.

The reserve clause itself, which was found in section 10 of the standard player’s contract, provided that:

In consideration of the compensation paid to the [player] by the [team], the [player] agrees and obligates himself to contract with and continue in the service of[the team] for the succeeding season at a salary to be determined by the parties of such contract.

What happened if the player and his team couldn’t agree on a salary for the succeeding season? According to Herrmann, the player was free to go elsewhere.

Q. And if he does not want to sign, what happens?

A. That ends it. He becomes a free agent.

Q. Could he go out and play for any other club in Organized Ball?

A. If he got employment, yes. There is no rule against it.

But on cross-examination, Herrmann admitted that the player would have a hard time finding a job with any other team.

Q. Could he get employment with any other club in Organized Baseball? ..

A. I do not imagine any other club would take him, because I have always felt, and we all feel, that reservation is absolutely necessary to keep the game alive.

Baltimore Federals director and stockholder Ned Hanlon, a veteran baseball man who had managed Baltimore and Brooklyn to five National League pennants before the turn of the century, described what happened if a player didn’t agree on contract terms with his team.

Q. At the end of a man’s term of employment, under the Organized Ball system, it is provided in these contracts that the club shall have a right to negotiate with him for employment for
another year, or another season, upon terms to be agreed upon. Suppose they could not agree on terms, on a salary, for instance, for the next year? What happened?

A. He could not play professional baseball. If they did not agree on terms, he could not go anywhere else, could not play anywhere else under professional baseball.

Q. How long could he be kept in that situation without employment?

A. For year after year.

Q. It would not prevent him from going to blacksmithing or plowing or anything like that, would it?

A. No, sir. If they put him on the reserve list, they could not agree on terms, and they did not see fit to sell him or exchange him to somebody else, they would reserve his reservation year after year, continuously. That is what it means.

The experience of former major leaguer Jimmy “Runt” Walsh supported Hanlon’s claim that the right of reservation could last forever. Walsh was a Phillies utilityman who decided to sign with the Baltimore Federals after Philadelphia sold his contract to Montreal after the 1913 season. After the Federal League folded, Walsh spent the 1916 season with Memphis. When he and that team could not agree on a salary for 1917, Walsh quit baseball and went to work at a Baltimore steel mill. Walsh had not played professionally since then, but he still heard from the Memphis club in following years.

Q. …They tendered you a contract at the end of the season of 1916 for the following year for $250 a month, and you would not accept that. Did they tender you another contract at the end of the year 1917?

A. I got a contract from them again this spring, yes, sir, this past spring, February, I think.

Q. At the end of each year they have been offering you contracts, have they?

A. Yes sir.

Q. Why do they do that? Do you understand why?

A. I do not understand the reason why, no, sir, with the exception that they still reserve me to their club.

Q. The object is to reserve you, so that you cannot make any other contract without their consent. That is the purpose of their offering you these contracts every year?

A. Yes, sir.

Connie Mack described the situation of holdouts like Walsh very graphically.

Q. Suppose you cannot come to an agreement with him?

A. I will tell you. If a player is at all reasonable we come to terms.

Q. But suppose you don’t think he is reasonable; suppose you can’t agree?

A. There are cases of that kind.

Q. What happens?

A. We just let him lay there.

THE BLACKLIST

Other rules of O.B. were intended to discourage players under reserve from jumping to “outlaw” organizations that were not parties to the National Agreement, such as the Federal League. Articles 22 and 23 provided that any player who signed a contract or even entered into negotiations with an outlaw team “shall be declared ineligible” for at least three years. Any National Agreement team that signed an ineligible player could be drummed out of O.B. Any playerwho even appeared in an exhibition game with an ineligible player was himself subject to blacklisting.

As several of the plaintiffs witnesses testified, players were reluctant to sign with the Federal League because they knew that they might be blacklisted for the remainder of their playing days. On November 12, 1913, Herrmann had told the annual meeting of minor league teams that “there will be no place in Organized Baseball” for players who did not respect their contractual obligations, including the reserve clause. According to Hanlon, his fellow director and part-owner of the Baltimore Federals, L. Edwin Goldman, and Baltimore’s player-manager, Otto “Dutch” Knabe, the team had to offer excessively large salaries and long-term, guaranteed contracts to attract players. Moreover, they alleged, most of the players who did take a chance with the new league were veterans who knew they were nearing the end of their playing days.

“Runt” Walsh’s testimony supported those witnesses’ statements. After the 1913 season, Walsh learned through the newspapers that the Phillies had sold his contract to Montreal of the International League. He had never been to Montreal and was not consulted whether he would care to go to Montreal, so he signed with Baltimore.

Walsh demanded a three-year contract without the usual provision that allowed a team to release a player on ten days’ notice. He wanted the security of a guaranteed, long-term contract because he believed there was little if any chance that he would be permitted to return to O.B. A letter he received from Montreal president Sam Lichtenheim after signing with Baltimore proved that Walsh’s concern was justified.

Dear [Mr. Walsh]:

…. I am very much surprised … you signed with the Federals….

… [I]fyou start to play with them, you are blacklisted from Organized Ball for three years, and if their league blows up I don’t know what you will do for three years.

… I don’t think you want to throw away three years of your future for the sake of a few hundred dollars advance money which you may have received, and which if it is not too much I may be willing to pay back for you ….

… So don’t be foolish and let these people blindfold you, which they have done with several players, and which players would be very glad to come back to Organized Ball but it is too late, because their clubs won’t take them back, but in your case I will take you back, if your terms are not too much, before you make this fatal jump, but once you have made the jump and played one game for them, I could not take you back if you were willing to play for me for $100.00 per month, as you must stay out of Organized Ball for three years, the same as any other player who plays one game for the Federal League.

Lichtenheim’s letter to Walsh was very helpful to the plaintiff’s case. The Montreal team president did not just threaten Walsh with blacklisting. He also encouraged Walsh to break his valid contract with Baltimore and generally libeled the new league.

[I]f the amount that they have advanced you is not too large, perhaps we could arrange to pay it back for you to them, when you report to us, and sign you to a contract, because … you know they will not go to the courts.

I am quite sure that Manager Knabe, or any of these other managers, would not do anything for you if you get hurt, or if you took sick, whereas in Organized Ball we have to take care of you, and I think you must know by now that this Federal League started out to be a Major League. I think you have already seen enough to know that they won’t even be as good a league as ours, as they have only obtained very few Major League players, and the big bulk of their players come from our league and lower leagues, and I am quite sure that you know the public will not look on them as a Major League.

Don’t you see that their whole trick is to get you signed to a contract so as to be taken over by Organized Ball, which will never be the case, but if they were taken over by Organized Ball, you would be in a worse position with them than you would be with us, because they would chop you down quickly, knowing that you could not go anywhere else.

Now just think this over and you will see that it is best to send them back their money, if they advanced you any money … and sign another contract with your real employers, who have always taken care of you, and who have made you what you are, and if you sign [a] contract with us we will protect your interests.

….

… [T]here is nothing to stop them throwing you out at any time, and cancelling your contract as soon as they know you cannot get back to Organized Ball for three years and which you know is the case. So I think you are much better off with Organized Ball, and which is the devil you do know, instead of Outlaw Ball, which is the devil you don’t know, and it must sound sensible to you, that Organized Ball, for whom you have worked for many years, can and will do more for you, than your new owners, who are only speculators, and who have started out to bluff the public right from the jump, because they have promised Major League Ball, which you know they will not have.

They also promised to have a club in Toronto, which they will not have, and I think you will find before you get through that they have made a great many other promises, which they will not carry out, whereas with Organized Ball we must carry them out, and if you know of any promise I ever made, of any kind, which I did not carry out, I will be glad to hear of it.

….

P.S. … [Y]ou must understand that you have a chance of being captain or manager here later on, whereas with them as soon as your usefulness as a player is finished, or you meet with an accident, which I hope you won’t, they would throw you on the street, and you could not work for them…. So don’t throw the substance away for the shadow, and get caught by these alluring offers which cannot materialise, and you know as well as I do that they cannot pay these salaries and take it at the gates by playing Minor League Ball, and you also know that they will play nothing but Minor League Ball, and will also have to play when we are away, in other words they will have to take our leavings, so I don’t see how your future is in any way secure with them…. [O]utlaws in business have never been successful, and without organization there cannot be any success, and if we were not organized your position as a player would not be secure, and I think they don’t know from week to week what cities they will play in and every week sees them change their cities, so you see they are only making a stab to be taken into Organized Ball, but they have guessed wrongly, and Organized Ball will never recognize them, and I think you know this already, and if you don’t know it you may write to President Ban Johnson or [National League President John K.] Tener, and get their reply and find out for yourself that what I tell you is correct.

JOHNSON FIGHTS BACK

Walsh never wrote to American League president Ban Johnson, as Lichtenheim had suggested. But only two weeks after Lichtenheim had written to Walsh, Johnson made his opinions known. In a March 5, 1914, interview with a New York Evening Sun writer, Johnson “declared war” on the Federal League.

There can be no peace until the Federal League has been exterminated … [W]e will fight these pirates to the finish. There will be no quarter.

Yes, I’ve heard that peacemakers are at work, but they are wasting their time. The American League will tolerate no such interference ….

This Federal League movement is taken too seriously, why, the whole thing is a joke. They are holding a meeting once a week to keep from falling to pieces. Quote me as saying that the Federals have no money in Buffalo, Indianapolis, and Pittsburgh. They have no ball parks in any of their cities, except an amateur field in Kansas City and a ramshackle affair in Pittsburgh. There are some wooden bleachers put up on Hanlon’s Park in Baltimore, I believe.

We hear from day to day that the Feds have millions behind them. If that is true they ought to build half million dollar stadium[s] in a few weeks. But getting down to brass tacks, they have neither grounds nor players that amount to anything.

When the list of players is finally announced the baseball public will realize what a bluff these fellows have been putting up. They have many unknown players, taken offthe lots[,] and a bunch of Bush Leaguers with a sprinkling of big fellows. But the American League will lose not more than ten men ….

We are going to cut and slash right and left from now on. We intend to show up the four flushers and the bluffers in the proper light.

The Johnson interview appeared in print the day before fifty-odd major leaguers returned to New York on the “Lusitania” after an around-the-world trip. According to the plaintiff, Johnson’s tough talk was intended to frighten those players away from the Federal League as well as to destroy the new circuit’s credibility with the public.

THE 1914 SEASON

In spite of Organized Baseball’s opposition, the Federal League opened the 1914 season confident of success. Opening day attendance was high, with Baltimore’s home opener attracting a standing-room-only crowd of 19,000.

The 1914 pennant race was a close one: Indianapolis, led by outfielder Benny Kauff (who hit .370, stole 75 bases, and scored 120 runs) and pitcher Cy Falkenberg (a 25-game winner with a 2.22 ERA and 9 shutouts), edged Chicago by one and a half games, with Baltimore a close third. Still, total Federal. League attendance did not approach that of either the American or National League. The Chicago Federals led the league in attendance, but drew fewer fans than the sixth-place White Sox. The established leagues suffered as well; AL attendance fell from 3.5 million in 1913 to 2.75 million in 1914.

The players were not complaining about the competition between the rival leagues. The Federal League eventually signed 81 major leaguers and 140 minor leaguers to contracts, nearly all of them at much higher salaries. Other players used the threat of jumping to get more money from teams in O.B. Several players — including Ray Caldwell, Walter Johnson, “Reindeer Bill” Killefer, and Ivy Wingo — signed contracts with Federal League teams but were persuaded to jump back to their former clubs. Caldwell made $2400 in 1913, but the Yankees gave him a four-year contract paying $8000 annually to bring him back into the fold. Killefer’s and Wingo’s salaries also more than doubled while Johnson’s went from $7000 to $12,500.

Several times, disputes over who had rights to a player ended up in court. Organized Baseball did not take legal action against players who were reserved but not under contract, but it did go to court to restrain players who had signed contracts for the 1914 season from jumping leagues. Early that season, pitchers Dave Davenport and George “Chief” Johnson and outfielder Armando Marsans of the Cincinnati Reds jumped to Federal League clubs. A Missouri federal judge granted the Reds’ request for an injunction against Marsans, but a court in Illinois refused to issue a similar injunction against Johnson because the contract lacked “mutuality.” On similar grounds, a New York court denied a White Sox request for a court order to prevent first baseman Hal Chase from jumping to the Buffalo Federals.

The tables were turned in the Killefer case. Killefer’s 1913 Phillies salary was $3200. On January 8, 1914, he signed with the Chicago Federals for $5800; only twelve days later he signed a new Phillies contract for $6500. A federal appeals court refused to order Killefer to stand by the contract with Chicago on the grounds that the Federal League team, which had induced Killefer to ignore his reserve clause, came into court with “unclean hands.” George Wharton Pepper, who represented O.B. in that case as well as in the Baltimore Federal Club litigation, persuaded the court that while the reserve clause was not legally enforceable by Philadelphia, the Chicago Federals had no business luring Killefer away before the Phillies had a fair chance to sign him to a contract for the 1914 season.

On January 5, 1915, the Federal League took the legal offensive by filing an antitrust suit against Organized Baseball. The Chicago federal judge assigned to hear the case was none other than Kenesaw Mountain Landis, who had the reputation of being a committed trustbuster. The trial of that case ended on January 22, and the Federal League hoped for a quick decision from Judge Landis. But the future commissioner seemed to be in no hurry to act. In March, Brooklyn Federals owner R.B. Ward approached Ban Johnson and again asked O.B. to allow its rival to become a party to the National Agreement.

1915: THE WAR CONTINUES

The Federal League opened the 1915 season with high hopes. Over 27,000 fans were on hand for opening day in Newark, where oilman Harry Sinclair had moved the Indianapolis Federals. But attendance fell off rapidly and losses began to mount. By the end of the league’s second season, Brooklyn’s Ward had lost $800,000; the Kansas City and Buffalo clubs were insolvent. Baltimore lost $35,000 in 1914 and almost $30,000 in 1915.

According to President Gilmore, the league’s financial ills became apparent early in the season.

A. [I]t was probably in May that some of us realized that it was going to be a very poor season from a financial standpoint, and I know along about the middle of July we started to hold meetings to discuss the situation, because previous to that time I had been called to Buffalo, and I had been called to Kansas City, in an effort to induce other people to invest money. Their overhead was far in excess of their receipts, and they were all beginning to complain.

Q. When did you say you reached the conclusion that the Federal League was doomed?

A. Along about the middle of June or the first of July…. [M]y opinion was that we were fighting a hopeless task. There were two clubs that had practically given up the fight, Kansas City and Buffalo. I had already received an opinion from the other members of the organization that they would not continue with six clubs….

Q. You had no idea from June on that the Federal League would be able to prepare for the next season at all?

A. I did not see any opportunity at all, no sir.

Q. Were you absolutely convinced of that?

A. I felt satisfied in my own mind to the extent that I began to figure out some way that we could at least save the ball players, and save our own reputations.

“IT WAS ONE BIG BLUFF”

Gilmore approached Sinclair and Ward with an audacious plan. First, they rented a suite of Manhattan offices and purchased an option to buy some vacant land at 143rd Street and Lenox Avenue. They then asked Corry Comstock, a New York City engineer and architect who was also the vice-president of the Pittsburgh Federal club, to draw up plans for a grandiose, 55,000-seat stadium. Gilmore then announced to the press that the Federal League planned to “invade” New York in 1916.

The purpose of all this? According to Gilmore, “[i]t was one big bluff,” a trick to force O.B. into “coming around and making some kind of offer.”

Q. Your real purpose was to get Organized Baseball to buy you out?

A. To reimburse us for some of our expenditures, yes, sir.

Q. To buy you out. Did not they have enough ball parks for the American and National Leagues at that time?

A. I presume they did.

Q. You expected them to buy you out and get rid of you as an annoying competitor; is that the proposition?

A. I think so, yes, sir.

Q. You had statements and interviews in the papers about it [the N.Y. stadium]?

A. Yes, sir.

Q. You said you were going to build it?

A. Yes, sir.

Q. And you had no idea of building it?

A. None at all. We did not know where the money was coming from unless some angel came along.

Q. You mean some devil; you were not associating with angels. Do you mean to tell this jury that you gave out interviews to the papers that you were going to build this stadium, employed an architect and manifested all of the different things that were necessary to accompany a real good faith act and had no idea of building a stadium at all?

A. It was one big bluff.

Q. That is the word you used for it?

A. Bluff, yes, sir.

Q. Might you not also characterize it as false pretense?

A. I do not know what you characterize it.

Q. Were you not engaging in false pretense?

A. We were trying to be protected to the best of our ability.

Comstock described the threatened invasion of New York by the Federal League as a “holdup”; he said there was “not a word of truth” in the announcement of the plans to build a stadium.

Gilmore and his co-conspirators did not tell the other Federal League owners about their scheme. According to Gilmore,

A. . .. [T]he bluff that we had formulated, the plan we had formulated, to put this thing through, was an absolute secret between Mr. R.B. Ward, Mr. Comstock, Mr. Sinclair and myself ….

Q. You were putting up a bluff on Baltimore?

A. Baltimore did not know one thing about the plan we were putting up in New York …. [W]e decided to keep it a secret from everybody. Mr. Weeghman [of Chicago] knew nothing about it. Mr. Ball of St. Louis knew nothing about it.

Gilmore’s machinations certainly fooled the Baltimore club. While he was trying to bluff O.B. into buying out the Federal League, Baltimore officials were naively making preparations for the 1916 season. Colonel Stuart S. Janney, a prominent Baltimore attorney who held stock in the team and served as its lawyer, testified that the club’s directors and stockholders had not expected to turn a profit overnight and were prepared to supply whatever additional financing was necessary for the 1916 season.

These preparations were encouraged by a series of letters Gilmore wrote to club officials in the fall of 1915, all of which contained some implication that the Federal League would be alive and well enough to operate in 1916. In an October 13 letter, Gilmore wrote:

[I] hope that your club is signing up some good talent for the coming year. I have wonderful faith in Baltimore as a Major League city, and know if you can get a fighting team there and keep it in the race, you will draw wonderful crowds and easily pay expenses.

On November 1, he wrote:

I also want to suggest that in view of your experience the last year that you make out a statement of the approximate cost to operate your club during the next season. In other words, I would like an idea of how much cheaper you think you can operate in 1916 than you could in 1915. This will be valuable information for our Board Members, and I want you to get it as accurately as possible.

On November 30, Gilmore forwarded to Baltimore club president Carroll W. Rasin a letter from a Williamsport, Pennsylvania fan recommending that the Federal League sign up for the 1916 season a local star who was a “natural-born hitter … fast on his feet; a sure catch and a ‘find.’” And on December 3, Gilmore wrote again to request the financial information that he had asked for in his November 1 letter.

PEACE TALKS

Baltimore officials did hear rumors that some Federal League owners were negotiating a settlement. At a November 9 league meeting in Indianapolis, Baltimore President Rasin asked Gilmore, Weeghman, and Sinclair point-blank if there was any truth in newspaper reports to that effect. All three denied that they were in communication with Organized Baseball, but Rasin suspected at the time that their denials “might not be frank.” In early December, Rasin saw more “newspaper talk” that O.B. and the Federal League were about to cut a deal. When he called Gilmore, Gilmore again assured him that there was no truth to the rumors.

On December 12, Gilmore ran into three National League officials in the lobby of New York City’s Biltmore Hotel. One of them asked Gilmore to “come around and take this matter up” at the National League owners’ meeting scheduled for the next day. Gilmore turned down the invitation. “Absolutely nothing doing,” he said. “We have gone too far and made too much progress on our New York invasion.”

The next day, the same men called Gilmore and asked him to “come over and fix this thing up.” Gilmore — hoping to hook his adversaries a little more firmly before reeling them in — feigned disinterest. “I told you the other day I would not have anything to do with it,” he said, “and I will not talk about it.”

Gilmore then turned to Harry Sinclair and said, in a voice loud enough for his caller to hear, “Harry, these people want [us] to come over and talk to them. Do you want to go?” Also intending the caller to hear him, Sinclair replied, “We might as well go and hear what they have to say.” The two of them went to National League President Tener’s office to discuss the situation.

Gilmore, Sinclair, and the National League representatives came to a tentative peace agreement. First, the NL agreed to make all blacklisted Federal League players eligible to play in O.B. and to let the Federal League owners sell their players’ contracts to the highest bidders. Next, the NL owners offered to buy the Brooklyn Federals’ park for $400,000, subject to the American League owners agreeing to kick in half of that sum. They also promised to approve the sale of the Chicago Cubs to Chicago Federals owner Charles E. Weeghman and put up $50,000 of the purchase price. The NL owners then agreed to buyout the Pittsburgh Federals for $50,000. Sinclair was a close friend of St. Louis Federals owner Phil Ball, and he assured the conferees that Ball would be satisfied if he could buy either the Cardinals or the Browns. The Buffalo and Kansas City clubs were no longer members in good standing of the Federal League — their owners had run out of money before the season ended, and the other teams had provided funds to pay their players in order to keep the league’s financial problems a secret — so there was little need to worry about them. There was apparently no discussion concerning the Newark franchise, even though owner Sinclair was present.

That left only the Baltimore club. Gilmore testified that he asked for $200,000 for Baltimore’s owners, but was laughed at. He later told Sinclair that he thought it was wise “to start high.” The meeting then broke up.

On December 16, 1915, Rasin received a telegram from Gilmore: “You and Hanlon be at Biltmore in morning. Important.” Rasin, Hanson, and Janney took the midnight train to New York, and went to Gilmore’s apartment at the Biltmore Hotel on the morning of December 17. Gilmore explained that he had summoned them to New York to tell them that the 1916 Federal League season was “all off.” Gilmore then told the stunned Baltimore officials about the tentative peace agreement of the 13th.

Janney and Rasin asked why Gilmore and the others had agreed to sell out, but Gilmore did not reply. They then asked what arrangements had been made concerning the Baltimore club’s interests. None, said Gilmore; however, he was sure that Baltimore would be “taken care of” before the settlement was made final.

Later, Sinclair, Weeghman, and representatives of other Federal League teams joined the meeting. They told the Baltimoreans that the opportunity to make peace had arisen suddenly and unexpectedly, and no one then present in New York felt he had authority to speak for Baltimore; however, like Gilmore, they were all sure that the National Commission would give due consideration to Baltimore’s claims.

The Baltimore officials were in no mood to take Gilmore’s advice and “accept the situation philosophically.” According to Janney, the discussion “grew rather bitter.” When Sinclair defended his and his allies’ actions, “quite a dispute arose” between him and Janney; “his words and mine,” Janney testified, “were not always of the smoothest.” Janney argued that the Federal League clubs should get some share of the proceeds of any agreement to dissolve the circuit, but Sinclair said he “would have none of that.”

Gilmore and his allies hoped to finalize the December 13 agreement at a meeting with American and National League club owners that evening at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. According to Gilmore, Comstock, and Ward, Rasin moved that a committee of three — Gilmore, Sinclair, and Weeghman — be authorized to represent all the Federal League clubs at that meeting. Rasin denied that he made such a motion.

THE WALDORF MEETING

The Waldorf meeting was called to order by National Commission president August Herrmann at 9:10 P.M., Friday, December 17, 1915. Among the thirty or so baseball men present at the meeting were American and National League presidents Johnson and Tener; Federal Leaguers Gilmore, Sinclair, Weeghman, and Rasin; American League owners Charles Comiskey (White Sox) and Colonel Jacob Ruppert (Yankees); and National League owners Charles Ebbets (Dodgers), James Gaffney (Braves), and Barney Dreyfuss (Pirates). A stenographer was present, and a transcript was produced.

The conferees quickly ratified those parts of the tentative peace agreement of December 13 that provided that the National League would put up $50,000 toward Weeghman’s purchase of the Cubs; that Organized Baseball would pay R.B. Ward’s heirs $20,000 a year for twenty years in exchange for the Brooklyn Federals’ stadium; that Organized Baseball would pay $50,000 to the owners of the Pittsburgh Federals; and that all Federal League players would be eligible to return to O.B.

Gilmore was asked if his committee was empowered to enter into a binding agreement on behalf of the Federal League.

Gilmore: I can say for the Federal League that the committee represented here tonight was appointed with full authority to discuss this proposition with you, and conclude any agreement that we might come to, and we are ready to open up the talk and see what can be done.

Herrmann: I understand, Mr. Gilmore, you state now that you have authority to act on behalf of the Federal League; that is, your committee?

Gilmore: We have full authority, Mr. Herrmann.

Rasin did not challenge Gilmore’s assertion. At about the time the meeting was beginning, a Baltimore Sun reporter went to the Biltmore to tell Janney that it looked as if Baltimore might be able to get a National League team. Janney hurried to the Waldorf, where Rasin also told him that Baltimore had a good chance of landing an established franchise if they asked for one. Herrmann then gave Janney the floor.

We feel just as I suppose everyone feels, that peace is the very best proposition in baseball and for baseball. We are all willing to concede that, and we hope it will come about. There is in the proposal which has been adopted, and which has been signed by certain parties — the situation in Baltimore is not touched upon, and it seems to me important in several aspects. In the first place, Baltimore has a population of seven hundred and fifty or eight hundred thousand people, including the suburbs ….

We are willing to purchase and pay for a franchise in the major leagues, if we can get it, and we want that to be the main keynote of our situation this evening ….

….

We are not venturing to suggest to you gentlemen just what franchise we think that would be. You could work that out probably better than ourselves, but that is our starting point, and that is what we would like to see, and which we lay before you.

Baltimore is not mentioned in the proposals that you have heretofore considered, and we think that, that is — we want to be taken up with every consideration, and … if you state or suggest that Baltimore would not pay the rest of the teams what the city does from which the franchise might be moved, we would be willing, and we will say that [we] will guarantee to pay as much as the city from which it is moved. In other words, the patronage there, we are willing to stand back of. We know it is there. We know that the people [will] attend the games, and we know we can produce the same revenue for a visiting team that has been produced by the city from which it will be moved ….

….

We represent a large body of representative citizens there, and we will see to it that suitable guarantees are given to back up every word that I have said. That is our position, gentlemen; and … we do not ask anything if we could be given the privilege of buying and locating a major league club in Baltimore, at a reasonable price, a franchise in … either one or the other of the two major leagues which you represent. We do not ask anybody to sacrifice anything or contribute to us. We are willing to stand in our own position and come forward and back our words with deeds and give you suitable guarantees.

Several of the major league owners present ridiculed the notion that Baltimore could support a major league franchise.

Comiskey: Well, what would you give for a franchise in Baltimore? Suppose we could blow life into McGraw and Kelley and Jennings and all those players that you had there that you could not support …. What would you give for those players if we would guarantee that they would play good ball in Baltimore for ten years, what would you pay for them and how loyally would you support them?

Janney: We would support them well.

Comiskey: What crowd would you draw?

Janney: We would draw sufficient to enable us to pay $250,000 for a franchise.

Comiskey: That is just the proper price for a minor league franchise …. Baltimore, a minor-league city, and not a hell of a good one at that.

Ebbets: That’s right.

Comiskey: As sure as you are sitting there now, and your friends will tell you. Charlie, show them what you have got in Baltimore. You are the best evidence in the world. Tell them what you drew in Baltimore ….

Ebbets: When [Ned Hanlon] quit Baltimore and came to Brooklyn, he said, “Baltimore is not a major league city.” We lost money in Baltimore operating the club with the same players that Mr. Comiskey speaks of.

Janney: There are very peculiar circumstances that brought that about.

Ebbets: Nothing peculiar about it; it is a minor league city, positively and absolutely, and will never be anything else.

Janney: That is your opinion.

Ebbets: Sure that is my opinion, because I had a piece of experience and lost money down there.

Janney: But money has been lost in other towns also in baseball.

Ebbets: Not in major league cities.

Janney: Yes, they have been lost in other towns that are major league cities.

Ebbets: It is one of the worst minor league towns in this country.

Janney: It will never be a minor league town because the people feel naturally —

Ebbets: You have too many colored population to start with. They are a cheap population when it gets down to paying their money at the gate.

Janney: They come across, I think, in good shape. This is perfectly futile, of course. It requires your consent and I am not going to try to convince you when you are so set in your ways.

Janney was right to call further discussion futile. Under both American and National League rules, the transfer of any franchise to Baltimore would require the unanimous consent of the league owners. From the statements of the owners at the meeting, it is clear that any motion to give Baltimore an existing team — Janney and Rasin had thought the Cardinals might be available — would have been met not with unanimous consent, but unanimous refusal.

The two sides agreed that a detailed settlement, including something for Baltimore, should be worked out by the National Commission and a Federal League committee of three. Gilmore proposed that himself, Sinclair, and Weeghman serve as that committee, and neither Janney nor Rasin objected.

There was then some discussion of the Federal League’s pending antitrust suit against Organized Baseball, which Judge Landis had still not decided. National League counsel John C. Toole felt that the suit should be withdrawn before any more negotiating was done:

[I]t seems to me that the very first thing that should be done, and that should be done very promptly, to show that the thing is moving along, is that both sides should agree that that action be discontinued, and prompt steps should be taken to discontinue it and get it out of the way. That ought to be done before you have any meeting of the [National] Commission with this committee.

Janney objected that Toole was putting the cart before the horse.

Janney: I think that should be part of the agreement ultimately reached, that the suit be discontinued. It would not certainly be any discourtesy to the Court for parties to a litigation to discuss its composition, and when they come to a composition, then to have the dismissal of the action as a part of the composition.

Toole: You are not settling that suit, that is the difficulty. If you were settling that litigation, that is another thing, but you are settling a multitude of things in no way involved in that, and reaching agreements on them and this decision has been in abeyance. He may decide it tomorrow, and all this go to nothing, and put you all in a very embarrassing position, although you do not, perhaps, get into contempt of court.

Janney: I think the most that could be done, so far as I can see, would be to wire our respective counsel to appear before the Court tomorrow and advise him that there are matters under discussion which may ultimately result in an agreement, and if this agreement is effective, it will involve the discontinuance of the action before him, and suggest it would be proper for him to delay rendering a decision in it until this could be seen, whether the composition was effected, and that would be perfectly compatible with every possible legal or courteous principle…. What we do here will be subject to the dismissal. It is not usual to dismiss the case and then compose it. You compose it and then dismiss it…. You do not dismiss your suit and then agree how to settle it. That is that whole settlement. You settle this thing, and then, with your settlement, go and dismiss it. I have no objection, of course, to notifying the attorneys and telling them to do everything that is necessary to be courteous and pleasing to the Court.

When the meeting was adjourned, Toole telegraphed Organized Baseball’s Chicago attorney:

Negotiations are pending, which if carried out will result in an agreement to withdraw the action brought by the Federal League. Please bring the matter to the attention of Judge Landis, if you think it advisable, and secure his approval of situation. Communicate with attorneys for Federal League, who will be advised by their client.

The Federal League was dead, but Gilmore and his allies weren’t shedding any tears over its demise. Fearful that the league was doomed anyway, they decided to cut their losses rather than fight to the finish. Organized Baseball was happy to offer the Federal League a generous peace settlement. After all, there was still a chance that Judge Landis would issue a damaging verdict in the Federal League’s antitrust action. The rival league’s New York bluff also raised the specter of even more bitter competition for players and fans, with plenty of red ink to go around.

Ban Johnson would have preferred not to call a truce. The Federal League’s threat to put a team in New York may have fooled the National League, but the American League knew better: It had considered building a new stadium on the Lenox Avenue property years earlier, but found that it was absolutely impractical to locate a park there. Johnson was characteristically blunt in describing his feelings about the peace pact.

Q. Can you tell us without any lengthy answer why did you pay $50,000 for [the Pittsburgh park]?

A. That was a tentative agreement that the National League entered into, and we abided by their decision in the matter. I could not see any reason why Pittsburgh should be given
$50,000. As a matter of fact I did not want to give a five-cent piece to Pittsburgh.

Q. What you wanted to do was to knock them out?

A. Knock them out; that is it.

Q. Not to pay a cent?

A. Not a nickel.

Q. You were not as generous as Mr. Herrmann. Mr. Herrmann said yesterday he wanted to help them out.

A. I did not want to help them out. I am very frank in that regard.

The National Commission and the Federal League committee signed a peace treaty in Cincinnati On December 22. Before the agreement was concluded, Gilmore called Rasin to ask if Baltimore would accept $75,000, but Rasin said no. Another meeting to discuss Baltimore’s claims was held in Cincinnati on January 5, 1916, but no settlement was reached. A day or two later, Baltimore filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Justice, but Assistant Attorney General Todd announced on January 11 that he had no reason to believe that Organized Baseball had violated the antitrust laws.

THE WAR MOVES TO THE COURTROOM

On January 27, the Baltimore stockholders voted to authorize the club’s directors to spend up to $50,000 on “litigation in such form as they deem advisable” to protect the stockholders’ interests. They eventually filed suit in Washington on September 20, 1917.

After a year and a half of legal skirmishing, a jury was sworn in On March 25, 1919. The testimony summarized above was presented, the judge gave his instructions, and the jury retired to deliberate On April 12. Given the judge’s instructions to the jury — which, in essence, told the jury that O.B. had in fact violated the federal antitrust laws, and that the Baltimore club was entitled to recover for any damages it suffered as a result — the verdict came as no surprise. The jury found in favor of the plaintiff and assessed damages at $80,000. The antitrust laws provide that guilty defendants pay three times the amount of the actual damages plus attorneys’ fees, so the final judgement was for $254,000.

Organized Baseball’s lawyers immediately appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. They attacked the trial court’s decision on a number of legal grounds, but focused most of their attention on a single key issue:

By far the most important question presented by the assignments of error is whether professional baseball is interstate commerce.

In his memoirs, George Wharton Pepper, O.B.’s top lawyer, described his appeal strategy.

I raised at every opportunity the objection that a spontaneous output of human activity is not in its nature commerce, that therefore Organized Baseball cannot be interstate commerce; and that, it not being commerce among the states, the federal statute could have no application….

… [T]he case came on for argument … on October 15th [, 1920]. I mention the date because of the coincidence that on the same day there was being played the final game in the [Dodgers vs. Indians] World Series of that year ….

. . . Counsel for the Federal League made the grave mistake of minimizing the real point in the case (the question, namely whether interstate commerce was involved) and sought to inflame the passions of the Court by a vehement attack upon the evils of [Organized Baseball], a few of which were real and many, as I thought, imaginary. I argued with much earnestness the proposition that personal effort not related to production is not a subject of commerce; that the attempt to secure all the skilled service needed for professional baseball is not an attempt to monopolize commerce or any part of it; and that Organized Baseball, not being commerce, and therefore not interstate commerce, does not come within the scope of the prohibitions of the Sherman [Antitrust] Act.

If the business of professional baseball was not interstate commerce, it was not subject to the Sherman Antitrust Act or any other federal regulation, even if all of the Baltimore club’s allegations of monopoly and conspiracy were found to be true.

On December 6, 1920, the Court of Appeals issued its decision, which was written by its Chief Justice, Constantine J. Smyth. Chief Justice Smyth first stated that interstate commerce “require[s] the transfer of something, whether it be persons, commodities, or intelligence” from one state to another. But, Smyth wrote,

A game of baseball is not susceptible of being transferred…. Not until [the players] come into contact with their opponents on the baseball field and the contest opens does the game come into existence. It is local in its beginning and in its end. Nothing is transferred in the process to those who patronize it. The exertions of skill and agility which they witness may excite in them pleasurable emotions, just as might a view of a beautiful picture or a masterly performance of some drama; but the game effects no exchange of things. . . .

It didn’t really matter that baseball players traveled across state lines, or that the players carried their bats, balls, gloves, and uniforms across state lines with them.

The players, it is true, travel from place to place in interstate commerce, but they are not the game ….

….

The transportation in interstate commerce of the players and the paraphernalia used by them was but an incident to the main purpose of the appellants, namely the production of the game. It was for it they were in business — not for the purpose of transferring players, balls, and uniforms. The production of the game was the dominant thing in their activities ….

. . . So, here, baseball is not commerce, though some of its incidents may be.

Suppose a law firm in the city of Washington sends its members to points in different states to try lawsuits; they would travel, and probably carry briefs and records, in interstate commerce. Could it be correctly said that the firm, in the trial of the lawsuits, was engaged in trade and commerce? Or, take the case of a lecture bureau, which employs persons to deliver lectures before Chautauqua gatherings at points in different states. It would be necessary for the lecturers to travel in interstate commerce, in order that they might fulfill their engagements; but would it not be an unreasonable stretch of the ordinary meaning of the words to say that the bureau was engaged in trade or commerce?

Chief Justice Smyth then cited with approval cases holding that those who produce theatrical exhibitions, practice medicine, or launder clothes are not engaged in commerce.

The Baltimore club tried to persuade the United States Supreme Court to reinstate the original verdict in its favor. But Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, writing for a unanimous Court, upheld the decision of the Court of Appeals.

[E]xhibitions of base ball … are purely state affairs. It is true that, in order to attain for these exhibitions the great popularity that they have achieved, competitions must be arranged between clubs from different cities and States. But the fact that in order to give the exhibitions the League must induce free persons to cross state lines and must arrange and pay for their doing so is not enough to change the character of the business…. [T]he transport is a mere incident, not the essential thing. That to which it is incident, the exhibition, although made for money would not be called trade or commerce in the commonly accepted use of those words. As it is put by the defendants, personal effort, not related to production, is not a subject of commerce. That which in its consummation is not commerce does not become commerce among the States because the transportation that we have mentioned takes place. To repeat the illustrations given by the Court below, a firm of lawyers sending out a member to argue a case, or the Chautauqua lecture bureau sending out lecturers, does not engage in such commerce because the lawyer or lecturer goes to another State.

The Supreme Court’s decision was issued on May 29, 1922 — almost seven years after the Baltimore Federals played their last game.

Given the legal doctrines of its day, the Federal Baseball case was correctly decided. The courts of that era applied the federal antitrust laws only to businesses that were primarily engaged in the production, sale, or transportation of tangible goods.

It is popularly believed that Organized Baseball was given immunity from the antitrust laws because baseball was a sport, not a business. That belief has grown out of a passage in the Court of Appeals opinion:

If a game of baseball, before a concourse of people who pay for the privilege of witnessing it, is trade or commerce, then the college teams who play football where an admission fee is charged, engage in an act of trade or commerce. But the act is not trade or commerce; it is sport. The fact that [Organized Baseball] produce[s] baseball games as a source of profit, large or small, cannot change the character of the games. They are still sport, not trade.

But a close reading of that language and the rest of Chief Justice Smyth’s opinion shows that the key to the decision was not the fact that baseball was a sport. The more crucial fact was that baseball — as well as the practice of law or medicine, the production of grand opera, and the other nonsporting activities cited in the opinion — was not commerce.

Antitrust doctrines have changed radically since Federal Baseball was decided in 1922. The cases that the Supreme Court relied upon in holding that baseball wasn’t interstate commerce have long ago been overruled. By 1960, the Supreme Court had held that doctors, theatrical producers, boxing promoters, and even the National Football League were subject to the federal antitrust laws.

But baseball has somehow retained its uniquely privileged status. In 1953 and again in 1972, in the celebrated Curt Flood case, the Supreme Court affirmed the holding of Federal Baseball. Justice Blackmun, in Flood vs. Kuhn, noted that baseball’s antitrust immunity was “an anomaly” and “an aberration.” But, he noted,

Remedial legislation has been introduced repeatedly in Congress but none has ever been enacted. The Court, accordingly, has concluded that Congress as yet has had no intention to subject baseball’s reserve system to the reach of the antitrust statutes….

…. If there is any inconsistency or illogic in all this, it is an inconsistency and illogic of long standing that is to be remedied by the Congress and not by this Court.

Is the Federal Baseball ruling of any consequence today? After all, the players’ union has managed to decimate the reserve clause through collective bargaining. Free agency, arbitration, limits on trades without consent — no longer is the major league player, in Curt Flood’s words, “a piece of property to be bought and sold irrespective of [his] wishes.”

But what about the owners? Al Davis and Robert Irsay could move away from Oakland and Baltimore because the antitrust laws prevent the other NFL owners from taking concerted action against such moves. What if Calvin Griffith, rather than selling the Twins, had decided to move them to Tampa — or back to Washington, D.C. — without American League approval? If the other owners simply refused to schedule any games with the Twins and Griffith sued them, would Federal Baseball still control?

Or what if the USFL owners decided to start a baseball league, too? (Perhaps they would play in the fall and winter.) If Organized Baseball threatened NBC that it would never again sell broadcast rights to that network if it televised the new league’s games, would the “USBL” win the antitrust suit that would undoubtedly follow?

Surely then Federal Baseball — a case decided over sixty [today ninety — ED.] years ago, long before television, jet airplanes, free agents, and night baseball — would finally be laid to rest. Of course, that was what Curt Flood’s lawyers thought would happen in 1972. Federal Baseball may be an anomaly and an aberration — but it may also outlive us all.

GARY HAILEY, a 1977 graduate of Harvard Law School, is a partner in the Washington, DC office of Venable LLP. He is also a father of four, a basketball referee, a biker, a voracious reader, and the author of many articles on sports and music.

But baseball is not just the romance of victory and defeat on the playing field; it is also a business. The game was intertwined with business promotion. Following the Cotton States Exposition of 1895 in Atlanta, town fathers, elected officials, and chambers of commerce across the state were under local pressure to get on board with the growing industrialization of the South and to attract Northern business investment to their communities. Among other tools, they sought to use baseball as a national calling card for their cities. The local team was the public face of the town. A city with a professional baseball team was a city to be reckoned with; a city with a winning professional team was a winner. This, too, was South Georgia baseball in 1913.

THE LEAGUE 

The Empire State League did not emerge fully formed and without precursors. The sandy soil of the region had proved to be fertile ground for baseball. The sport was long popular in South Georgia, and amateur nines had been playing the game for several decades before the league was organized. Amateur and semipro teams played in many South Georgia cities by the last decade of the nineteenth century. Most towns had a local team, as did many churches and schools. The larger towns and county seats also had teams sponsored by local businesses and associations (YMCA, Elks, etc.) or organized around certain professions (waiters, firemen, etc.). It was the “town” team, however, that proved most important to the fans. These groups of home-grown talent would play nearby towns for prizes and bragging rights, and the contests were often part of a larger celebration. The teams were organized to take on all comers and typically looked for challengers of equal status and ability, most often from a similarly sized town. County seats, such as Thomasville or Valdosta, often met one another for contests that had repercussions beyond the playing field, not unlike modern-day high-school football in the region. 

Attempts to organize these “town” teams into a league went back at least to 1900, when a Southeastern Base Ball League was proposed; it never began play. In 1903, two attempts failed: a Wiregrass League and a South Georgia League. In 1906, the Georgia State League, Class D, got off the ground, played a partial schedule, and then collapsed as teams failed and dropped out. Five of the towns that would later make up the Empire State League—Americus, Brunswick, Cordele, Valdosta, and Waycross—were members of this six-team league.[fn]Seven cities were represented in the 1906 league; Columbus and Albany were the other two. The Columbus franchise relocated to Brunswick in June. Albany and Columbus were in the South Atlantic League in 1913. Thomasville’s Empire State League entry was that town’s first minor league team.[/fn] The breaking point for the 1906 league was the Fourth of July holiday. Traditionally, teams would play a doubleheader on this date, sometimes traveling between towns for a home-and-home series. With most workers off for the day, box-office receipts could be high, as games were played amid picnics and other outdoor events. Excluding any postseason play, this holiday was a team’s largest payday. For the Georgia State League, this was also the time to cash out. Following the holiday, the 1906 league collapsed, with Waycross left as the lone solvent team, issuing a challenge to other nines in a bid to keep going. It would be six years before another attempt was made to assemble a league. 

Population and employment growth, spurred by civic promotion, may be the least recognized component of the drive to professionalize the town teams. New jobs, especially in the timber and related industries, attracted workers to the area; banking and other services followed. Between 1900 and 1910, population in each of the six towns that would make up the league grew by an average of 49 percent; between 1910 and 1920, each town continued to grow by an average of 26 percent. Even with high growth rates, these were still small towns, with populations ranging from 6,000 (Cordele) to just over 15,000 (Waycross). The “boomtown” of the group, Waycross, had increased in population by 145 percent between 1900 and 1910. Brunswick (11,000 residents in 1913) and Valdosta (8,300) had population growth rates of 41 percent from 1910 to 1920, and employment in Brunswick grew by 93 percent between 1909 and 1914. These high growth rates were partly the result of, and further argument for, the self-promotion of the region, with the towns vying with one another to attract Northern investment. In general, business in this era and region meant employment based on extracting natural resources, such as cotton and timber, in order to provide raw materials to Northern factories. Much like the contemporary view that a modern city is “major” if it has a major sports franchise, the presence of a professional baseball team became part of the self-image of these towns. 

The Empire State League was the brainchild of one man—James Sinclair—carried to success by many other men. An executive with the South Atlantic Line Railroad in its Waycross offices, Sinclair sought to gain entry for his local team into the South Atlantic League (Sally) for play in the 1913 season. The Sally, stretching from South Carolina to Florida and including four teams in Georgia, had no room for another member, and no team was looking to be replaced. By August 1912, the rebuffed Sinclair was publicly contemplating creating a new league in the southern part of the state. He envisioned a six-team circuit that would include five of the cities that were later part of the league, with Tifton, Moultrie, or Fitzgerald originally considered instead of Thomasville. At Sinclair’s invitation, representatives from the interested cities met several times in different locations to discuss the idea. James Sinclair was elected chairman of the committee formed at these meetings. The circuit would be named the Empire State League.[fn]Georgia’s Empire State League should not be confused with the longerlived league of the same name in New York, which was operating as an “outlaw” league in 1913. The league names are the same because the root nickname is the same. New York is and long has been referred to as the “Empire State.” Georgia business promoters adopted the nickname “Empire State of the South,” a sobriquet in common use from the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries. The National Association denied entry to the New York Empire State League, based on the reputation of the proposed owners, at the same session where it allowed entrance to Georgia’s Empire State League.[/fn] Teams would pay $100 to the league as an entry fee, demonstrate that they had at least $300 on hand, and post a $500 bond to guarantee compliance with the salary cap. Each team was required to have local ownership. Six teams, representing Americus, Brunswick, Cordele, Thomasville, Valdosta, and Waycross, raised the required funds and formally joined the league by the end of February. In a hint of things to come, however, Americus had a difficult time raising sufficient funds in these early months. 

Following their initial meetings, the group assembled in Valdosta to continue their talks, formalize the organization of the league, and elect Sinclair to the office of league president. It would be a short reign. The league’s board of directors, made up of a representative from each of the member cities, scheduled a meeting for February 19 in Brunswick to finalize plans for the season. Sinclair, however, was done. Citing his growing need to attend to his business matters, he announced his impending resignation. In Brunswick, the league quickly moved to fill his place, electing a local businessman, C. C. Vaughn, to the presidency. Oscar Groover of Thomasville was elected vice president, and L. J. Leavy of Brunswick was elected to the post of secretary/treasurer. Leavy was immediately instructed to contact the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues in order to apply for entry on behalf of the league. 

An important step for the nascent league was to seek membership in the National Association, which was granted in March. The Empire State League could have gone into the season as an “outlaw” league simply by organizing a schedule for the member teams. This would not have been much different from the current situation. But the teams would still just be playing for bragging rights, not national recognition. Membership in the National Association provided a level of stability that was important to the league’s organizers. As a member of the association, the league gained protection for its players, because all association members were required to respect the contracts of other member leagues. In addition, only a limited number of players could be drafted by leagues with a higher classification, and only at the end of the season. The league was admitted as a Class D minor league; teams in this class made up about half of all the professional leagues in 1913.[fn]The classifications of minor leagues in the National Association in 1913, and the total number of leagues at each classification level, were: Class AA (3 leagues), Class A (2 leagues), Class B (9), Class C (6), and Class D (22). In all, there were 130 Class D teams, representing 47 percent of the total number of minor-league teams.[/fn] 

Empire State League rosters were limited to twelve players, and no more than three of the men could have prior service with higher-classification minor-league teams (C or above). Salaries were capped at $1,000 for the season (about $21,000 in today’s dollars), though few if any of the players received the maximum allowable salary.[fn]Based on the cost to enter the league and operating costs during the season (including travel and lodging), the 10 percent of gate receipts that went to the league, and accounting for the average attendance and admission price, each team would have roughly $3,000 to $3,500 to spend on player salaries and/or retain as profit.[/fn] Because of these constraints, we can reconstruct some of the organizational logic behind the make-up of team rosters. This was the era of the player-manager, so the highest-paid roster spot would presumably go to such a player. For most teams, this accounted for one of the three spots limited by “prior service.” Any remaining “prior-service” spots, and the higher salaries that would go with them, might be used for pitching or hitting, depending on the manager’s preference. A player-manager would also typically be a position player, rather than a pitcher, meaning that seven more roster spots would be taken by position players. This leaves four roster spots, which were taken up by four pitchers or three pitchers and a utility player. Many of the pitchers could play the outfield when they weren’t on the mound, providing a little flexibility in the roster. In this league, an injury generally meant the end of a player’s season, as a roster spot could not be held while the man recuperated. 

More than 180 men played in the Empire State League—enough to fill the team rosters two-and-a-half times over. Most of these players were from other Class D leagues, “on loan” or released from higher-level minor-league teams, or trying to break into professional baseball for the first time. There was no formal arrangement between the Empire State League and any other leagues, though many of the teams entered into agreements on a player-by-player basis. For example, Tom Bowden, property of the Boston Braves, was “farmed out” to Cordele, and Americus’s “Mr. Popularity,” Dick Manchester, was property of the Albany, Georgia, South Atlantic League team. Several players from Macon (Sally) “rehabbed” with a league team. During the season, more than forty men from higher-classification leagues found playing time in the Empire State League. 

The creation of the Empire State League should be seen as a “professionalizing” of the game in South Georgia rather than as introducing something entirely new. Many of the players from a 1912 “town” team roster played for the same team in the league the next year. The towns that made up the league had been playing each other for years, and rivalries were well established. Some of these were continued in the Empire State League, but some, such as the fierce rivalry between Thomasville and Monticello, Florida, faded out when one of the teams involved was not part of the new league. In the seasons leading up to the creation of the league, Americus, Brunswick, and Waycross fielded the strongest teams in the region. Ironically, these three finished out of the running in 1913. 

THE SEASON 

The Empire State League scheduled a 90-game season, with teams playing three home and three away games each week, taking every Sunday off. No doubleheaders were scheduled—save for the Fourth of July holiday—though several would be held in order to make up rainouts. Games would typically start around 3:30, and a nine-inning contest lasted an average of just under two hours. Average take at the ticket booth was a bit less than 50 cents per person.[fn]The per-ticket average is based on contemporary attendance and receipt accounts. The teams charged different rates for grandstand and pavilion seats and frequently held special promotions, such as “Ladies’ Day,” which introduces some variability into this average.[/fn] Teams traveled by train and dressed for the game in a local hotel or boarding house. Based on available evidence, the parks can charitably be described as “unrefined,” with sandy ground that made growing grass difficult. Seating was provided in covered band-box “pavilions” and open-air grandstands, set to one side of the field, usually along the first-base line. Bullpens didn’t exist; pitchers warmed up down the foul lines. The ballpark might also be used for other events. In Valdosta, the field was within a dirt track oval used for motorcycle races. 

The Empire State League began play on May 1, with Waycross visiting Brunswick, Americus appearing in Cordele, and Valdosta hosting Thomasville. Businesses closed early, parades were held, city officials strutted, and the ballparks were mobbed. Special trains ran from each visiting team’s city and the surrounding towns. But even before the season was properly underway, there was controversy. The league had announced a contest to award a trophy to the city that had the largest home-opener crowd; determining the winner became clouded by allegations of over counting by some teams. Brunswick claimed the opening-day attendance title with 3,000 fans—exactly 3,000—and over 2,700 were claimed by Waycross for its opener on May 5. Given that the other teams reported more realistic figures for the period and ballpark sizes (1,200 to 1,500 fans), and given that the postseason games averaged 770 spectators, it seems likely that some over counting did, in fact, occur. Still, the opening-day scenes must have been impressive, and the overflow of fans would have been accommodated along the foul lines and in the outfield. When Thomasville held its first game at home, the team reported almost 1,200 fans in attendance in a park that was described to have a capacity of about 800. 

The league scheduled a meeting to discuss the attendance prize, but more important matters took center stage. Two weeks into the season, it was time to change league presidents again. On May 19, C. C. Vaughn, who had been elected to the position just three months earlier to succeed James Sinclair, gave notice of his intention to resign. Actually, Vaughn had tried to get out earlier but had withdrawn his previous resignation. Now he had a good excuse—he was moving to New Orleans. Vice President Groover was elevated to the presidency and would retain that post for the remainder of the season. (And no attendance trophy was awarded.) 

Like the rest of the teams, the Americus Muckalees,[fn]Team nicknames were seldom if ever used in press accounts of the games. Four of these teams would keep the same names for the 1914 season; Cordele changed its team name to the Ramblers, and Waycross became the Grasshoppers or Moguls.[/fn] named for a local tributary of the Flint River, actually began play before the regular season was underway, facing off with minor-league and college opponents in a sort of preseason exhibition tour. Americus’ 13-game schedule was more ambitious than most. In addition to the practice time, the team may have needed the gate receipts just to start the season. The Americus team was an uneven nine. They had the bats, but not the arms, to be successful. Numerous four- and fivegame losing streaks, along with a few winning streaks, gave the team a certain mediocre consistency. Three managers came and went over the course of the season: Harry Weber, Hal Griffin, and Bill Kuhlman. Weber quit after two weeks; Griffin then took over but shortly gave way to Kuhlman. The team finished fourth in both halves of the season, and its overall record also placed it fourth among the six teams of the league. The season for Americus was not without its bright spots, however. Late in the season, catcher Dick Manchester was voted the “most popular player” in the league by the fans; he won the title, and a loving cup, over the second-place finisher, Valdosta’s Otto Jordan. 

With the offensive prowess of outfielder Henry Chancey, Americus should have fared much better. Chancey led the team—and the league—in batting with a .386 average and also led in home runs (10), hits (142), total bases (212), and extra base hits (46).[fn]The batting, fielding, and pitching statistics in this article include appearances in the postseason and/or tie games. The author is currently at work on calculating more accurate regular-season figures based on contemporary box scores. Suffice it to say that whether or not postseason or tie games are counted, the individuals identified here were the best on their respective teams.[/fn] He was second in the league in doubles (32) and third in runs (68). Third baseman Grady Bowen was close behind, batting .324, and was ranked fifth in the league in hits (118). The team’s pitching was led by “Red” Dacey, with a 9–3 record, and Pratt, who went 9–6. First baseman Hal Griffin led the league in putouts (983), with Bowen at third base and Kuhlman at second ranking fourth and fifth, respectively. 

The Cordele Babies played in the smallest city in the circuit but in front of some of the most rabid fans in the league. “Babies” seems like an unusual team name to us today, but was a common nickname around the country for teams of the period and was also used in 1913 by the South Atlantic League (Class C) team in nearby Albany, Georgia.[fn]No formal relationship between the two teams has been found, and it is unlikely that one existed, as the two cities were bitter rivals in attracting businesses and industrial development.[/fn] The team was managed by Eddie “Rip” Reagan, a former Sally and Southern Association player.[fn]Reagan played in a different league every year from 1906 to 1912.[/fn] Reagan was well known to Cordele fans, having played for the city in the 1906 Georgia State League. The team’s strength was its pitching, led by Cleo “Kid” Wilder (16–10) and Dana Fillingim (15–10), who pitched back-to-back no-hitters in a doubleheader against Waycross on July 23.[fn]The two games of the doubleheader were each seven innings, and both games were umpired by another pitcher—Gentle of Valdosta. Also of note, Cleo Wilder has been misidentified in at least one source (Johnson and Wolfe) as “Percy” Wilder. Percy, manager of a team in Jacksonville in 1913, did play a role in the creation of the league, as a member of the committee assembled by James Sinclair, but he was not on the roster of any Empire State League team.[/fn] Evidently, the Babies had that team’s number; Wilder also recorded 15 strikeouts on May 17 against Waycross. Wilder and Fillingim had faced each other as pitchers on top high-school teams in 1912; ten years after being teammates in Cordele, Dana would be in the majors and Wilder would be pitching against Shoeless Joe Jackson in an outlaw league. However, pitching was also Cordele’s weakness; no other moundsman on the staff posted a winning record. With a 12–16 record, Hall recorded the most losses in the league. Outfielders Brazier (.308) and Wassem (.306) led the team in batting. Catcher Carl Eubanks finished fourth in the league in putouts, the only player in the top five in that category who was not a first baseman. 

By the third week of the season, Cordele and Valdosta separated themselves from the rest of the league and stayed close to each other in the standings for the next several weeks. After 45 games, the halfway point of the schedule, the two teams were well out in front of the others. They seemed destined to leave the rest of the field behind, fighting it out to the end for the league championship. However, there was concern among league directors that only two teams—three if the strong Thomasville nine was included—were really in a race for the championship. At the midpoint of the season, Brunswick, Waycross, and Americus were all within a few games of each other, grouped together seven to ten games behind the leaders. The lack of interest in noncontending teams could have a negative impact at the box office. On June 11, President Groover announced that the league’s directors would gather to discuss splitting the season. At that point, Cordele trailed Valdosta by one game in the standings. 

League officials met on June 13; up for discussion were possible changes to the playing schedule. The proposal for the league champion to meet the champion of the South Atlantic League in a postseason series had died on the vine. With the teams in relatively good financial health and with no other postseason opponent available, the league decided to extend the schedule from 90 to 102 games, splitting the season in order to set up a championship contest between the first- and second-half winners. There was also some hope that, by dividing the season, currently weak teams would have an opportunity to compete for the second-half crown and thus build interest—and ticket sales—in their cities. Whether or not that would be the case, the decision did have an immediate effect on the race to win the first half. At the time the new format was announced, Valdosta’s lead over Cordele was only two games, with fewer than two weeks left to play in the first half. 

The Empire State League directors had more on their minds at that June meeting than just adjusting the season schedule. Umpiring had become a problem. For league officials, the math was simple. With six teams in the league, there would be three games going Professional Baseball on at any one time. Thus, to their in Georgia – 1913 minds, just three umpires would be required, with perhaps a few more identified as potential substitutes. Lamar Ham, who had played in the 1906 Georgia State League, Robert Carter, and M. J. McLaughlin were the first “men in blue” for the league. Umpires were hired and paid by the league and, given the financial uncertainties before play began, it made sense to be conservative. For the umpires, however, facing potentially hostile crowds alone, without knowing what level of support to expect from the league, could make their jobs unnecessarily difficult and sometimes dangerous.[fn]On June 28, 1913, an umpire was killed by a bat-wielding player at an amateur game in Louisville.[/fn] The umpires pushed for two-man umpiring crews, but the season began with umpires working games alone. The league turned out not to be a weak partner in this arrangement; President Groover handed out several player suspensions for actions on the field during the season. Even so, the issue of crew size came to a head in mid-June, and the umpires disappeared from the field. Players filled in, at least fourteen of whom umpired games from June 11 to June 27. Typically, these were two-man umpiring crews, drawing a player from each team, though a few games featured three-man crews. One of the players—the Valdosta pitcher Gentle—evidently found the task to his liking, and he quit his team to finish out the season as an umpire. As the season progressed, the league, recognizing that it was in good financial shape, capitulated. More umpires were hired, and two-man crews became the norm. By the end of the season, about a dozen umpires, not counting players, had worked for the Empire State League. 

The Valdosta Millionaires, led by player-manager Otto “Dutch” Jordan, a former major leaguer and Southern Association All-Star,[fn]Otto Jordan played in the New York State League from 1901 to 1903; with Brooklyn (National League) from 1903 to 1904; and in the Southern Association from 1905 to 1913, mostly with Atlanta. As captain of the Atlanta Crackers, he was once arrested in New Orleans for stealing a baseball from the Pelicans during a game—but that’s another story.[/fn] were one of the best teams in the league. Jordan replaced opening-day manager “Whitey” Morse just one week into the season, to the delight of the locals, who welcomed the “prince of the second sackers.”[fn]Atlanta Constitution, 8 May 1913, 11.[/fn] The “Millionaires” nickname was the result of a newspaper contest; the team was more often referred to locally as “Otto’s Otters.” Jordan paced his team in batting with a .344 average in 96 games, but the defense showed some unevenness. Jordan at second base was second in assists in the league with 262, while third baseman Leininger was second in the league in errors (45). Valdosta’s best pitcher was Winges, who compiled a 17–7 record; also notable was pitcher “Rube” Zellars, who posted a 15–13 record, tied for the second-most losses in the league. 

With a week to go in the first half, Valdosta held a two-game lead over Cordele. But was there just a week left to play? Back on June 13, Secretary Leavy had identified July 3 as the starting point for the second half. But that would have resulted in an uneven schedule, putting more games in the first half than the second. President Groover issued a statement on June 25 that the end of the first half would be June 28—three days hence. This caused an immediate outcry in Cordele. With three games left to play, Valdosta’s lead was down to one game. In the final series of the first half, Valdosta would host Cordele, who would have to win two of the three games to gain a postseason berth. In the end it wasn’t much of an issue, however, since if the first half ended on July 3 as originally announced, Cordele would have had to play three more games against Valdosta, for a total of six straight, and would have had to win four of them. As it was, Valdosta won the first two games of the set and secured a place in the postseason championship series. The first half of the season ended on a good note for the league, with half of its teams finishing above .500. So far, so good.

The second half of the season began on June 30, with Americus in Waycross, Thomasville hosting Brunswick, and Valdosta visiting Cordele. Perhaps Cordele came out of the gate looking for a little payback; in the second game of the series they prevailed over Valdosta by a score of 13–0. It would be one of the few bright spots in what remained of their season, as the team— which had been vying for a playoff berth just a week earlier—would finish the second half in last place. With the first half of the season in the books, fans were now looking forward to that Friday’s Fourth of July holiday, which would feature home-and-home twin-bills between Thomasville and Valdosta, Americus and Cordele, and Brunswick and Waycross. Team owners around the league were also looking forward to the holiday payday. 

The Brunswick Pilots, their nickname derived from the river pilots who were hired to guide ships in and out of the town’s busy port, were the most poorly run team in the league. The Pilots had three managers during the season: Bert Kite, Charlie Moran,[fn]Beginning in 1902, Charlie Moran had a long and varied baseball career and was later a major-league umpire.[/fn] and “Whitey” Morse (who also had a brief managing stint with Valdosta at the start of the season). Brunswick fielded the largest number of players during the season in an ultimately frustrating attempt to find a winning combination. All the league teams rotated players on and off their rosters, but none did it with Brunswick’s verve. The team went through enough players to fill the rosters of three league teams. The Pilots had some good hitters, but many of them did not play with the team long enough to make a difference. First baseman/manager “Whitey” Morse was second in the league in putouts (873). Only one Brunswick pitcher— Hartner—had a winning record (15–8). In the first half of the season, the team had a six-game winless streak and two five-game winless streaks, which guaranteed a poor finish. The team performed better in the second half, avoiding any lengthy losing streaks, but they still could not consistently win games. Only the poor play of Cordele kept Brunswick from a last-place finish in the second half of the season. Cordele faded in the last third of the second half, suffering through an 11-game winless streak late in the season, followed by one win and then a six-game losing streak. When the 11-game streak began, the team was in second place; a week and a half later, Cordele was in last place to stay. 

When the Empire State League was created, attention was paid to ensuring a balanced geographic reach for the league. In doing so, obvious rivalries were created or, as in the case of Valdosta and Thomasville, were carried over into the new league. Cordele and Americus were separated by 30 rail miles; Brunswick and Waycross were 57 miles apart; Thomasville and Valdosta had just 44 miles to travel to meet one another. Because of these pairings, the league could celebrate the Fourth of July with games in every league city. Special trains were run so that fans could see their team in both cities where they played that day. Picnics and other events were scheduled to coincide with the games. 

Although the league made it past July 4 with all its teams in good shape, trouble was brewing in Americus, creating a crucial test for the league. For a number of other minor leagues, not just the aforementioned 1906 Georgia State League, the Fourth of July was often the make-or-break point. If the league lost a team now, no one could tell how far reaching the effects might be. Even if the season could be completed with a five-team circuit, the fact that South Georgia could not fully support a minor league would be embarrassing for business leaders and civic promoters, potentially affecting business recruitment in the region. Thankfully for all involved, Americus limped along, though it was forced to hold a fund-raising drive to sell subscriptions in order to keep the team in operation through the remainder of the season. 

The Waycross Blowhards represented the most populous city in the circuit, but the highest average attendance in the league couldn’t help a team with the worst batting average. The origin of the “Blowhards” nickname was the result of a fan contest and reflected the major industry in town—railroad-engine construction and repair. Waycross was managed for most of the season by Charlie Wahoo, formerly of the Carlisle Indian School. He was followed in the manager’s seat by Jack Hawkins and then Willie Clark. Infielder Charles Anderson was the standout on the team, batting .301 in 85 games. Outfielder Fenton batted just .259 but was second in the league in home runs, with 7 roundtrippers. Pitcher “Wild Bill” Clark led the team with a 16–9 record, tied for third most wins in the league; no other Waycross pitcher had a winning record. 

The league’s decision to split the season helped to make the races in the second half more competitive, as all the teams stayed within four or five games of each other. But with two weeks to go in the season, Thomasville took off, eventually finishing six and a half games ahead of second-place Valdosta. The team posted an 11-game winning streak from August 12 to 25, which put the top spot out of reach for any other team. The Thomasville Hornets—the nickname was literally picked from a hat—were managed by Martin Dudley, who played the previous few seasons in the Class D Cotton States League and had appeared in the South Atlantic League in 1910. Shortstop Herbert “Dummy” Murphy[fn]Murphy was deaf and received the standard nickname of the time for deaf players. His given name was Herbert Courtland, but he was called “Pat” by friends.[/fn] led the team in batting with a .338 average, followed by second baseman “Piggie” Parker, who batted .321. Murphy also led the league in errors (47 in 73 games). The team featured a strong pitching staff with three moundsmen posting winning records: Vincent Roth (18–8), who also batted .283 and led the league in wins; “Red” Day (16–6); and Larry Cheney (10–6).

Thomasville walked away with the second half of the season, which ended on August 27.[fn]The results shown for the second half of the season do not match those previously published in other sources. This variance is most likely due to several transcription errors in the Atlanta Constitution’s reporting. The Constitution’s final standings for the second half appear to have been directly copied by both Sporting Life and Sporting News. Simple addition demonstrates that the overall team totals for wins (150) and losses (149) do not agree in those results. (You can’t have a win without someone else having a loss, and vice versa.) From these sources, especially the oft-cited Sporting News, the erroneous results have been repeated in later publications. Baseball Reference cites a different set of totals also at variance with the results presented here. The “won/lost” figures shown in the included tables are based on game accounts from multiple contemporary sources. The corrections do not affect the order in which the teams finished for the second half of the season. It is also worth mentioning that one game in the second half was protested and officially dropped from the records by the league (July 9, Thomasville at Americus). The Atlanta Constitution correctly reflected this change.[/fn]

The average attendance for the regular season was about 400 fans per game, and all six teams were close to that average. Waycross led the league, with an average of 431 paid admissions per game, followed by Brunswick (411) and Thomasville (405). Cordele had the lowest average attendance for the season (364), with Americus (380) and Valdosta (394) doing somewhat better. To tell the whole story, however, these figures have to be considered in terms of the total population in each town. Waycross, for example, had the highest total attendance, but, being the largest city in the league, actually drew the smallest proportion of its population to the park on average (2.8 percent). Cordele, about one-third the size of Waycross and with the lowest total attendance, actually did the best in terms of the percentage of its total population attending its games (6 percent), with Thomasville, half the size of Waycross, coming in right behind (5.7 percent).

THE POSTSEASON

The championship series began on Friday, August 29, using a best-of-seven format. It was somehow appropriate that Thomasville and Valdosta were playing for the championship. Four months earlier, these two teams faced each other to open their seasons; they also faced each other on the Fourth of July. Since the two towns involved were so close to one another, the games were scheduled to alternate between the two cities, with Valdosta hosting the opener as winner of the first half of the season. That game attracted 741 fans. Otto Jordan had kept his team sharp, winning seven of nine games in the closing weeks of the regular season. In the first game, Valdosta walked away with a win. Thomasville pitcher Cheney loaded the bases in the first inning, which allowed the Otters to score a run on an error by shortstop Murphy. Thomasville came back in the next inning, scoring two runs to edge ahead. This score held up until the bottom of the fourth, when Valdosta erupted for five runs, assisted by two errors and several walks. Valdosta added two more runs in the fifth; Thomasville started a rally in the seventh but could only get two runs across. Final score: Valdosta 8, Thomasville 4. It was a good start for the Otters, and the series moved to Thomasville. 

The second game of the series was held on Saturday in Thomasville before a crowd of 595. This game would prove to be a bit tighter than the first one, but the outcome was the same. Both teams scored a run in the first inning; Valdosta’s Van Landingham hit the second pitch of the contest over the center-field fence for a home run—the first in the series. By contrast, Thomasville scored its first run on a walk, a sacrifice, and a double. The Otters went ahead in the top of the second, with Van Landingham, on his way to a three-for-five day at the plate, getting the RBI. The Hornets tied the score in the bottom of the third via a double, a bunt, and a single. Valdosta went ahead for good in the fourth inning, scoring a run and then building on this lead with two additional runs in the seventh, including the second home run of the series, this one hit by left fielder Jack Hawkins. Final score: Valdosta 5, Thomasville 2. Valdosta now led the series two games to none. 

There was no baseball the next day since it was a Sunday. However, it was not an off day for the Thomasville team. That day, Hornets shortstop Murphy got married to Miss Ella Sanford of Thomasville. It would make a nice story to report that Murphy, up to now hitting a combined two-for-nine, suddenly came alive at the plate. Or that he settled in and reduced his league-leading error rate. Unfortunately for Murphy, neither was the case. Fortunately for the team, on the other hand, the good spirits of the wedding party carried over to the next game of the series. 

On Monday, September 1, the two teams were back at it. If Thomasville wanted to stay alive, the team needed to start winning. The series had returned to Valdosta, and the largest crowd of the series—1,018 cranks—was present to root for the teams. Special trains from the surrounding towns ran for this game, and it was the Hornets’ turn to shine—although that wasn’t immediately apparent. Valdosta started the scoring off with a run in the bottom of the second inning and increased their lead with a second run in the fifth. But the Otters’ pitching failed them late in the game; Thomasville scored five runs over the final four innings. The Hornets tied the game in the seventh, chasing Vaughn, the starting pitcher. The relief pitcher, Zellars, walked in another run, giving Thomasville the lead, and allowed single runs in the next two innings. On the mound for Thomasville, Cheney, who had a rocky start in Game 1 of the series, came through for the Hornets, allowing just two runs on nine hits. Newlywed Murphy led all players with two errors; perhaps he was tired. Final score: Thomasville 5, Valdosta 2. The Hornets had made a good showing, although Valdosta still led the series, two games to one. 

On Tuesday, the contest returned to Thomasville. The 732 fans who turned out to see the game were treated to a pitching beauty. Vincent Roth went the distance for the Hornets, keeping Valdosta off the scoreboard and surrendering just two singles. He helped his own cause by swatting a home run in the third inning; Thomasville second baseman Murch also hit a home run, his coming in the first. The Hornets scored two runs in the opening frame and three in the third. The Otters, meanwhile, could not solve Roth, who struck out six, walked two, and stranded five on his way to a complete game shutout. Final score: Thomasville 5, Valdosta 0. The series was now tied at two games apiece. 

Game 5 was on Wednesday, September 3, in Valdosta, before a crowd of 742. Valdosta came out swinging, outhitting the Hornets through nine innings but ultimately falling short of victory. This game was a defensive gem, with Thomasville’s “Red” Day facing off against Winges for the Otters. Both men struck out three batters; Winges walked three to Day’s two. Valdosta opened the scoring in the third inning with a run scored off a single, a sacrifice, and another single. The Hornets came back in the sixth inning, scoring two runs on a walk, an error, a single, a sacrifice, and another single. This was the epitome of “small ball” in the Deadball Era. Day made those two runs hold up, going the distance for the victory. Final score: Thomasville 2, Valdosta 1. Thomasville now led the series three games to two—just one win away from a championship. 

Thomasville got that win the next day, September 4, at home in front of a crowd of 789. In his third start of the series, Cheney’s performance on the mound, combined with the defense behind him, cemented victory for the Hornets. Valdosta managed five hits off Cheney but produced no runs. The big bats of the Otters were generally silent; Jordan went one-for-four, as did Van Landingham. Thomasville got on the scoreboard in the bottom of the first, scoring one run on two singles and an error. The Hornets added another run in the second on two singles and a sacrifice and then put the game out of reach in the seventh, with three runs scored off a round-tripper hit by left fielder John Wagnon. It was his first home run of the entire season, and fans responded by collecting $30 in the stands, which they then delivered to the player. Appropriately enough, Hornets manager Martin Dudley caught a popup to end the game and the series. The Thomasville pitching staff had its second complete game shutout of the series. Final score: Thomasville 5, Valdosta 0. 

The City of Thomasville was ecstatic. The Hornets had won the “rag”—the championship banner—in the inaugural season of the Empire State League. People cheered, honked horns, and rang bells. There was also cause for celebration of a financial sort. Each team received $774 from gate receipts; players on the winning team received $266 to divide among themselves, while players on the losing team got $177 to split.[fn]Members of the winning team received about $22 apiece ($462 in today’s dollars); players on the losing team got $15 each ($315 in today’s dollars). Each team received over $16,000 in today’s dollars.[/fn] 

At a banquet on the day after the series win, Manager Dudley had more good news: his own wedding plans. Dudley’s announcement came in the form of a telegram; he was in Valdosta with his betrothed. Present at the banquet was the team’s shortstop, newlywed “Dummy” Murphy, who was now looking north to the major leagues. 

THE LEGACY 

The Empire State League made it to the finish line with all six franchises intact. This outcome was not always assured and was quite an accomplishment for a firstyear circuit. Sporting Life reported that the season “was an artistic and financial success, all of the clubs that entered the race finishing in good condition for another fling at the game next year.”[fn]Sporting Life 62, no. 1 (6 September 1913): 29.[/fn] The men who played in the league had demonstrated day in and day out that the desire to succeed at their craft could carry them through the rough times and muggy afternoons of South Georgia. More than 30 of them went on to play in higher-classification minor leagues; two— “Dummy” Murphy and Dana Fillingim—made it from the Empire State League to the major leagues.

In November 1913, the Empire State League changed its name to the Georgia State League for the upcoming season, a nod to the 1906 circuit.[fn]Two unrelated Georgia State Leagues, which operated in the Middle and Western Georgia regions, fielded teams in 1920–21 and 1948–56.[/fn] The salary limit was raised to $1,200. There was also a change at the top of the league. At the November 11 league meeting in Cordele, I. J. Kalmon of Americus was elected president, replacing Groover, who had retired. Kalmon was not the group’s first choice; J. B. Jemison, the brother of Atlanta Constitution sports editor Dick Jemison, was selected but turned down the offer. In a surprising turn, James Sinclair, the man whose idea had launched the league, returned to the fold, winning election as vice president. All six teams from the 1913 league stayed on as members of the Georgia State League, and 35 players from 1913 (70 percent of the 50 men on the “reserve” lists of the teams) returned for 1914. Seven players were drafted from the Empire State League to play in higher leagues for 1914, most going to Class C clubs. 

The 1914 season was a complete success and finished with Cordele beating Thomasville in four straight games for the championship. By 1915, however, problems began to overtake the league. The major liability of the circuit was the size of its member cities. Operating costs (equipment, travel, and lodging), player salaries, and team profits were all directly related to the number of people each team could attract to its games. Smaller cities had less of a population base to draw from, even though some of these cities were fairly successful at putting people in the seats. Cordele dropped out before play began in 1915 and was replaced by a franchise in Dothan, Alabama. Americus, again struggling financially as it had in 1913, disbanded three weeks into the season; the league filled its spot with a team from Gainesville, Florida. Bowing to the obvious, the circuit was renamed the FLAG (Florida-Alabama-Georgia) League on June 15. But the changes weren’t enough; the league folded on July 17, 1915. A playoff series was attempted but not completed. It would be 20 years before the Empire State League cities were back in professional ball to stay. Still and all, two years of sustained operations had convinced many that professional baseball could work in South Georgia. By proving that Class D baseball could be successful, the Empire State League laid the foundation for later minor-league ball in the region, though events conspired against an immediate continuation of the South Georgia Class D circuit. World War I, an influenza pandemic, the Great Depression, and a second world war, each in their way, delayed the return of the six cities to professional baseball, just as those events delayed the population and business growth of the region. By the end of World War II, five of the six cities once again hosted minor-league teams; in 1951, Brunswick became the last Empire State League city to welcome back minor-league baseball. The dream of professional baseball in the region turned into a nightmare in 1906; it was made a success in 1913. The Empire State League proved that business and sporting interests could come together to field professional teams in South Georgia. 

WILLIAM F. ROSS III is writing a book on professional baseball in South Georgia during the Deadball Era.

Sources

The majority of the information presented in this article is based on contemporary newspaper and other periodical accounts. Primary sources include the Atlanta Constitution, Sporting Life, and The Sporting News. The author also wishes to recognize the assistance provided by Ephraim Rotter, Curator of Collections with the Thomas County Historical Society. The following sources were also consulted:

Websites

• Baseball Reference: www.baseball-reference.com 
• Retrosheet: www.retrosheet.org 
• SABR Minor League Database: www.minors.sabrwebs.com 
• United States Bureau of Economic Analysis: www.bea.gov 
• United States Census Bureau: www.census.gov

Books

• Anderson, Alan. Remembering Americus, Georgia: Essays on Southern Life. Charleston, S.C.: The History Press, 2006. 
• Bell, John. Georgia Class-D Minor League Baseball Encyclopedia: A Statistical History of the Georgia-Alabama, Georgia-Florida, and Georgia State Leagues. Carrollton, Ga.: Vabella Publishing, 2003. 
• Caldwell, Wilber W. The Courthouse and the Depot: The Architecture of Hope in an Age of Despair. Macon, Ga.: Mercer University Press, 2001. 
• Faber, Charles F., and Richard B. Faber. Spitballers: the Last Legal Hurlers of the Wet One. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2006. 
• James, Bill, and Rob Neyer. The Neyer/James Guide to Pitchers: An Historical Compendium of Pitching, Pitchers, and Pitches. New York: Fireside, 2004. 
• Johnson, Lloyd, and Miles Wolff, eds. Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball. 3rd ed. Durham, N.C.: Baseball America, 2007. 
• McQueen, A. S., and Hamp Mizell. History of Okefenokee Swamp. Tallahassee, Fla.: Rose Printing Co., 1992 (reprint). 
• O’Neal, Bill. The Southern League: Baseball in Dixie, 1885–1994. Austin, Tex.: Eakin Press, 1994. 
• Rogers, William W. Transition to the Twentieth Century: Thomas County, Georgia, 1900–1920. Tallahassee, Fla.: Sentry Press, 2002. 
• Simon, Tom, ed. Deadball Stars of the National League. Washington, D.C.: Brassey’s, Inc., 2004. 
• Simpson, John A. “The Greatest Game Ever Played in Dixie”: The Nashville Vols, Their 1908 Season, and the Championship Game. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2007. 
• Sullivan, Neil J. The Minors: The Struggles and the Triumph of Baseball’s Poor Relation from 1876 to the Present. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1990. 
• Utley, Francis Lee, and Marion R. Hemperley, eds. Placenames of Georgia: Essays of John H. Goff. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1975. 
• Wiggins, Robert Peyton. The Federal League of Base Ball Clubs: The History of an Outlaw Major League, 1914–1915. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2009. 
• Wright, Marshall D. The Southern Association in Baseball, 1885–1961. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2002. 
• The South Atlantic League, 1904–1963: A Year-by-Year Statistical History. Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2009.

Sandy Koufax
Edited by Marc Z. Aaron, Bill Nowlin, and Glen Sparks
Associate editors: Len Levin and Carl Riechers
Publication date: September 9, 2024
ISBN (ebook): 978-1-960819-26-0, $9.99
ISBN (paperback): 978-1-960819-27-7, $24.95
8.5″ x 11″, 186 pages

SABR’s Digital Library book on Sandy Koufax explores what made him so special in baseball and American society through 17 insightful essays and recaps of 36 key games in his career. Touching on subjects from Koufax’s potential basketball career, his relationship with manager Walt Alston, celebrity culture in Los Angeles, and his effect on the hurlers who came after him, to analyses of Koufax’s stats and records, Sandy Koufax takes a deep dive into one of baseball’s true greats.

Many pitchers enjoyed longer careers than Sandy Koufax. Few, however, reached the glorious heights of this Dodgers left-hander. Signed as a bonus baby at the age of 19, the Brooklyn native spent his early years battling control issues while also displaying occasional flashes of brilliance. Finally, frustrated and on the verge of retirement, he decided, “I was really going to find out how good I can be.”

In 1961, in his seventh big-league season, Koufax led the majors in strikeouts. From 1962-66, he compiled a 111-34 won-loss record and a 1.95 ERA. He led the National League in ERA every season during that span, hurled four no-hitters, and won three Cy Young awards. Hitters feared his devastating mix of fastballs and curveballs. The great slugger Willie Stargell once said, “Trying to hit Sandy Koufax was like drinking coffee with a fork.” In eight World Series games, he posted a 0.95 ERA.

Unfortunately, Koufax also battled arm injuries. Tired of all the pain medication, he called it quits after the 1966 season, a few months before his 31st birthday, his place in the Baseball Hall of Fame assured.

Koufax is revered in the Jewish community, even among non-Dodger fans, for his decision not to pitch in Game One of the 1966 World Series, which was scheduled on the Yom Kippur holy day. “There was no hard decision for me,” Koufax said. “It was just a thing of respect.”

Sandy Koufax is a collaborative effort of 47 members of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).

SABR members, get this e-book for FREE!

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Below: Find memorable game stories and essays from SABR’s Sandy Koufax

SABR Biography

Sandy Koufax delivers a pitch during his third career no-hitter on June 4, 1964. (SABR-Rucker Archive)

Click here to read more about Sandy Koufax’s life and legacy at the SABR BioProject

Game Recaps

Essays

Contributors: Marc Z. Aaron, Jake Bell, Charlie Bevis, Luis Blandón Jr., Kurt Blumenau, Thomas J. Brown Jr., Paul Browne, Ken Carrano, Alan Cohen, Carter Cromwell, Richard Cuicchi, Larry DeFillipo, John Fredland, Craig Garretson, Ed Gruver, Vince Guerrieri, Andrew Harner, Bruce Harris, Jeff Howard, Mike Huber, Mark Kanter, Norm King, Kevin Larkin, Len Levin, Scott Martire, Les Masterson, Andy McCue, Chad Moody, Bill Nowlin, Tim Odzer, Tim Otto, Byron Petraroja, Bill Pruden, Carl Riechers, Howard Rosenberg, Quentin Sallat, Paul Semendinger, Paul Sinclair, Glen Sparks, Russ Speiller, Mark S. Sternman, Aaron Tallent, William M. “Matt” Vines, Steven C. Weiner, Sarah Wexler, Paul White, Brian Williams, and Gregory H. Wolf.

The Broadview Buffaloes in front of the Broadview, Saskatchewan, CPR Station, 1937. Back row: Buck Eaton, John Isaacson, Chris Edwards, Dick Webb, Gene Bremer, Mack Sinclair. Front row: Lionel Decuir, Red Boguille, Roy Schappert, Kitchie Bates, Ronnie Bates (manager). (Thora Anderson, Broadview)

Broadview is a Saskatchewan town of fewer than 1,000 people, 90 miles east of Regina on the southern Canadian Pacific Railroad (CPR) line. It’s a seemingly unlikely place to have hosted a powerhouse fully-integrated baseball team during the 1930s, but host such a team it did: the Broadview Buffaloes.

My father, Jack Wyatt, was born in Broadview, as was I. One of my father’s acquaintances, a local resident named Chris Edwards, had played third base for the Buffaloes.1 I was able to interview Edwards, along with a friend of his named Bus Conn,2 who had been a teammate of his on the Buffaloes. Edwards was able to put me in touch with an elderly Regina woman named Edie Maynard,3 who, along with her husband, Frank, had operated a Broadview hotel on the CPR line, and had helped to bankroll the team during the 1930s.

Mrs. Maynard had acted as the team’s treasurer, and still possessed the books from her ownership tenure. One interesting expense item therein was a $1,000 bond that the team had to pay at the international border each year to allow the Black players entry into Canada; the payment was then refundable upon the return of the same players at season’s end.

What was unusual about this arrangement was the number of players being imported en masse to represent a single team. Prior to 1930, there had been many documented cases of imported African American ringers coming to Canada from the US to play, but these were individuals for the most part. Usually, they were pitchers only, as in the case of the legendary lefty John Donaldson, who had thrown for semipro teams in the Saskatchewan centers of Moose Jaw and Radville in 1925.4 A single Black pitcher helping an otherwise White team was a common arrangement.

The Buffaloes were a semipro squad. It was typically the Black imports who were paid, while most of the local amateurs (who were still good ballplayers in their own right) were not. The Western Canada baseball landscape was a competitive one in that era. Every town and city wanted to win, and side bets were very common. Senior baseball in Broadview dates from 1934 and 1935, when the town fielded an all-White team called the Red Sox. Independent of any league, they played the lucrative tournament circuit (or as lucrative as prairie baseball during the Great Depression could be).

By 1936, still as independents, they took aboard a 21-year-old right-handed pitcher, Gene Bremer,5 and his catcher, Lionel Decuir. The two Negro League players, and their Shreveport Acme Giants teammates, had visited Winnipeg in 1935 for an exhibition series against future Hall of Fame pitching great Satchel Paige and his Bismarck Corwin-Churchills, an integrated team from across the border in Bismarck, North Dakota. (The Bismarck team captured the inaugural National Baseball Congress semipro title later that year.)6

Between 1936 and 1938, the Broadview roster featured Bremer, Decuir (who later moved to the Kansas City Monarchs), and others from the Negro Leagues, including pitchers Jimmy Miller and George Alexander, power-hitting Sonny Harris, and the versatile Red Boguille. (According to Edie Maynard’s records, Bremer was paid $45 a month plus housing expenses his first year in Broadview.) The team’s White locals, in addition to Edwards and Conn, included Roy Schappert, Kitchie Bates, Harold Horeak, Mack Sinclair, and Dick Webb. All were decent ballplayers, and well-known in the area.

The Red Sox won three major tournaments in 1936 with their beefed-up lineup. On June 11 they took the Broadview Annual Sports Day Tournament, beating the Moose Jaw Athletics, 5-0.7 On July 1 they won the Moosomin Dominion Day Tournament by defeating Virden, Manitoba, 9-3. (In the semifinal, the Red Sox had defeated Regina Nationals ace Myron Appell, a fireballer who was one of the province’s top pitchers.8 A month earlier, Appell, from Nebraska, had dominated the visiting Houston Black Buffaloes, striking out 14 in seven innings. The loss was the touring Black Buffaloes’ first in 27 games. They fared no better against Appell later in the month, victims of a no-hitter.)9 And on July 22, Broadview took the four-team Yorkton tournament, beating the host team 8-4 behind Jimmy Miller, after Bremer had pitched Broadview to an 8-2 victory over the Northgate (North Dakota) Yankees in the earlier game.10

Finally, on July 31, the Red Sox, with Miller again on the mound, made a real name for themselves by downing the famous House of David, the bearded White barnstormers from Benton Harbor, Michigan, in an exhibition game at Indian Head by a score of 8-5.11

In 1937 the Red Sox changed their name to the Buffaloes and joined the elite Saskatchewan Southern League, with the Weyburn Beavers, Notre Dame Hounds, and Moose Jaw Athletics as competition. Weyburn’s catcher was 19-year-old Elmer Lach, the future hockey Hall of Famer, and the Moose Jaw team featured brothers Doug and Reg Bentley, also of National Hockey League fame.12

The Notre Dame team was a group of students from the religious and educational institution located in Wilcox, Saskatchewan, some 30 miles south of Regina.13 The league’s deliberately light schedule allowed plenty of time for exhibition and tournament play.

The Broadview crew, preseason favorites based on their high-powered attack, did not disappoint, winning the pennant easily with an 8-1 record, their only loss early in the season to the young students of Notre Dame. As well, they captured four tournament titles, in Grenfell, La Fleche, Lemberg, and Regina,14 the last featuring a 17-1 whipping of the local Regina Pilsners.

In this prestigious Regina Exhibition Tournament, a six-day affair, shortstop Horeak and catcher Decuir led the Broadview attack, while Winnipeg natives Buck Eaton and John Isaacson handled the bulk of the pitching duties.15 In another tournament nine days earlier, Broadview had split the prize money with the Northgate Yankees after the two teams had battled to a 7-7 tie in Broadview in a game called because of darkness.

The league opted to skip in-house playoffs after the season, electing instead to compete in the provincials with the northern teams. Broadview, however, was denied any postseason competition when an allegation was made that one of its players had played professionally the year before. This was ironic, in light of the fact that there were professional ringers all over the prairies in any given year. Investigation into a further allegation revealed that the Buffaloes had also been playing against touring American teams without the proper SABA (Saskatchewan Amateur Baseball Association) permits.16

The Saskatchewan Southern League opened its 1938 season with only a single change of membership from the previous season, the Regina Senators replacing the Moose Jaw franchise, which did not reapply for entry. The Senators joined the Weyburn Beavers and Notre Dame Hounds in attempting to dethrone the defending champion and preseason favorite Buffaloes. Hard-hitting Broadview infielder Harold Horeak had moved to the Regina team, while Weyburn still featured 20-year-old Elmer Lach, then primarily an outfielder.17

The schedule had been expanded somewhat from 1937’s deliberately short one, but still featured gaps to accommodate the popular tournament play. When league play finished on July 31, the Buffaloes had won another pennant, finishing 16-5, their closest pursuers the Regina Senators at 9-9.18

By this time, the team was making a name outside Saskatchewan. A July 13, 1938, Winnipeg Free Press article reported, “A baseball classic of note is scheduled for Moosomin ball park … when the cream of western senior ball teams meet in the $300 tournament…. Broadview Buffaloes, with colored players from the Southern States, are a mighty machine that is tops in the Saskatchewan Senior League right now.”19 The Buffaloes didn’t win that tournament, finishing third, but they did win a number of other tournaments and important exhibition games.

In the annual Grenfell Tournament in May, the Buffaloes won a semifinal marathon in 14 innings behind eight shutout innings of relief from hurler Ramie (first name unknown). Lionel Decuir’s home run in the seventh inning tied the game, and his second won it in the 14th. The team missed out on the tourney’s top money, however, falling in the final to the Dunseith (North Dakota) Acme Giants before a crowd of more than 4,000. They rebounded days later with a 2-1 exhibition victory over the strong Northgate Yankees, first baseman Sonny Harris’s final-inning round-tripper providing the winning margin.20

A season’s highlight was another victory in the annual Broadview Sports Day Tournament on June 16, as they thumped the Northgate Yankees 12-4 in the final behind Red Boguille’s eight-hitter. Second baseman Sonny Harris had a double and a triple and scored three runs, while third baseman Don Sherran chipped in a triple and two singles. Broadview had blanked Liberty, 5-0, in the semifinal behind George Alexander’s four-hitter. Eight days later, they won a 16-team tournament in Watson, Saskatchewan, by defeating the hometown team 2-0.

They next claimed first-place money at the Dominion Day tournament in nearby Norquay. That summer, the Buffaloes beat the powerful Grover Cleveland Alexander House of David team twice, as well as the minor-league San Antonio Missions, also twice, and the colored House of David squad.21

The Buffaloes’ superiority over the rest of the league’s teams, however, proved to be the Southern League’s undoing. Before the July 31 end of the regular season, fans had become accustomed to seeing them win, and attendance was falling accordingly. By late July, teams stopped playing their scheduled games, failing to meet their commitments to the league.

The lost gate revenue had its expected effect on each team’s finances. An assessment of the league’s 1938 season suggests that while the league’s caliber of play was high, in fact as high as that of any other league in the province, the member teams seemed more interested in their individual agendas than in a commitment to the overall welfare of the circuit.22

With the bitter taste of the previous year’s postseason still lingering, and expecting similar treatment at the hands of the SABA authorities, Broadview decided to bow out of the 1938 playoff picture and continue on the tournament and exhibition trail into August, before calling it a season. After three impressive years, two of those in the Southern League, the Broadview Buffaloes disbanded. Their run was over.

Several of the White players left to join other prairie teams. Most of the Blacks returned to the Negro Leagues. Lionel Decuir caught for the Kansas City Monarchs23 in 1939 and ’40, where he had Satchel Paige for a teammate. In 1942 Sonny Harris found his way to the Cincinnati Buckeyes, who moved in midseason to Cleveland. His teammate there, Gene Bremer, was the most successful of the Buffaloes imports. Born in 1915 in New Orleans, Bremer was not a big man at 5-feet-8 and 160 pounds,24 but he could throw hard, using no windup and featuring a fastball that may have hit the low 90s. He was an excellent hitter as well: According to Baseball-Reference, his career OPS+ of 112 is the highest of any post-1900 pitcher (for at least 75% of their game appearances) with at least 100 plate appearances.

But tragedy struck Bremer, when he suffered a fractured skull in a car accident in late 1942 that killed two of his Cleveland Buckeyes teammates.25 Taking a year off from baseball in 1943 to recover, Bremer came back and still pitched well. He was a four-time Negro League All-Star,26 appearing in the years 1940, 1942, 1944, and 1945 in the East-West All-Star Game, the Black equivalent to the White major leagues’ All-Star Game. These games were held in Chicago, before crowds as large as 50,000.

Bremer was talented enough to play with and against such megastars in these games as Satchel Paige, Jackie Robinson, Josh Gibson, Roy Campanella, Buck Leonard, Cool Papa Bell, Sam Jethroe, Ray Dandridge, and Double Duty Radcliffe. With the Buffaloes, he had already been part of what may have been the first fully-integrated team in Canada in the mid-1930s; he seemed poised to repeat his feat nearly a decade later, when a war-time rumor had Bremer and two teammates, third baseman Parnell Woods and outfielder Sam Jethroe, about to receive tryouts with the American League’s Cleveland Indians. But the traffic accident then killed the tryouts, in addition to his two teammates.27 Had Bremer been signed by the Indians, he might have been a two-time trailblazer, once on each side of the border. Bremer retired as a Buckeye in 1948, and died in 1971 at the age of 54, still a Cleveland resident.28

The Broadview Buffaloes had a short but successful existence, dominating their competition in the southern prairies between 1936 and 1938. Their legacy is that they were one of the first fully integrated baseball teams in Canada, if not the first. The composition of their roster was not only rare for its time, but a harbinger of things to come in its similarity to the makeup of major-league rosters of 25 to 30 years later.

DANIEL WYATT is Canadian, born and raised on the prairies of Saskatchewan. Currently residing outside Toronto, he is the author of 12 books in the historical and historical fiction genres. He’s had articles published in various magazines, including The Hockey News and Baseball Digest, and has been a steady article contributor to TheNationalPastimeMuseum.com online baseball history website.

ANDREW NORTH is a retired developer of statistical software. He is a director of the Centre for Canadian Baseball Research and serves on the Editorial Board of the Journal for Canadian Baseball. A SABR member since 1982, he lives in St. Marys, Ontario, where he maintains the research library at the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

Sources and acknowledgments

My father, Jack Wyatt, and local Broadview residents Chris Edwards, Edie Maynard, Bus Conn, and others were very accommodating to interview requests. A useful biographical reference was Barry Swanton and Jay-Dell Mah’s book Black Baseball Players in Canada. And of immeasurable help was Mah’s outstanding website www.attheplate.com, dedicated primarily to baseball in the Western provinces. Many of his accounts are from local newspaper archives. The site is a treasure trove of information and is recommended unreservedly.

Notes

1 Daniel Wyatt interview with Jack Wyatt, Regina, Saskatchewan, September 1975.

2 Daniel Wyatt interview with Chris Edwards and Bus Conn, Broadview, Saskatchewan, September 1975.

3 Daniel Wyatt interview with Edie Maynard, Regina, Saskatchewan, September 1975.

4 Barry Swanton and Jay-Dell Mah, Black Baseball Players in Canada (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland, 2009), 59.

5 Different sources suggest different spell ings of Bremer’s surname. The Seamheads Negro Leagues data base uses Bremer. Swanton and Mah use Bremmer.

6 Swanton and Mah, 32.

7 Jay-Dell Mah, “Western Canada Baseball” website: http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1936_1k.html.

8 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1936_1k.html.

9 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1936_50i.html.

10 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1936_1k.html.

11 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1936_50i.html.

12 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1937_1j.html.

13 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1937_50i.html.

14 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1937_1k.html.

15 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1937_1k.html.

16 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1937_50i.html.

17 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1938_1j.html.

18 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1938_1.html.

19 Winnipeg Free Press, July 13, 1938: 15. Accessed July 9, 2021 via https://archives.winnipegfreepress.com/winnipeg-free-press/1938-07-13/page-15/.

20 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1938v1k.html.

21 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1938_1k.html.

22 Jay-Dell Mah, http://www.attheplate.com/wcbl/1938_50i.html.

23 Swanton and Mah, 58.

24 Swanton and Mah, 32.

25 Swanton and Mah, 32.

26 Swanton and Mah, 32.

27 Swanton and Mah, 32.

28 Swanton and Mah, 32.

In an iconic moment from A League of Their Own (1992), Manager Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks) asks Evelyn Gardner (Bitty Schram), “Are you crying? Are you crying? There’s no crying! There’s no crying in baseball!”

Baseball is not just a game for boys.

This was never more apparent than when A League of Their Own came to movie theaters in 1992.

Granted, the primary purpose of A League of Their Own is to entertain audiences and rake in profits for its makers. But in offering a fictionalized history of the first season of the All-American Girls’ Professional Baseball League, which Chicago Cubs owner Philip K. Wrigley initiated after scores of major leaguers exchanged their flannels for khakis during World War II, the film casts a welcome spotlight on the AAGPBL’s then-long forgotten participants.

The two primary characters in A League of Their Own may be fictional ballplaying sisters, but they are very real products of their era. Dottie Hinson (Geena Davis) yearns for her husband’s return from the war and has no sense of the importance of the AAGPBL. Conversely, playing in the league allows Kit Keller (Lori Petty) a freedom for which she yearns but otherwise could not enjoy, given her gender and the prevailing culture. The film’s impact is summed up by film critic Roger Ebert, who observed, “Until seeing [it], I had no idea that an organization named the All-American Girls’ Professional Baseball League ever flourished in this country, even though I was 12 when it closed up shop [in 1954]….[Director Penny] Marshall shows her women characters in a tug-of-war between new images and old values, and so her movie is about transition—about how it felt as a woman suddenly to have new roles and freedom.”1

Almost two decades after its release, A League of Their Own remains memorable as much for rescuing the AAGPBL from oblivion as for its now-iconic line, spoken by Rockford Peaches skipper Jimmy Dugan (Tom Hanks), an alcoholic ex-major leaguer who is an amalgam of Jimmy Foxx and Hack Wilson. After be- rating player Evelyn Gardner (Bitty Schram)—as any manager might—Dugan is aghast when Evelyn begins to cry. “Are you crying?” he asks, rhetorically. And he continues: “Are you crying? Are you crying? There’s no crying! There’s no crying in baseball!”

A League of Their Own is not the only film that spotlights females swinging bats and fielding grounders. But it easily is the best-known. Coming in a close second is the original (and best) version of The Bad News Bears (1976), in which Amanda Whurlitzer (Tatum O’Neal), a 12-year-old with a whale of a pitching arm, rescues an inept Little League nine. While stressing that the purpose of Little League is to have fun, the scenario emphasizes that a girl can play ball as well as a boy. Almost three decades later, a dumbed-down remake was released. Here, a girl who is the Pedro Martinez of Little League uplifts the Bears, but all the adult female characters are Playboy Playmate-like bimbos or caricatures of humorless, type-A personality 21st-century businesswomen. In the 2005 Bad News Bears, there is even product placement for Hooters.

If A League of Their Own shows how women once played pro ball in a league of their own, the point of Blue Skies Again (1983), a little-seen baseball fairy tale, is that a woman just might be able to compete alongside men. The one desire of Paula Fradkin (Robyn Barto), the film’s heroine, is “to play second base for the [major league Denver] Devils.” While by no means a great film, Blue Skies Again insightfully examines the struggles of women who attempt to upend the male establishment. At Paula’s first tryout, a white ballplayer tells a black counterpart, “I can’t see [team owner Sandy] Mendenhall being the one to integrate baseball.” When the black man glares at him, the white man begins to sputter. “You know what I mean…” he says, and “integrate” soon is replaced by a word not found in any dictionary, “interfeminate.”

An additional feature spotlighting women ballplayers is Girls Can Play (1937), which despite its proactive title is no ode to sexual equality. It is the tale of an ex-racketeer who organizes a girls’ softball team as a front for selling watered-down liquor. Eventually, he fatally poisons his girlfriend, the team’s catcher, because she “knows too much.” The “girls” of the title are cast primarily for their attractiveness, and are passive sex objects and victims. The film is of note only for the presence of young Rita Hayworth, playing the murder victim, who then was serving an apprenticeship as a Columbia Pictures B-film player. 

In Girls Can Play (1937), a young Rita Hayworth serves as catcher for a women’s softball team run by a crook who eventually poisons her with bad liquor.

Various short subjects highlight women baseballers. A typical title is Gracie at the Bat (1937), a comedy whose working title was Slide, Nellie, Slide. “Fireball Gracie,” the featured character, pitches for the Fillies, a girls’ softball team. Gracie has the oddest wind-up, but she literally throws smoke at an opposing batter. Unlike The Mighty Casey, she belts a game-winning homer. But her teammates are a temperamental lot who peruse romance magazines and powder their noses in the dugout. 

Similarly, in Fancy Curves (1932), an entry in the “Play Ball with Babe Ruth” series, the Bambino agrees to coach a sorority squad that has challenged a fraternity to a ballgame. “I’ve often wondered why girls haven’t played more baseball,” the Babe observes, adding, “It’s no more difficult than any other sport they take part in.” Nonetheless, his charges are tired stereotypes. After singling, one of the women produces a pocket mirror and powders her face while on first base. The girls inflict damage on the boys only when the Babe dons a wig, swishes up to home plate, and pinch hits a homer. This denouement also is employed in the animated Casey Bats Again (1953), in which a father organizes his daughters into a girls’ team and dresses in drag to enter the game and drive in the winning run.

Some high-profile on-screen baseball aficionados have been women. Easily the most celebrated is Annie Savoy (Susan Sarandon) in Bull Durham (1988), who memorably expresses her belief in the “church of baseball.” But Annie’s idea of baseball worship is not only spiritual. She is highly sexed, and readily sleeps with her ballplayers of choice. An altogether different female fan is Aunt Mary (1979), the fact-based account of a Baltimore spinster and die-hard baseball devotee (Jean Stapleton) who coaches a sandlot ball club. The story of Mary Dobkin shows how the unlikeliest of women can do a “man’s job” and function in her own modest way as an activist. Conversely, Gloria Thorpe (Rae Allen), a nosy female sportswriter, is a villain in Damn Yankees (1958). Gloria is determined to unravel the mystery of Joe Hardy, savior of the Washington Senators, and her snoopiness implies that women have no business in the press box.

Across the decades, bats, balls, and women have mixed in non-baseball films. An instant-classic baseball moniker is found in Whip It (2009), the saga of female roller derby players who are known to their fans by nicknames. The lead character (Ellen Page) chooses one that a baseball-lover will embrace: Babe Ruthless!

Then there is Katie O’Hara (Ginger Rogers), the heroine of Once Upon a Honeymoon (1942), an American who finds herself in Paris just before France falls to the Nazis. Upon being asked where she was born, Katie proudly replies, “Parkside Avenue, Brooklyn.”

“Near Ebbets Field?” is the response.

“Foul balls used to light in my backyard,” Katie quips, before sighing, “Dem lovely bums.”

In Woman of the Year (1942), all it takes is an afternoon at Yankee Stadium to transform highfaluting, baseball-ignorant political columnist Tess Harding (Katharine Hepburn) into an ardent rooter.

Marjorie Winfield (Doris Day) wants to play with the boys — for a while, at least — in the 1951 film On Moonlight Bay.

One of the most fascinating portrayals of a distinctly pre-feminist woman ballplayer is found in On Moonlight Bay (1951). Doris Day plays Marjorie Winfield, a tomboy jock. In a game in which her teammates and opponents are boys, she promptly bashes a triple. Then she steals home. But Marjorie’s athleticism is treated as a passing phase of her young life. One look at the handsome boy-next-door (Gordon MacRae) and Marjorie readily exchanges her mud-stained flannels for a frilly dress. Her mother shows her how to enhance her bosom, telling her, “Sometimes nature needs a little help.” As their first date concludes, the lad calls her “the most beautiful and the most feminine girl I’ve ever met.” As they kiss goodnight, Marjorie’s white-gloved left hand pushes aside forever the cap and ball that are resting on the table beside her.

Thankfully, not all pre-feminist women were so easily swayed away from sports. Leave it to Lucy—as in pre-I Love Lucy Lucille Ball—to play a 1940s woman who oozes spunk and swings a mean bat. In The Dark Corner (1946), Lucy is Kathleen Stewart, the newly-hired secretary of a troubled private detective (Mark Stevens). One evening, the pair visits a penny arcade. After swatting at pitches in a batting cage, Kathleen explains her prowess by noting, “My father was a major league umpire.” When her boss makes a pass at her, she quips, “I haven’t worked for you very long, Mr. Galt, but I know when you’re pitching a curve at me—and I always carry a catcher’s mitt.” He defends himself by noting, “No offense. A guy’s gotta try to score, doesn’t he?” She responds, “Not in my league.”

In Hollywood movies across the decades, baseball often has symbolized wholesome, mom’s-apple-pie Americana. This representation radiates from Cass Timberlane (1947), based on a Sinclair Lewis novel, which charts the evolving relationship between the title character, a widowed, middle-aged, small-town Minnesota judge (Spencer Tracy) and Virginia Marshland (Lana Turner), a much younger woman from the proverbial other side of the tracks. Clearly, the judge is respectable. But how do we know that the same can be said for Virginia? Because, early on, we see her immersed in a spirited softball game.

Despite the prevailing post-World War II culture, in which men were expected to rule the family and women to embrace femininity while staying home and baking cookies, an enlightened male still could be supportive of a female athlete. Virginia and Cass eventually marry. As Cass nervously awaits the birth of their child, he and a nurse peer through a hospital window at eight newborns. “You need one more for a baseball team,” Cass declares. “Ah, save that spot in the outfield for young Timberlane, will ya!”

The nurse poses a question: “Supposing the baby’s a little girl?”

“Oh, that’s so much the better,” Cass responds.

“Mrs. Timberlane’s a very fine ballplayer herself.” 

ROB EDELMAN is the author of “Great Baseball Films” and “Baseball on the Web”. His film/television-related books include “Meet the Mertzes”, a double-biography of “I Love Lucy’s” Vivian Vance and fabled baseball fan William Frawley, and “Matthau: A Life” — both co-authored with his wife, Audrey Kupferberg. He is a film commentator on WAMC (Northeast) Public Radio and a contributing editor of “Leonard Maltin’s Movie Guide”. His byline has appeared in “Base Ball: A Journal of the Early Game”, “Baseball and American Culture: Across the Diamond”, “Total Baseball”, “The Total Baseball Catalog”, “Baseball in the Classroom: Teaching America’s National Pastime”, and “The Political Companion to American Film”. He authored an essay on early baseball films for the DVD “Reel Baseball: Baseball Films from the Silent Era, 1899-1926”, and has been a juror at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum’s annual film festival. He is a lecturer at the University at Albany, where he teaches courses in film history.

Sources

• Edelman, Rob. “Baseball at the Movies.” culturefront, vol. 8, no 3 & 4 (Fall, 1999): 49–52.
• ———. “Baseball’s Cinematic Presence Mirrors America’s National Spirit.” Memories & Dreams, vol. 25, no. 2 (Spring, 2003): 5–8.
• Wood, Stephen C. and J. David Pincus. Reel Baseball. Jefferson, NC and London: McFarland & Company, 2002.

Photo credits

National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, Cooperstown, NY.

Notes

1 Roger Ebert. “A League of Their Own.” Chicago Sun-Times, July 1, 1992.

Our Game, Too: Influential Figures and Milestones in Canadian Baseball
Edited by Andrew North
Associate Editors: Len Levin, Bill Nowlin, and Carl Riechers
Publication Date: June 29, 2022
ISBN (ebook): 978-1-970159-81-3, $9.99
ISBN (paperback): 978-1-970159-82-0, $34.95 US / $44.99 CDN
8.5″ x 11″, 459 pages

Canadian baseball has a rich, diverse, and deeply rooted history, one that spans fully two centuries. As was true in the United States, the stories reflect the competitive and entrepreneurial spirits of a rapidly changing time. Baseball’s development north of the border was shaped by the same social and economic influences, and at roughly the same times, as it was to the south. Arranged chronologically, the essays in this SABR Digital Library book tell the tales of the influential figures and milestone events that defined and directed the game’s growth in Canada. The articles shine a spotlight on the movers and shakers, the pioneers, the leagues and games and tournaments, and the regions all across the country that hosted them.

Crowds as large as 10,000 viewed matches between London and Guelph in the 1870s, at a time when the combined population of the two cities was less than 27,000. Thousands flocked to Vancouver’s Powell Street Grounds in the 1920s and 1930s to watch their local heroes, the Asahi, a team of Japanese Canadians. The Toronto Maple Leafs baseball team played their first game in 1895. Almost 100 years later, over four million people would spin the turnstiles to see the Toronto Blue Jays. Canadians played in the Negro Leagues and in the All American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGBPL), and Canada has been home to both affiliated minor leagues and “outlaw” leagues.

This book is an initiative of the Centre for Canadian Baseball Research and SABR’s Hanlan’s Point Chapter in Toronto. It is the collaborative effort of more than 30 SABR members, almost all of them Canadian.

• E-book: Click here to download the e-book version of Our Game, Too for $9.99 from the SABR Store. Available in PDF, MOBI, and EPUB/Kindle formats.
• Paperback: Get the paperback edition of Our Game, Too from the SABR Store ($34.95 includes shipping/tax; delivery via Kindle Direct Publishing can take up to 4-6 weeks.)

Below: Find player biographies and essays from Our Game, Too: Influential Figures and Milestones in Canadian Baseball

Biographies

Essays

Contributors: Richard Armstrong, Robert K. Barney, Gary Belleville, Warren Campbell, Patrick Carpentier, Stephen Dame, Marcel Dugas, Eric Frost, Larry Gerlach, Gary Gillette, Tom Hawthorn, Martin Healy Jr., Colin Howell, William Humber, Heidi LM Jacobs, Sean Kane, Maxwell Kates, Martin Lacoste, Bill Lamb, Len Levin, Brian “Chip” Martin, David Matchett, Andy McCue, David McDonald, Peter Morris, Andrew North, Bill Nowlin, Riley Nowokowski, Bill Pruden, Carl Riechers, David Siegel, Paul Sinclair, Allen Tait, Dennis Thiessen, Christian Trudeau, Max Weder, and Daniel Wyatt.

We Are, We Can, We Will: The 1992 World Champion Toronto Blue Jays
Edited by Adrian Fung and Bill Nowlin
Associate Editors: Len Levin and Carl Riechers
Forewords by Buck Martinez and Dave Winfield
Publication Date: August 24, 2022
ISBN (ebook): 978-1-970159-83-7, $9.99
ISBN (paperback): 978-1-970159-84-4, $34.95 US / $41.95 CDN
8.5″ x 11″, 394 pages

The 1992 Toronto Blue Jays will always be remembered as the first World Series-winning club based outside the United States and the first from Canada. Before that memorable season, the Blue Jays were respected as consistent contenders, the team never seemed able to win a championship. After winning the division in 1991, the 1992 club confidently adopted “We Are, We Can, We Will” as their team motto, indicative of their unshakable belief that they were capable of winning the American League pennant and then the World Series.

They were right. When Joe Carter caught the final out of the World Series in Atlanta, he touched off a celebration in Toronto and across Canada for baseball fans who had waited many years for the Blue Jays to finally hoist the Commissioner’s Trophy.

We Are, We Can, We Will, published by the SABR Digital Library in 2022, features biographies of every player who played for the 1992 Toronto Blue Jays including Hall of Famers Dave Winfield, Jack Morris, and Roberto Alomar. Manager Cito Gaston, Hall of Fame general manager Pat Gillick, and radio broadcaster Tom Cheek are also included, as well as a “ballpark biography” of SkyDome, Toronto’s home ballpark. Ten reports describe significant games from the 1992 season illustrating Toronto’s championship journey from Opening Day to the last game of the World Series. The book concludes with an essay on the Blue Jays’ celebratory visits to Washington, DC, and Ottawa, and an article on how team management deftly reshaped the roster in the winter to prepare Toronto for another successful championship drive in 1993.

This book is the result of a collaborative effort by 53 SABR members, many from the Hanlan’s Point (Toronto) SABR Chapter.

SABR members, get this e-book for FREE!

• E-book: Click here to download the e-book version of We Are, We Can, We Will for FREE from the SABR Store. Available in PDF, MOBI, EPUB/Kindle formats.
• Paperback: Get a 50% discount on the We Are, We Can, We Will paperback edition from the SABR Store ($17.95 includes shipping/tax; delivery via Kindle Direct Publishing can take up to 4-6 weeks.)

Buy the book

• E-book: Click here to download the e-book version of We Are, We Can, We Will for $9.99 from the SABR Store. Available in PDF, MOBI, and EPUB/Kindle formats.
• Paperback: Get the paperback edition of We Are, We Can, We Will from the SABR Store ($34.95 includes shipping/tax; delivery via Kindle Direct Publishing can take up to 4-6 weeks.)

Below: Find player biographies, memorable game stories, and essays from We Are, We Can, We Will: The 1992 World Champion Toronto Blue Jays

Biographies

Game Recaps

Essays

Contributors: Sean Addis, Malcolm Allen, Mark Armour, Rich Bogovich, Thomas J. Brown Jr., Frederick C. Bush, Warren Campbell, Alan Cohen, Rory Costello, Joe Cox, Mark Davis, F. Timothy Deeth, Brian Frank, David Fuller, Adrian Fung, J.P. Garrett, Sam Gazdziak, Tim Hannan, Tom Hawthorn, Paul Hofmann, Bob Hurte, Chris Jones, John Kennedy, Norm King, Tara Krieger, Justin Krueger, Bob LeMoine, Len Levin, Dan Levitt, Nick Malian, Joe Marren, Les Masterson, David Matchett, Bill Nowlin, Carl Riechers, Joel Rippel, Harry Schoger, Paul Sinclair, Steve Sisto, Tim Sitar, David E. Skelton, Doug Skipper, Curt Smith, Mark S. Sternman, Allen Tait, Joe Thompson, Stew Thornley, Alfonso Tusa, Eric Vickrey, David Vincent, Joseph Wancho, and Bob Webster.

Holyoke was incorporated as a town in the year 1850, and the construction of a dam on the Connecticut began shortly thereafter.5 Immigrant labor from Ireland, Canada, Poland, Germany, and Italy was in no short supply. Holyoke truly thrived as a post-Civil War industrial city, making its mark most notably by producing high-quality paper products. The city’s population would increase from a mere 4,600 in 1885 to over 60,000 people just 35 years later. At one point, there were nearly 30 paper mills in operation, as well as factories that produced woolens, cotton, thread, silk, and industrial machinery.6

However, as was the case with other cities that were established purely on manufacturing during the industrial revolution, times would not always prove to be prosperous. Newer technologies and cheaper foreign labor would soon render many of these once-thriving mills obsolete. The first of the major employers to depart the city was the Farr Alpaca textile mill, which liquidated in 1939.7 Skinner Mill closed its doors in the late 1960s, although, as a slight consolation, the property site was eventually rehabbed and donated to the city to establish the now-popular Heritage State Park.8 Throughout the 1970s, most other major employers followed this lead, departing the city or closing altogether. As factory after factory shuttered — taking with them the employment opportunities that were once plentiful — the fate of a once-mighty industrial center would soon be in jeopardy.

While the closing of the mills was obviously the major factor leading to widespread unemployment in the city (16.7% by April 1975)9 and the concomitant social problems, a number of other factors also contributed. As the mills and the manufacturing jobs they provided became more of a scarcity, Holyoke also experienced a rather sharp increase of individuals entering the city looking for this exact type of employment. Throughout the first half of the 1970s, young servicemen would return home from the Vietnam War to discover that the jobs that had been available at the time of their enlistment were no longer in such supply. The guarantee of work opportunities that their parents’ generation had enjoyed in Holyoke had seemingly disappeared.

The city also experienced yet another tremendous ethnic migration during these years, as a large number of people from Puerto Rico and South America came to Holyoke seeking a better future for themselves and their families.10 Large ethnic migrations were nothing new to Holyoke — however, the employment opportunities that had been in great supply when the European and Canadian immigrants entered the city were no longer available. In fact, these migrants had the unfortunate timing of arriving at the exact period in the city’s history that these manufacturing jobs were disappearing. Couple this with the usual difficulties that face non-white migrants upon entering the United States — including barriers of language and culture, as well as hostility from those already residing here — and a great many tensions would prove to be inevitable.11

This is the backdrop that the Holyoke Millers of the Class AA Eastern League began playing ball in during the 1977 season. Elected officials believed that a minor-league baseball team in the city would lead to an increase in tourism revenue for Holyoke (it was estimated by multiple sources that a AA-level team would lead to an additional $250,000 for a community in 1977).12 Eastern League President Pat McKernan simply told city officials that if they could raise sufficient funds to complete necessary renovations to the municipally owned MacKenzie Field, he would deliver a franchise to Holyoke.13 A range of $65,000–108,000 was given to complete multiple tasks, including refurbishing locker-room facilities, construction of a concession stand, and the possible resodding of the field, while removing a cinder running track that cut through the outfield grass.14 As the city was in a bit of a down-and-out period, elected officials appeared willing to take a chance on something that could potentially reverse civic fortunes.

The city was able to muster the minimum $65,000 necessary to attract an Eastern League franchise. the Berkshire Brewers, a franchise that had been based in Pittsfield, Massachusetts 1965–1976, were convinced to depart the cozy confines of Wahconah Park for the “Paper City” of Holyoke. League president McKernan held true to his promise to deliver a team to Holyoke, aided no doubt by his connections that still existed with the Berkshire team. (He had formerly been the franchise’s president, a colorful tenure that included his wedding at home plate between games of a doubleheader, as well as an “attendance hunger strike,” a promotion where he would fast on each home game day if the team drew fewer than 500 fans — no small feat, considering he weighed in at more than 350 pounds.)15 Baseball fans were treated to an early holiday present, as city aldermen passed their final vote by a tally of 11–4 on December 21, 1976, to transfer the necessary funds to the Parks Department to bring minor-league baseball to Holyoke.16 The new franchise would be named the Holyoke Millers — a tribute to the industrial past upon which the city was founded.

As the city prepared itself for its first-ever season of AA baseball, it also found itself embroiled in a national headline-making controversy. On a nearly nightly basis, suspicious fires ripped through old tenements and factory buildings, leaving residents completely on edge. As the cause of these blazes was going undiscovered, law enforcement officials dispatched a Special Arson Squad to investigate all fires within Holyoke, to assess if any were of criminal nature.

The Special Arson Squad would make its first arrest on April 13, 1977 — the day the Millers played their first-ever game — a 15–2 exhibition victory against the neighboring University of Massachusetts in Amherst.17 Right fielder and leadoff hitter Gary LaRocque blasted the second pitch of the game 335 feet down the right field line for a home run, and with that, the Holyoke Millers were born.18

Two days later, the Millers began their 1977 Eastern League regular season in Pennsylvania on a Friday night against the Reading Phillies. This would be the first of a nine-game road trip to commence the season — a scheduling abnormality that was by design, intended to give the Holyoke Parks Department sufficient time to complete the necessary renovations that MacKenzie Field needed to host professional baseball.

Meanwhile, back in Pittsfield (the city that had previously been the franchise’s home), General Electric (the region’s major employer) announced the layoff of 225 employees.19 While Holyoke and Pittsfield were facing many of the same struggles at that time, there was seemingly no shortage of irony that these two events were occurring on the same day. Pittsfield’s sad loss — for one day, anyhow — was contrasted with Holyoke’s gain.

The starting lineup for the first-ever Holyoke Millers game was:

1. Gary LaRocque, RF
2. Billy Severns, CF
3. Ike Blessitt, DH
4. Gary Holle, 1B
5. Jeff Yurak, LF
6. Neil Rasmussen, 3B
7. Ron Jacobs, C
8. Ed Romero, SS
9. Garry Pyka, 2B
   Ron Wrona, P

Four hundred seventy fans (Reading officials had been hoping for 1,500–2,000) saw the young Millers build a 4–0 lead behind Wrona (one of the Millers’ most experienced pitchers, despite being in only his second year of pro ball) through five innings. However, the Phillies awakened with seven runs in the sixth inning, three of which were unearned. They would ultimately drop all four games in Reading, on their way to a 2–7 road trip to begin the season. Holding leads seemed to be particularly troublesome for the new team, as they would blow multiple 4–0 leads against Reading, as well as a 6–0 advantage at Jersey City. Holyoke’s bullpen would begin the season by dropping their first 11 decisions before a reliever would garner a single win.

The Millers were scheduled to make their home debut at Mackenzie Field on Sunday, April 24, 1977 — an afternoon contest against the Waterbury Giants. Competition for fans on that day would be fierce, as the game would be directly competing with a live performance by the locally popular polka ensemble, the Larry Chesky Orchestra, who were performing that afternoon at Mountain Park (a mid-sized Holyoke amusement park that was a popular destination from the late 1800s until its closing in 1987). In some ways, the rain that would postpone the game was a blessing of sorts, as a poor attendance showing at a home debut opener as a result of a polka concert might not exactly inspire.

Rather, the Millers took to the field at MacKenzie the following evening before a raucous 2428 fans — who were treated to a back-and-forth affair that saw the home side overcome a 5–0 deficit, before falling, 7–5.20 Future longtime major leaguer George Frazier would take the loss in relief. Designated hitter Ike Blessitt would provide the fireworks, bringing the Holyoke faithful to their feet, turning on a shoulder-high offering and blasting it 375 feet down the left field line for a game-tying two-run homer in the seventh.21

Blessitt proved to be the Miller that would bring the fans the most consistent excitement, leading the Eastern League in runs batted in for 1977, and winning the fan vote as the Most Popular Miller.22 His was an interesting story; while most members of the team were young prospects on the way up (Frazier and Romero both enjoyed lengthy major-league careers, while Jurak, Holle, Greg Eradyi, Doug Clarey, and Mark Bomback would all reach the show, if only for brief stints), Blessitt had already seen his career reach its pinnacle.

“The Blessitt One,” as he was known to the MacKenzie faithful, had already experienced a brief call-up to the Detroit Tigers at the end of the 1972 season, going hitless in five at bats over four games. Blessitt was well known throughout Michigan, having been a high school four-sport legend growing up just outside of Detroit. However, he was reassigned to the Tigers’ AAA affiliate during spring training of the following season, and was unfortunately involved in an off-field incident with manager Billy Martin in Lakeland, Florida, leading to the arrest of both men.23 According to Martin, he was trying to prevent Blessitt from getting into a late-night altercation with another man in a cocktail lounge, taking the young outfielder out to the parking lot to calm him down. The Lakeland police arrived on the scene shortly thereafter, made racial slurs to Blessitt as they arrested him, while also apprehending Martin, who claimed to be an innocent bystander.24

Given Martin’s well-documented history with numerous incidents of late-night barroom brawling (he was famously fired as manager of the New York Yankees for allegedly sucker-punching a marshmallow salesman in a bar at the end of the 1979 season25), the notion of him acting as a virtuous peacekeeper seems fictitious. Nonetheless, Blessitt would never reach the major leagues again following this evening in Lakeland.26

Blessitt’s blasts would be a lone early bright spot as the inexperienced Millers stumbled badly out of the gate, winning only three of the first 18 games of their existence.27 While victories were rare, the fan promotions you would expect at a minor-league ballpark certainly were not. The Millers held a “Guaranteed Win Day” (where fans would be admitted free of charge to the following day’s game if the Millers were unable to prevail),28 a “Mustache Night” (where 25-year-old general manager Tom Kayser promised to have his mustache shaved off if attendance surpassed 1500 for the game),29 while hosting appearances by Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller, as well as Max Patkin, a.k.a. “the Clown Prince of Baseball.” A “Beer Night” promotion was also considered, but never came to fruition.30

Nonetheless, something was clearly working — the Millers boasted the second-highest attendance figures in the Eastern League, drawing 61,171 fans for the season. They would rally to a respectable final record of 73–66, but would never realistically challenge the first-place West Haven Yankees, finishing 13½ games out of first.31 The team went their separate ways after the season and, with minor league salaries being typically low, many would go to work for the winter months. First baseman Gary Holle returned to his home in Watervliet, New York, to work as a legislative aide for a state senator, while doubling as the color commentator for Siena College’s basketball broadcasts. Outfielder Jeff Yurak would continue his education at California State University at Pomona, majoring in marketing. Pitcher Mark Bomback would return to his home in Fall River to work as a salesperson at a local clothing store.32

Perhaps the biggest accomplishment of the new team was the mere fact that Holyoke now had a POULIN: Miracle on Beech Street galvanizing institution to bring it together, even as the arson-related problems kept the community on constant edge. By the end of May alone, the city had endured 17 multiple alarm fires that year.33 In spite of all the efforts of the Special Arson Squad, the perpetrators of the majority of these blazes would never be determined. While New York City would ultimately gain some relief from their civic nightmare when David Berkowitz was arrested that August — ending the citywide fear of the Son of Sam murders — Holyoke experienced no such reassurance.

The Millers would open their 1978 season on the road at West Haven, dropping the first three games of the campaign to the Yankees. The home opener at MacKenzie on April 16 featured a ceremonial first pitch by Mayor Ernest Proulx, an offering that bounced multiple times before reaching the plate.

Based on the performance of the pitching staff during the year, Mayor Proulx could potentially have earned a spot in the rotation, as they posted the worst earned-run average in the Eastern League. In spite of the return of several fan favorites from the prior season (including the reigning EL home run champion Holle, along with Rasmussen, Yurak, and Bomback), the Millers greatly struggled to draw at the gate in 1978. An unusually cold and windy spring — even by Massachusetts standards — contributed to the reduced attendance, but the team’s performance on the diamond certainly didn’t help.

Rick Nicholson earned the first win of the season for the Holyoke nine on April 17 before 372 fans. Nicholson had been the top reliever in the New York-Penn League the previous season with the Newark Co-Pilots, posting a 5–2 record with 12 saves. This success was not replicated in Holyoke, as he compiled an ERA of 7.03 over 16 games.34

This would not be the lowest attendance figure of the season, as a May 2 contest against the Waterbury Giants would draw only 207 fans. Even the “Mustache Night” promotion couldn’t entice fans to the ballpark, as the same event that drew nearly 2000 fans in 1977 would only draw 372 in the new year.35

In all, the honeymoon period between Holyoke and the Millers was apparently over. They drew 13,000 fewer fans than the previous season, as the team stumbled to a fifth-place record of 61–76. The MacKenzie faithful were able to enjoy a fine campaign from future major league outfielder Marshall Edwards, as well as a career year from Eastern League MVP Yurak, and a franchise-record 60 stolen bases by second baseman Steven Greene. As management had identified the 45,000 mark as being the “break-even” point for attendance, the team managed to just scrape by in 1978.36

If the cliché about Rome not being built in a day is true, the 1979 Millers are certainly a prime example. The team improved its win total by a mere two games, while drawing 50,207 fans for the season — a modest improvement at best from the year before. This attendance number was surely aided by a mid-season appearance by the Famous Chicken — drawing 6,300 spectators (capacity at MacKenzie was listed at 4,100).37 However, the groundwork was seemingly laid for bigger things in the future, as Harry Dalton had taken over as general manager of the parent Milwaukee Brewers, an executive with a keen eye for recognizing young talent. Almost immediately, more major-leaguecaliber prospects would don the Millers colors.

While four members of the pitching staff — Barry Cort, Sam Hinds, Larry Landreth, and Lance Rautzhan — would ultimately reach the big leagues, the most notable new member of the Holyoke nine would be twenty-year-old switch-hitting outfielder Kevin Bass. Bass would enjoy a fourteen-year major league career, highlighted by appearances in the postseason and All-Star Game in 1986 for Houston. His tremendous 1986 season would end unfortunately, however, as he struck out with two men on base in the 16th inning of Game Six of the National League Championship Series to end the game, sending the New York Mets to the World Series. As a young Miller, however, Bass enjoyed a respectable 1979. While his .263 batting average with eight home runs would be just the tip of the iceberg of his potential as a ballplayer, his Sammy Davis Jr. impersonation was already at a major-league level.38

Another item of note about the 1979 Millers was that they may have set an unofficial record for number of born-again Christians on one pro baseball team.39 Of the 21-man roster, 11 players identified as having recently found the Lord. Catcher Bill Foley told The Sporting News, “I’ve never before seen this many on one team! I felt a void in my life that needed to be filled”. Millers players filled this particular void with chapel services every Sunday and regular Bible readings throughout the season.40

The Millers faced some additional stiff competition for the local entertainment dollar throughout the second half of their season. After eight years of planning and negotiations, a million-square-foot shopping mall would open on July 5, 1979, in the Whiting Farms Road area of the city on the outskirts of town.41 At the time of its opening, the promise of increased job opportunities and an expanded tax base seemed to be trumpeting a new era of prosperity for the city.42 An unfortunate drawback of this new construction, however, would be the increased difficulty to attract business to downtown, as so many potential customers would instead opt for the convenience of one-stop shopping at the mall. Between the lack of businesses occupying downtown buildings, the ongoing arson fears, and an increase in crime as a direct result of unemployment, the center of the city became a very unpopular destination.

Meanwhile, back on the ballfield, the 1979 season proved to be a dress rehearsal of sorts for much bigger things to come as the 1980s commenced. But in many ways, the biggest shift for the Millers would not occur on the field at all, as young general manager Tom Kayser made headlines when he purchased the team from Spike Herzig and the Northeastern Exhibition Company at age 27.43 The sale was announced a mere 24 hours before the Millers would open their 1980 season at MacKenzie against Reading. While an exact sale price was never announced, league officials stated it was less than the $45,000 an average Eastern League team was valued at in 1980. Sources say the sale price was closer to $30,000, as there was fear that another owner would buy the team and move it out of Holyoke. Kayser was seemingly given a bit of a hometown discount, as he was committed to ensuring that the team would stay put.44

The 1980 squad was, in a word, loaded. In addition to Bass and future big-league catcher Steve Lake, they possessed a pitching staff that featured MLB mainstays Doug Jones, Frank DiPino, and Chuck Porter. Rick Kranitz led the team with 13 wins, while closer Kunikazu Ogawa saved 16 games with an earned run average of 1.96.45

The featured attraction at MacKenzie that summer, however, was David Green — a prospect who had been dubbed “the next Roberto Clemente.”46 Green was the son of Edward Green Sinclair, considered one of the best Nicaraguan players of all time. The younger Green was a five-tool prospect, leading the Eastern League in triples with 19 while batting .291 and earning a spot on the Eastern League All-Star Team.47

Manager Lee Sigman’s squad ran away with the Northern Division, finishing with a record of 78–61, a full ten games ahead of their closest competitors. They rolled into the playoffs against the Buffalo Bisons, with Green blasting the winning home run off Dave Dravecky in the clinching game to put Holyoke into the Eastern League Finals against the Waterbury Reds.48

In the finals, the Millers dropped the opener by a count of 3–2, but bounced back in Game Two behind a combined six-hit shutout by Kranitz and Ogawa to even the series.49 In the winner-take-all Game Three, Doug Loman homered, tripled, and doubled while Chuck Porter threw a complete-game shutout as the Millers defeated the Reds, 7–0, to claim the 1980 Eastern League Championship before 2,717 fans.50 It was a glorious night in Holyoke, as children danced on top of the Millers dugout to “We Are Family,” the Sister Sledge classic that had become the unofficial anthem of the Pittsburgh Pirates during the previous summer. It would be the first professional baseball title for a Western Massachusetts team since the Springfield Giants won the Eastern League for three consecutive seasons 1959–61. The Giants of those championship years featured a number of future legends, including Manny Mota, Matty Alou, and Juan Marichal.51

The 1980 season of the Millers would prove to be the franchise’s high-water mark. On December 12, 1980, the parent Brewers pulled off a blockbuster trade with the St. Louis Cardinals, trading David Green along with Sixto Lezcano, Lary Sorenson, and Dave LaPoint in return for future Hall of Famers Rollie Fingers and Ted Simmons, along with future ace (and Major League actor) Pete Vukovich.52 Milwaukee also moved on from their affiliation with Holyoke, establishing their AA team in El Paso. The Brewers organization wanted out of the Eastern League — as the cold northeastern weather, sub-par ballparks around the league at the time, and the cinder track that ran through the outfield at MacKenzie Field were all factors leading to their departure.53 The California Angels would fill the void left by Milwaukee — and although the new-look Millers would feature a number of future major leaguers, this would not translate to on-field success in 1981 or 1982.

In 1981, Holyoke rode the coattails of their championship season at the turnstiles, as they drew an all-time franchise high of 80,117. While the team got off to a strong start, they would end up faltering down the stretch, finishing a whopping 16½ games behind the first place Glens Falls White Sox.54

Speed was the name of the game for the Millers in ‘81, as future Angels mainstay Gary Pettis’s 55 stolen bases would pace a team that would swipe a total of 151. Darrell Miller wore his last name on both the front and back of his jersey, splitting time between catcher and outfield — long before his two siblings Reggie and Cheryl would both be inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame just down the road in Springfield. Dennis Rasmussen posted a record of 8–12, while showing flashes of potential he would later fulfill in the majors — all while living in what he believed was an illegal trailer park at the foot of Mount Tom.55

The biggest news around the Millers in 1981 would occur in early November, when team owner Tom Kayser announced he was offered a position as the Assistant Minor League Director for the Pittsburgh Pirates organization, and would be selling the team.56 It ended up being a wise career move for Kayser, who would ultimately spend 25 years as the president of the Texas League, retiring in 2017.

A Holyoke-based group of executives led by City Alderman Hal Haberman were the early favorites to purchase the team, with an Eastern Massachusettsbased group also solidly jockeying for position.57 In total, more than 30 potential bidders from as far away as Florida and California made inquiries about buying the team, before a different local group made a deal to purchase the Millers to keep them in Holyoke.

University of Massachusetts Political Science Professor Jerome Mileur recalled “having a few beers at the White Eagle Club” in Amherst with fellow UMass employee George Como (a systems analyst in the computer center) when they floated out the idea of purchasing the team from Kayser.58 They recruited local heating oil businessman Ben Surner, and ultimately put in a bid of $85,000 to buy the Millers. The deal was announced on December 1, 1981.59

Unfortunately, the new ownership team stumbled early out of the blocks. The ownership group’s first hire was general manager Larry Simmons, who would not make it to opening day before being fired.60 the Eastern League establishment was cautious of the new ownership group, with longtime owner Joe Buzas directly asking Mileur at the Winter Meetings, “Why the hell would a college professor want to own a baseball team?” Mileur simply responded that he was a great fan of the game and had best of intentions.61

The team itself also struggled, as the Angels prospects failed to make an impact with the local fans, with attendance plummeting to just over 54,000. Oddly, the highlight of the season was not one that was readily apparent, as young author Domenic Stansberry had moved to Holyoke and was writing a murder mystery based on the Millers and Holyoke called The Spoiler. While Stansberry has had a moderately successful career in the interim, The Spoiler has remained out of print for many years, an apt analogy for the fate of the Millers.62

However, the biggest challenge the group would face was their rocky relationship with city officials. MacKenzie Field also doubled as the home baseball diamond for two of the high schools in the city, and there was increasing pressure from members of the community to ensure that their municipal field would be utilized by residents. Ultimately, it was decided that the Millers would not have access to the field for practice during the school year, as the teams from Holyoke High School and Holyoke Catholic High would be given priority. Additionally, the cinder running track that ran through the outfield would also be utilized by the track teams at these schools before the Millers.63

Public meetings between Millers owner Surner and Holyoke Mayor Ernest Proulx would become increasingly more contentious, and the team and city reached an impasse that could not be overcome.64 The Millers would move to Nashua, New Hampshire and participate in the 1983 Eastern League season as the Nashua Angels.65

Coincidentally, one of the factors the ownership group faced in Nashua was a boycott from the community, who felt that the presence of the team was having a negative impact on attendance at youth baseball games. After four years in Nashua, Mileur had bought out both Surner and Como and the team was moved to Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, where the franchise has had a long and successful tenure. Mileur would ultimately retire from ownership in 1994, selling the team to the City of Harrisburg for four million dollars.66

While the Nashua Angels returned to play a single game at MacKenzie Field during the summer of 1983, it would be the end of professional baseball in Holyoke. Currently, the Valley Blue Sox of the New England Collegiate Baseball League play their home games at MacKenzie every summer. It seems hard to believe that Holyoke — given its lack of professional-level facilities — was able to be home to a AA team, even if only for six years. Clearly, the economics and atmosphere around minor league baseball have shifted so radically over the years that such a scenario would be impossible today — and it was honestly quite miraculous that it was able to happen then. 

ERIC T. POULIN is an Assistant Professor of Library and Information Science at Simmons University, where he directs their Western Massachusetts-based campus. He first joined SABR in 2002 after completing a Steele Internship at the A. Bartlett Giamatti Center for Research at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. This is his first contribution to the Baseball Research Journal.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank the late Jerome Mileur for his insight, along with Ben and Jay Demerath III for making invaluable connections. Eileen Crosby and the staff at the Holyoke History Room were incredibly gracious with their time, as well as the great Tim Wiles and the A. Bartlett Giamatti Center for Research at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. Tom Kayser was very generous with his insight and information. Maury Abrams and Pumpkin Waffles provided tremendous support and perspective. Above all, eternal gratitude goes to Gabriela Stevenson for her editing, fact-checking, and overall determination to ensure the story of the Millers would be told.

Notes

  1. Ella Merkel DiCarlo, Holyoke — Chicopee: A Perspective, Holyoke, MA: Transcript-Telegram, 1982.

  2. Merkel DiCarlo.

  3. Merkel DiCarlo.

  4. Merkel DiCarlo.

  5. Merkel DiCarlo.

  6. Merkel DiCarlo.

  7. Merkel DiCarlo.

  8. Merkel DiCarlo.

  9. Merkel DiCarlo.

10. Merkel DiCarlo.

11. Merkel DiCarlo.

12. Bill Doyle, “Eastern League President Favors Holyoke for Franchise,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, December 3, 1976.

13. “City Needs Money For EL Team,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, October 15, 1976.

14. “City Needs Money For EL Team.”

15. Milton Richman, “Gate-Slim Pittsfield Boss On Hunger Strike,” The Sporting News, July 10, 1971, 43.

16. “Aldermen Welcome Franchise,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, December 22, 1976.

17. Michael J. Burke, “Special Arson Squad Makes First Arrest,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, April 13, 1977.

18. “Miller Hitters Maul Minutemen Hurlers,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, April 14, 1977.

19. “G.E. Eliminating 225 Jobs,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, April 13, 1977.

20. Bill Doyle, “Millers’ Debut Is a Success,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, April 26, 1977.

21. Doyle.

22. “Blessitt Is Most Popular,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, September 6, 1977.

23. Milton Richman, “Blessed Are the Peacemakers? Ask Martin,” The Sporting News, March 29, 1973.

24. Richman, “Blessed Are the Peacemakers…”

25. Phil Pepe, “Yanks Wheel, Deal, and Squeal,” The Sporting News, September 19, 1979.

26. Lee Thompson. “Former Detroit Tigers Outfielder Ike Blessitt Bringing His Big-League Story to Bay City for Bay Medical Charity Auction,” Mlive, April 28, 2011, accessed August 31, 2021. https://www.mlive.com/sports/baycity/2011/04/former_detroit_tigers_outfield.html.

27. “Nothing Is Working for Failing Millers,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 4, 1977.

28. “‘Guaranteed Win Day’ Starts Millers’ Promotions,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 6, 1977.

29. Bill Doyle, “Millers ‘Shave’ Bristol Sox, 8–7,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 18, 1977.

30. “‘Guaranteed Win Day’ Starts Millers’ Promotions.”

31. Bill Doyle, “Millers Clinch Third Place,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, September 3, 1977.

32. Bill Doyle, “Miller Players Are Ready to Bid Holyoke Farewell,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, September 2, 1977.

33. Michael Burke, “Fire Destroys Main St. Block,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 28, 1977.

34. Bill Zajic, “Hannon ‘Curves’ Giants,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 3, 1978.

35. Bill Doyle, “Millers Pitching Collapses in Loss,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, May 8, 1978.

36. The Baseball Cube, accessed August 31, 2021. http://www.thebaseballcube.com/minors/teams/stats.asp?Y=1978&T=10573.

37. Ray Fitzgerald, “His Vision on Target,” Boston Globe, July 7, 1981.

38. Mike Downey, “Would Fans Respond to ‘Bark Like a Dog’?” The Sporting News, October 27, 1986.

39. “Religious Millers,” The Sporting News, August 11, 1979, 44.

40. “Religious Millers.”

41. Pat Cahill, “Holyoke Mall Celebrates Its 10th Anniversary,” Sunday Republican. July 16, 1989.

42. Cahill.

43. Garry Brown, “Want To Buy a Ball Club?” Sunday Republican. May 11, 1980.

44. Brown.

45. The Baseball Cube, accessed August 31, 2021. http://www.thebaseballcube.com/minors/teams/stats.asp?Y=1980&T=10573.

46. John Sonderegger, “Potential: The One Thing a Gimed David Green Couldn’t Grasp,” St. Louis Post-Dispatch, July 14, 1986.

47. Bill Doyle, “Holyoke Proves Itself,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, September 6, 1980.

48. Warner Hessler, “Millers End Bisons’ Year,” Buffalo Courier-Express, September 1, 1980.

49. Bill Doyle, “Millers Force Showdown,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, September 3, 1980.

50. Mike Bogen, “Millers Cop EL Crown,” The Morning Union, September 6, 1980.

51. Garry Brown, “Springfield Marks 50 Years without a Professional Baseball Team; Is It Time to Take Another Swing?” MassLive, March 22, 2015, accessed August 31, 2021. https://www.masslive.com/living/2015/03/garry_brown_springfield_marks_50_years_without_a_professional_baseball_team.html.

52. Sonderegger.

53. “It’s Spring Again,” Hampden County Enterprise, April 13, 1981.

54. The Baseball Cube, accessed August 31, 2021. http://www.thebaseballcube.com/minors/teams/stats.asp?Y=1981&T=10573.

55. Owen Canfield, “Remembering the Eastern League,” The Sporting News, May 9, 1985.

56. Barry Schatz, “Millers owner bows out; local businessmen want to buy team franchise,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, November 5, 1981.

57. Schatz.

58. Author interview with Jerome Mileur, October 19, 2006.

59. Barry Schatz, “Millers’ Deal to Keep Team in Holyoke,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, December 2, 1981.

60. Don Conkey, “The Holyoke Millers: Sharp Decline in Attendance Just One of Many Problems Confronting New Management,” The Sunday Republican, May 23, 1982.

61. Author interview with Jerome Mileur, October 19, 2006.

62. Domenic Stansberry, The Spoiler: A Novel, New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1987.

63. Barry Schatz, “Field Availability Is Snag between City, Millers,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, October 14, 1982.

64. “Proulx Says Millers Should Be More Flexible,” Holyoke Transcript-Telegram, October 22, 1982.

65. Milton Cole, “Nashua Votes to Take Millers,” Daily Hampshire Gazette, December 7, 1982.

66. Author interview with Jerome Mileur, October 19, 2006.

Powell saw the births of division playoffs and the designated hitter during his 1961–77 career, which ended with a .266 batting average and .462 slugging average. But for popular-culture buffs, Powell has the distinction of being a key part of a storyline in a first-season episode of Cheers.2 It involves a retelling of an Orioles-Red Sox doubleheader in 1972. But could events really have happened the way they’re explained in the dialogue?

Cheers aired on NBC from 1982 to 1993, focusing on the goings-on at a Boston bar owned by fictional former Red Sox relief pitcher Sam “Mayday” Malone. It used the famed Bull & Finch Pub for exterior shots. Adored by women in his “little black book” and idolized by men for his romantic exploits, Sam is a minor celebrity and a reformed alcoholic who suffers a relapse or two throughout the show’s run. Later in the series, he’s revealed to be a sex addict.

Sam’s career with the 1970s Red Sox occasionally becomes a topic of conversation in early episodes for the bar’s regular characters: wisecracking waitress Carla Tortelli, know-it-all postman Cliff Clavin, beer-guzzling accountant Norm Peterson, former pitching coach and good-natured but slightly unintelligent Ernie Pantusso, and high-brow waitress Diane Chambers. In the episode “Sam at Eleven” Sam recounts a memorable day in 1972, when he saved both games of a doubleheader against the Orioles on seven pitches.

Boston was five games out of first with eight to play. They couldn’t afford to lose a game. Malone retired Powell on a 5-3 grounder with two men on base and a one-run lead to end the first game. He faced the iconic slugger again in the bottom of the ninth with Don Buford on first base. Though the scene ends before a full recounting, it’s implied that Powell was not successful against “Mayday.”3

Indeed, a Baltimore-Boston doubleheader took place toward the end of the 1972 schedule. The Red Sox had 15 games left and a predicament more dire than the one Sam described—at the time, Boston was 76-64, Detroit was 77-66, and Baltimore was 77-66. After that, the resemblance to the fictional account quickly fades.

Neither game required a Red Sox reliever—Marty Pattin and Luis Tiant each pitched a complete game. Pattin was a formidable hurler in 1972, compiling a 17-13 record with 13 complete games and four shutouts.

In the first game, Powell left in the seventh inning; Terry Crowley moved from right field to take over first base. Unlike Sam’s tale, there was no significant danger for the Red Sox—they won the game 9-1. Veteran shortstop Luis Aparicio had 1 RBI and scored two runs, and rookie Dwight Evans went 2-for-4 with two RBIs; Carlton Fisk went 3-for-4 with three RBIs; and Pattin tossed a five-hitter. Boston escalated the pounding in the fourth inning, when they tagged Jim Palmer—a 21-10 pitcher in ’72—for two runs and extended the lead to 4-1.

Roric Harrison replaced Palmer and let in five runs (two charged to Palmer); Bob Reynolds came into the inning with one out and ended the destruction when Pattin grounded into an infield double play.4

In the second game, Tiant pitched a four-hit shutout and struck out seven Orioles in the 4-0 win. It was an emblem of an outstanding season—Tiant led the major leagues with a 1.91 ERA. The Sox were scoreless until the fifth inning, when Doug Griffin singled, Tiant advanced him with a sacrifice bunt, and Tommy Harper singled him home. Boston added two more runs in the seventh inning and another in the eighth. Four runs tallied on five hits.

Powell struck out to lead off the ninth. It was his last at bat of the doubleheader.5

Despite batting .252 in 1972, Powell was an apt selection for Malone’s story: four-time All-Star, 1970 American League MVP, runner-up for 1969 AL MVP, and hitter of 21 home runs in 1972. He began his pro career with the Orioles’ Appalachian League team in Bluefield in 1959, playing in 56 games and batting .351. The O’s moved him to the Triple-I League in 1960, where his batting average was .312 for the Fox City Foxes.

In 1961, he thrashed International League pitching with the Rochester Red Wings and a .321 batting average. The Orioles elevated the slugger to Baltimore, where he played four games that year. From 1962 onward, he was a charm for Chesapeake Bay, until departing for the Indians in 1975–76. He ended his career in the National League with the Dodgers in 1977.

The AL East had a tight pennant race at the end of 1972. In early September, Powell reflected that the Orioles should have been ahead. “But look, I’m not hitting what I should, Donny Buford is only hitting .210, and Dave Johnson is batting only .224,” said Powell. “With the great pitching we are getting, if we were hitting like we should, we’d be out in front like always. That’s the only difference from last year.”6

Powell bashed a three-run homer in the Orioles’ 3-1 win against the Yankees on September 15. Complemented by “a vital relief lift from Grant Jackson and the defensive heroics of Bobby Grich,” the first-inning blast gave legendary hurler Jim Palmer his third straight 20-win season.7 Yankees pitcher Mel Stottlemyre walked Don Buford and Rich Coggins to begin the game, then got Grich out before the cleanup hitter and future food impresario tagged him for a 425-foot home run. Powell was on a streak—it was his third round tripper in four games.

Ultimately, the Tigers won the AL East pennant, beating the Red Sox by half a game and the Orioles by five games. And these days, Boog greets his regulars at Boog’s BBQ and cracks out the occasional story about his playing days, no fictionalizing needed.

DAVID KRELL is the editor of the anthologies “The New York Mets in Popular Culture” and The New York Yankees in Popular Culture.” He’s also the author of “Our Bums: The Brooklyn Dodgers in History, Memory and Popular Culture.” David’s contributions to SABR’s Baseball Biography Project include Johnny Podres, Bucky Dent, Joe Pepitone, Kurt Russell, and Harry Sinclair. David is the chair of SABR’s Elysian Fields Chapter (Northern New Jersey).

Notes

1 Mike Klingaman, “Fans still wait to rub elbows with former slugger Boog Powell at his BBQ stand,” The Baltimore Sun, https://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/orioles/bs-sp-boog-20170329-story.html, April 3, 2017 (accessed February 24, 2020).

2 Cheers, “Sam at Eleven,” Paramount Television, NBC, directed by James Burrows, written by Glen Charles & Les Charles, October 21, 1982.

3 “Sam at Eleven.”

4 Boston Red Sox 9, Baltimore Orioles 1, Setpember 20, 1972, https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1972/B09201BOS1972.htm (accessed February 24, 2020).

5 Boston Red Sox 4, Baltimore Orioles 0, September 20, 1972, https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1972/B09202BOS1972.htm (accessed February 24, 2020).

6 Phil Fuhrer, “Orioles Calm Despite Clustered Field,” The Sun-Telegram (San Bernardino, CA), September 4, 1972: 20.

7 Lou Hatter, “Orioles shade Yankees,” The Sun (Baltimore), September 16, 1972: 21.

A crowd heads toward Braves Field. The ticket and administration building (shown at left) still stands and today serves as the headquarters for the Boston University police. Note the trolley tracks in the foreground, indicating the path of transit vehicles exiting from within the ballpark itself. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)

The best stories should always be told last. That is why, in the waning days of a year marking Fenway Park’s centennial, some time should be reserved for another, more complicated stadium saga.

The beginnings of this tale have a familiar quality to them.

In the midst of the Deadball Era, a jewel box ballpark rose a few miles west of the center of Boston’s downtown, accessible by excellent streetcar service.1,2 The park was universally acclaimed upon its opening. Serendipitously, it hosted a World Series in its inaugural year.

This is not, however, another Fenway tribute, but rather a testament to Fenway’s younger but ultimately somewhat shabbier sibling, Braves Field.3 The birth and subsequent demise of Braves Field serves as a “pivot point” in ballpark history, one that distinguishes two very different approaches to how baseball parks should be built and how they should relate to their host city and its citizens.

Braves Field, the last of the jewel box ballparks, resulted largely from the genius of one man, built by him within a matter of five months. When the park opened in 1915, it featured an unprecedented effort to integrate the workhorse of the urban transportation system, the streetcar, into the infrastructure of the facility. When Braves Field was abruptly abandoned in 1953, it didn’t just take a village to replace it; it took an entire county. Milwaukee County Stadium was a publicly financed stadium, located on the site of an abandoned gravel pit that took three years to construct. County Stadium was divorced from the urban fabric and reflected the increasing dominance of the automobile in American life.4

Simply put, this one change changed everything.

The Rogue Visionary

More than anything else, Braves Field represented the triumph of James E. Gaffney, his vision of baseball as it should be played, and his appreciation for the fans, or cranks, who flocked to see it.

Who was James Gaffney? That was the central question posed by Braves chronicler Harold Kaese in his landmark history of the franchise, first penned in 1948. Gaffney came to the franchise from New York cloaked in the intrigue, allegations, and influence of the Tammany Hall political machine.

Kaese’s portrait of Gaffney can only be characterized as somewhat charitable. Gaffney was a self-made man who rose from street cop to alderman. From there he wound his way into the lucrative construction trade through a variety of corporate vehicles, most notably the construction company of Bradley, Gaffney, and Steers. As the right hand man of Tammany chief Charles F. Murphy, he had ready access to cash and connections. Amongst his closest friends numbered the “Old Fox” Clark Griffith. Indeed, rumors abounded that Gaffney had, on behalf of Murphy, supplied the funding for Griffith’s 1911 purchase of an interest in the Washington franchise. Gaffney also reportedly sniffed around the possible purchase of two American League franchises before setting upon the course of acquiring the Boston Nationals.5

That transaction was realized through a short-lived collaboration with John Montgomery Ward, a New York lawyer and former pitcher for the Providence Grays. Ward had also been an organizer of both the player-centric Brotherhood and the short-lived Player’s League.6 A third New Yorker, John Carroll, collaborated on the purchase of the franchise in December 1911, with Ward serving as the baseball man, Gaffney as the business man, and Carroll as the bridge-building “go between.”7 Boss Murphy was again alleged to have partnered with Gaffney, sharing profits and losses as they had supposedly done in the transaction with Griffith and in the operations of Gaffney’s construction business.8

What are we to make of the string of allegations surrounding Gaffney, some 100 years after the fact? Here is what the record indicates: Boss Murphy insisted in 1913 to newly elected New York governor William Sulzer that if any change was going to be made in the office of state highway commissioner, Gaffney should get the job. When Sulzer demurred, Murphy delivered the message that it was “Gaffney or War.”9 Sulzer then became the first and only governor of the state of New York to be impeached. Gaffney had been accused in one case of taking a $30,000 payoff, and in another matter had apparently benefited from the expiration of the statute of limitations.10 In one famous incident, a grand jury witness testified that he was “morally certain” that Gaffney had acted as a bagman for Murphy by seeking a five percent share of a construction contract.11 The same witness, however, could not testify that he was “legally certain” as to Gaffney’s identity.12

In retrospect, the New York Herald sounds understated in its assessment that “[a]s a power under cover, [Gaffney’s] position has been unprecedented.”13 It did not take long for the “power under cover” in the Boston franchise to emerge. Gaffney and Ward clashed almost immediately. Notwithstanding Gaffney’s “genial disposition, unaffected ways and his loyalty to friends,”14 by August of 1912, Ward had resigned as president of the Braves. (The team had been renamed in tribute to the symbol of Tammany supremacy.) Gaffney, originally the treasurer, although always the principal shareholder, became president.

Even before this coup, Gaffney had been the man out front. Immediately upon purchasing the team, he had been quoted as pledging $100,000 to make the team an on-field success. The franchise itself had been a bargain. In 1912, a half-interest in the Red Sox sold for $150,000, a mere $37,000 less than a full stake in the Boston Nationals.15

After Ward’s departure, Gaffney decried the inadequacy of the Walpole Street Grounds in Boston’s South End and sought to replace the site. He quickly turned to the alternative approach of improving and expanding the tired facility, increasing the park’s capacity as well as removing the principal distortion in its dimensions, a left-field fence within 275 feet of home plate.16 It would now take a 350-foot wallop to clear left field.

A body in motion tends to remain in motion, and when Gaffney’s Tammany-based expectation of immediate success met with frustration on the field, rumors began to crop up as early as June of 1912 that he might be looking to sell his interest in the team.17 By the early months of his third season in ownership, Gaffney was nearing the limits of his frustration. Disgusted, he remarked to his manager, George Stallings, in early 1914: “Do anything you want with them. Take them away. Drown them if you want to—I never want to look at them again.”18 On July 4 of that season, Gaffney’s Braves were languishing in last place.

And then the impossible happened.

The World’s Greatest Ballpark

The Braves’ World Series sweep of Connie Mack’s men may not have been the only miracle of 1914. During the Braves’ late summer surge, the whirling turnstiles of the Walpole Street Grounds had transformed James E. Gaffney from disgruntled Tammany owner into arguably the most ambitious baseball visionary of the decade.

The original model of Braves Field envisioned the roof extending over both the left-field pavilion (shown) and the right-field pavilion. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)

The Braves have left town, the left-field pavilion has already been demolished, and baseball’s perfect ballpark is playing host to football. The initial vast outfield expanse of Braves Field is clearly illustrated by the large gap between the football bleachers and the light towers which had been located within the walled perimeter of the original park. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)