Tag: Cap Anson

July 21 in baseball history: Last team to integrate

JULY 21, 1959 • CHICAGO, ILLINOIS – Elijah “Pumpsie” Green was put in as a pinch runner for the Boston Red Sox on this night in 1959. The Red Sox became the last team to integrate. It completed what Jackie Robinson started in 1947. Every other major league team had had an African American in the lineup by this time, except the Red Sox.

It was a bumpy road for Green through the Red Sox system. He was invited to training camp in Scottsdale, Arizona that spring and reportedly had a good one, but was sent to the Red Sox minor league team in Minneapolis to start the season.

The Boston chapter of the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) asked for an investigation to determine if Green had been discriminated against as a player and in the housing he was provided. According to a July 22, 1959 United Press International story, the Red Sox said “they would call a Negro player when they developed one of major league caliber in their farm system.” The Red Sox now believed they had “a Negro of major league caliber,” and the team was cleared of discrimination.

Here are the first Black players (in the modern era*) for each team and the season of their first game:

Jackie Robinson
Larry Doby
Hank Thompson
Monte Irvin
Sam Jethroe
Minnie Minoso
Bob Trice
Ernie Banks
Curt Roberts
Tom Alston
Nino Escalera
Chuck Harmon
Carlos Paula
Elston Howard
John Kennedy
Ozzie Virgil
Pumpsie Green		 Brooklyn , 1947
Cleveland , 1947
St. Louis , 1947
New York Giants, 1949
Boston Braves, 1950
Chicago White Sox, 1951
Philadelphia Athletics, 1953
Chicago Cubs 1953
Pittsburgh , 1954
St. Louis Cardinals, 1954
Cincinnati Reds, 1954
Cincinnati Reds, 1954
Washington Senators 1954
New York Yankees, 1955
Philadelphia Phillies, 1957
Detroit Tigers, 1958
Boston Red Sox

*Blacks were not allowed to play in the major leagues from the late 1800s until Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947 because of a “gentleman’s agreement” between the owners.

CONTRIBUTING SOURCES:
Baseball-Almanac famous firsts
United Press International, July 22, 1959
Cap Anson, instigator of the Gentleman’s Agreement

March 27: How Cubs got name

MARCH 27, 1902 | CHICAGO, ILLINOIS. The identity of Chicago‘s National League team is so ingrained it’s hard to imagine the franchise not being called the Cubs. But for the first quarter century of the team’s existence it wasn’t. They were known at various times as White Stockings, Colts, even Orphans – more on that in a moment. Here’s how the Cubs got their name;

The Cubs moniker can be traced to the Chicago Daily News newspaper of this date in 1902. The term for young bears was used by a sportswriter at spring training to describe a team with a bunch of young but promising players. The story’s headline read:

Manager of the Cubs is in Doubt Only on Two Positions

A search of newspaper archives at Chicago’s Newberry Library shows that that March 27, 1902 story is the earliest known use of the term “Cubs” to describe the team. The article mentioned it once more in describing the intentions of the manager:

"Frank Selee will devote his strongest efforts on the team work of the new Cubs this year."

The name caught on, which wasn’t surprising considering the club was known as Orphans at the time.

Here’s how that came about, as a charter member of the National League in 1876 the team was known as the Chicago White Stockings. A few years later star Cap Anson became player/manager. Sportswriters began referring to the team as Anson’s Colts, and eventually just Colts.

Anson was also known as “Pop.” When he left the team in 1897 the team became known as Orphans. Get it? You knew “Cubs” would stick when rival papers such as the Chicago Tribune (which later owned the team) began to use it.

Interestingly, when the Cubs relinquished the name White Stockings, the new American League franchise grabbed it, shortened it, and have been known as the White Sox ever since.

When the National Football League came to town in the 1920’s, the team chose Bears because they played in the home of Cubs.

More info:
The Chicago Daily News, Thursday, March 27, 1902 (Thanks to Newberry Library, Chicago)
The New York Times, “Nicknames of Baseball Clubs,” by Joseph Curtin Gephart,
Retrosheet has a treasure of information
MLB team histories
More info on team names, wikipedia

Mar 8 – Baseball goes to Paris

PARIS, FRANCE, MARCH 8, 1889.  It was a dream come true for Albert Spalding. A team of touring American baseball players he organized played an exhibition baseball game in Paris, France.

They finally settled on a park in the shadow of Eiffel's rising tower,

There was some difficulty finding a suitable field. As Mark Lamster wrote in Spalding’s World Tour, “Paris was endowed with countless formal parks and squares, but a large, enclosed space that would allow Spalding to charge admission was proving harder to come by.” They finally settled on, and got permission to use, the Parc Aérostatique, a park in the shadow of Eiffel’s rising tower, which would be completed later that year.

Albert Spalding, the fledgling sporting goods magnate, was a good ballplayer in his own right, and quite the promoter. He decided to tour the world to promote baseball and, in turn, get more business for his sporting goods venture.

He set out west from Chicago after the 1888 season with a group of 20-odd ballplayers, including stars Adrian “Cap” Anson and John Montgomery Ward. They barnstormed across the western states playing in cities like Omaha, Denver and Salt Lake City, eventually reaching San Francisco and settling sail for Hawaii and Australia. Spalding’s tour played in Sydney, Cairo, Paris, London and numerous ports along the way.

The tour returned to the United States in April 1889, more than a year after leaving. And just in time for the 1889 National League baseball (the American League hadn’t been established yet.) And many stories to tell of baseball goes to Paris.

Contributing sources:
Spalding’s World Tour, by Mark Lamster, Public Affairs Publishing, 2006
Eiffel’s Tower