Checkerboard Plaid

A few weeks ago John Zinn posted these marvelous photographs on Facebook showing the semipro Doherty Silk Sox of Paterson, N.J., playing an unidentified Black team at Doherty Oval sometime between 1915 and 1929:

The photos are from the collection of the Paterson Museum, and John was trying to identify the Black team.
 
The most striking thing about these photographs is the black-and-white checkered uniforms worn by the Black team. This reminded me of this photo:
 


This picture of Charles Earle was published in the New York Age (June 8, 1918), after Earle had joined the Grand Central Station Red Caps as team captain, so I had always thought this might have been the only visual representation of the Red Caps’ uniforms. It’s blurry, but to my eye it strongly resembles the checkerboard uniforms in the Paterson photos, and I had never seen any other uniforms like them in that era, at least belonging to Black teams. So it seemed very likely that Charles Earle played for the team in John’s photos, which would date them to 1918 or before. But I couldn’t find any evidence that the Grand Central Red Caps had played in Paterson in those years.
 
However, in 1916 & 1917 Earle played for the Brooklyn Royal Giants. And their uniforms that year were described in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, in an account of an April 29 game between the Royal Giants and the white semipro Bushwicks at Ridgewood Field in Brooklyn:

 This is a precise description of the uniforms found in John’s photos. Here’s a detail from the third photo above, showing the Royal Giants’ first baseman, Ernest Gatewood, and the U.S. flag on his left sleeve:

 

Moreover, the Royal Giants played the Silk Sox in Paterson on May 13, 1917, two weeks after the uniform description was published, the Silk Sox winning 8-1 (Paterson Morning Call, May 14, 1917, p. 3):
 



My only remaining question involves the fact that there exists a pair of photos often said to show the 1917 Brooklyn Royal Giants, wearing completely different (and more conventional) uniforms.

L to R: Doc Sykes, Louis Santop (wearing his 1914 Lincoln Giants “World’s Colored Champions” uniform), String Bean Williams, Charles Earle, Pearl Webster, Ernest Gatewood, Bill Kindle, Joe Hewitt, Bill Handy, Lefty Harvey, Johnny Pugh

Top row, L to R: Nat Strong, Doc Sykes, Max Rosner
Middle row, L to R: String Bean Williams, Charles Earle, Bill Kindle, Bill Handy, Johnny Pugh
Front row, L to R: Louis Santop, Pearl Webster, Ernest Gatewood, Joe Hewitt, Lefty Harvey
 
All the players in both photos played regularly for the Royal Giants in both 1916 and 1917—except for Doc Sykes, who, as far as I can tell, only played for the team in 1916, not in 1917. So it’s my contention that these photos show the 1916 Brooklyn Royal Giants, while in 1917 the team adopted the striking black-and-white plaid uniforms with red trim that are pictured in the Paterson Museum photos.
 
Thanks to Heather Garside of the Paterson Museum and John Zinn. The three Silk Sox/Royal Giants photos appear courtesy of the Paterson Museum.

Comments

[Allison Jones]

Awesome! My great-grandfather was Bill Estes, who played first base for the Doherty Silk Sox during this game. I believe that is him in the top picture.