Agate Type

the wrong philadelphia giants

I recently ran across this photo, supposedly of the 1906 Philadelphia Giants, which was auctioned off back in 2006:


Here’s the conclusion of the catalog description:

“As for the detailing of the pictured elements, we identify [white sportswriter and Giants owner Walter] Schlichter, and Sol White likely sits to his immediate left. Rube Foster, we believe is the tallest player standing in the back row. The caption, ‘Season 1906’, was not applied to this print but, instead, to the original. This photo is a splendid rendering of a highly successful independent, Black baseball team that only anticipated the coming of the Negro Leagues - and one showcasing the Hall of Famer, Rube Foster, at the peak of his playing career.”

Despite the authoritative prose, nearly everything said here is completely wrong.  True, it is the Philadelphia Giants, and that is Schlichter at the center of the photo.  But neither Rube Foster nor Sol White is in the photo, which is readily apparent if you’ve ever seen any photos of them.  Another star of the ’06 Giants, Pete Hill, is missing, too. 

It’s not, however, a photo of complete nobodies.  Standing at the far right is Danny McClellan, who played with the Giants through the 1910 season.  Standing at the far left is Spottswood Poles, which tells us something.  Poles joined the Philadelphia Giants in mid-season 1909, and played the 1910 season with the club, before jumping to the Lincoln Giants in 1911.  So we’ve narrowed down the possible years to 1909 and 1910, when McClellan and Poles were on the Philadelphia Giants.

As it happens, I’ve located another photograph that shows a Giants team of a very similar vintage, this time with most of the players identified.

Poles and McClellan are seated to the right of Schlichter.  Standing second from left is Bill “Bonehead” Pierce, who played for the Philadelphia Giants only in 1910.  Next to him, standing in the center, is Jesse Barber, who played with the Giants in 1909 and 1910 before defecting to the American Giants in 1911.  Next is Lee Wade and then Fisher (no first name known), both of whom pitched for the Giants in 1909 and 1910 only.

I can’t match everybody in the two photos for certain, with the exception of Schlichter, Poles,  McClellan, Fisher (standing second from left in the first photo), and the two guys in front, who I believe are the same in both pictures: on the left Bill Francis and on the right William “Knucks” James, both of whom left the Giants after the 1910 season.

But there are a couple of interesting differences I’ve left for last.  Consider first the guy sitting to the left of Schlichter in the original photo. 

I believe he’s Bruce Petway:

Petway played for the Philadelphia Giants in 1908 and 1909.

Next consider the guy standing second from right (between the false Rube Foster and Danny McClellan).

Look anything like this guy?

 

The regular shortstop on the 1909 Philadelphia Giants was none other than John Henry Lloyd.  In 1910 he was signed away by Rube Foster for his Leland Giants, and I don’t believe he is in the second photo.

So my conclusion is that the original photo above was mistakenly identified as the 1906 Philadelphia Giants.  In fact, it’s really the 1909 Philadelphia Giants.  The second photo, meanwhile, shows the 1910 Giants (note that Knucks James is still wearing his uniform from the previous year).

The first photo absolutely does not include Rube Foster, who was touted by the seller as the photograph’s main selling feature, or Sol White, who at the time of the auction (October 19, 2006) had been Foster’s companion in the Hall of Fame for only a few months.  But the photo does show the Hall of Famer John Henry Lloyd, plus noted players Spot Poles and Bruce Petway. So maybe it was worth the price it went for.

Incidentally, here are the actual 1906 Philadelphia Giants, from their manager Sol White’s book:

 

UPDATE 1/13/2013 Bill Mullins has found the 1909 Philadelphia Giants photo published in the New York Press (September 12, 1909), with a caption identifying all the players.

barber/barbour

Here’s an email from John Russell, sent to the Negro League Biographical Committee and me, on Jesse Barber (or is it Barbour, after all?):

Sometimes stuff just falls into your lap.  I was reading Gary Ashwill’s fantastic Agate Type website (a must read just for the info on C. Manela, the Negro Leagues one and only Filipino, all by itself) and noticed that he had found Jesse Barber's WW1 Draft Registration Card.  The Card listed Jesse Bernard Barber as being born on January 5, 1888 in Charlottesville, Virginia; living in Chicago, Illinois; and his occupation as a Professional Baseball Player employed by the American Giants Ball Club.  He was married and the sole support of his mother and wife, also listed as being tall and slender.  Absolutely no doubt this was our man.

Of course, in the 1920 Census, Barber was listed as living in Chicago with his wife Gertrude.  I had tracked Barber down in the Census long ago and spent fruitless time once looking for him in the WW1 Draft Registration Database.  Like his teammate Robert Gans, the WW1 Draft Registration Database had his last name spelt wrong, listing him as Jesse Burber (so easy, I could kick myself).  This new info seemed to also answer the question of whether Barber's last name was really Barber or Barbour.  I had always felt it was really Barbour as that is how Rube Foster listed it on the American Giants’ letterhead.

Armed with new information, I started goofing off looking for more Jesse Barber info.  I immediately found him in the recently added 1942 Old Man’s WW2 Draft Registration Cards of Ancestry.com.  This is the only part of the WW2 Draft Registration that has been released, covering men born from 1877 to 1897 on the assumption that all these guys are dead so their privacy cannot be violated.  There’s a bunch of new info in here such as Daniel McClellan’s birth date, more confirmation that our Robert Gans is the guy who died in 1949, etc.  In any case:

In 1942, Jessie Bernard Barbour, born: January 5, 1888, Charlottesville, Virginia, was living in Bridgeport, Connecticut, and working for one Mr. Louis Schulman.  His closest contact was also listed as Louis Schulman with no mention of his wife.  This info made perfect sense.  Barber/Barbour, at the end of his career in the mid to late 1920s, was playing for the Mohawk Giants and Philadelphia Colored Giants (in other words, the New York/New England area).  Another black team active around that time and area was Jesse's old teammate Frank Wickware’s Bridgeport, Connecticut, Colored Giants.

So it looks like Jesse probably came to Bridgeport to play for Wickware and stayed.  There is probably some interesting stuff buried in the Bridgeport, Connecticut, newspapers (I seem to remember that Rufus Baker, another long-time Negro Leaguer also lived and died there.  Did he know Jesse?).  As for his wife, he was well-known to have an alcohol problem at the end of his career and she probably left him.  There is one other interesting thing included in his 1942 Registration: his Height and Weight.  The 54-year-old Jesse is listed as being 5 feet 11 and a half inches tall and weighing 176.  In old team photos, Jesse seems to be slightly over 6 feet tall.  Considering that men shrink as they age, he was probably slightly taller in his prime.

As Jesse had obviously settled in Bridgeport, I then checked the 1949-2001 Connecticut Death Index on Ancestry.com.  There he was again.  Jesse Barbour, listed as a 73-year-old Negro Male, died in Bridgeport, Fairfield County, Connecticut, on October 20, 1959.  He was listed as having never been married.  This is pretty obviously our man, though he was 71, not 73.  (The addition of a few years in old age seems quite common with the reason being evidently that this makes you eligible for Social Security earlier.  For example, Oscar “Home Run” Johnson, who was always out for a honest or dishonest buck, tacked on four years, going from 1896 to 1892).  Thus:

Jesse Bernard Barbour (aka Jessie, aka Barber)
Born: January 5, 1888, Charlottesville, Virginia, USA
Died: October 20, 1959, Bridgeport, Connecticut, USA
Height (in his prime): 6 to 6 feet 1 inch; Weight: 170 to 175 pounds

All this research took 10 minutes when, years ago, I got nothing for hours.

The remaining questions now are:
1)  Is there an obit for him in the Bridgeport newspapers?
2)  Was he born Barber or Barbour (did he modify his last name like Satchel Page/Paige or Ted Radcliff-e)?
3)  What info does his death certificate contain?
4)  What was he employed by Louis Schulman to do?

Do we have anyone who can look around some Bridgeport microfilm?

Cheers, John Russell

And here’s the World War II draft card, where he spells his name “Barbour”:

jesse barber

Between us, Patrick Rock and I have found about 250 Negro Leaguers with World War I draft cards.  They yield specific birth dates and places, along with other information, much of which is completely new to researchers.  The draft cards confirm older research and longtime assumptions in some cases, conflict with them in others.  A good number of players who had previously been known only by last names or nicknames are now fully identified, with first names, birth dates, and so on.  Since the registrants signed the cards, we can see how they rendered their names themselves, which goes a long way toward solving some longstanding problems.

Here’s an example: the American Giants outfielder who has normally been called “Jess Barbour” by historians actually signed his name “Jesse Barber” (which, incidentally, is also how he appears in the 1910 census in Philadelphia, and the 1920 census in Chicago).  His name normally appeared in contemporary newspapers and box scores as “Barber”; but at some point, he was confused with the Pittsburgh Keystones’ catcher Elmore Barbour, which is possibly how the “-our” spelling started to be associated with him. (He also appeared in a passenger manifest traveling from Cuba in 1916, accompanied by Frank Wickware, as “Jess Balbour.”)  I suspect (though I don’t know for sure yet) that the second baseman “Bull” Barber, who appears in Riley as a Hilldale, Harrisburg, and Kansas City Monarchs player from 1920 to 1925, is actually a third person.  Other sources give his name as Leroy Barber, and there is a draft card for a Leroy Barber of the appropriate age living in Fayette, Pennsylvania, which is not far from Harrisburg.

In the ancestry.com database, Barber’s name was digitized as “Burber,” which I think is just a misreading of his signature (he didn’t round off the “a,” making it look like a “u”).  Only 15 Burbers appear in the draft card database, and the first couple I checked were definitely mistakes for “Barber.”

In coming weeks I’ll post a few of the more interesting finds from the draft cards.  Some further Cuban statistics are also forthcoming (1907 Premio de Verano and the 1908 Cuban League).  And I’m nearing the completion of the statistical portion of my big project on the 1920-1922 Negro National League—more on that soon.