The Journal of Biddy Owens, the Negro Leagues, Birmingham, Alabama, 1948 Read online

That was that. He doesn’t care if we are tired or not. I don’t get to play that much. I only get in games against the industrial league teams, and exhibition games, or the league games that we are really losing bad. Piper says if I can flatten out my swing I’ll get into more games.

  The exhibition games against other teams in the Negro Leagues are hard, but games against colleges or strictly amateur teams are usually pretty easy. A lot of big companies have teams that play in what they call “industrial leagues.” The Barons started off as an industrial team way back when.

  May 9

  The Barons played an exhibition game against the Homestead Grays. We won 4 to 3, but Buck Leonard hit a ball farther than I have seen any ball hit. Pepper said that you had to be a white man on a bus to go catch that ball, because if you were on the back of the bus where the Negroes sit, you never would catch up with it.

  May 11

  Lost to Cleveland in Montgomery. Me and Bill Greason went to the movies. No sooner had we settled in our seats in the Colored balcony than an usher came and said that all the Coloreds had to leave the theater. We asked why, and she said she didn’t know, just that the manager told her it was so. A couple of people said they weren’t going to leave, but a sheriff’s deputy came up and told us all to go on downstairs right away or we would wish we had.

  We got downstairs and we all had to line up against the wall while a white lady walked by us. Somebody had snatched a purse from her hand while she was walking, and she thought maybe he had run into the movie theater.

  She looked us over and then said she didn’t see the one who had snatched her purse.

  I wanted to go back upstairs, but Bill was mad and said he was leaving the theater. They didn’t give us our twenty cents back, either.

  I did inventory tonight. We have eight gloves that belong to the team, nine bats, four bases, and the catcher’s gear. Everything else belongs to the players. I think I’m going to buy my own glove.

  May 14

  I read in a magazine that Jackie Robinson had been a football star in college. He went to UCLA, in California.

  Piper asked me what the score had been for our first game of the season, and I looked it up in my journal and told him. That pleased him, and then everyone started telling me things to write down. Pepper and Ed Steele got into an argument over who was fastest: Cool Papa Bell or Sam Jethroe. Ed said he saw Sam Jethroe get a double on a bunt.

  Pepper said that he had seen Cool Papa Bell walk into a hotel room, switch off the light, and get into bed before the room got dark. But then Artie Wilson said that one time Jesse Owens, who everybody said was the fastest man in the world, was on a field with Cool Papa Bell. He said that Cool Papa Bell had challenged Jesse to a race, and Jesse just smiled and said he had heard about Cool Papa. That settled it for most of us. Cool Papa Bell had to be the fastest if Jesse Owens did not want to run against him!

  It took ten hours to reach Indianapolis yesterday. We got here at one o’clock in the morning. The hotel we stayed in was pretty beat-up looking, and we only got three rooms for the whole team. Pepper, Bill Powell, and Joe Bankhead slept on the bus.

  May 15

  The team we played today, the Indianapolis Clowns, came out and started fooling around, doing tricks with the ball and making people laugh. Piper said he didn’t like that at all because it made it seem that Negro baseball teams weren’t serious.

  On one hand, everyone knows the major leagues are taking people like Jackie Robinson and Larry Doby because they aren’t loud talking or clowning around. On the other hand, a team like the Clowns fools around before the ball game and sometimes even during the game if they can get away with it. The way I figure, they’ll be the last ones to get into white folks ball.

  Piper said when people see teams like the Clowns doing tricks with the ball or just being comical, they forget that they can play ball, too. I agree with Piper, but I really like to see the Clowns fooling around. They had this big guy on first base, Goose Tatum, and he was really funny. He could make the ball roll down his arm and then flex his muscle and make it pop up. When the game started he could hit, too. But we beat the Clowns, and I think everybody played harder against them because of what Piper had said. Sometimes Piper seems a little too tight, but when he says something, everybody listens to him. Everyone on our team was dead serious, and in the last inning, with us up by two runs, Pepper said something to their catcher, Sam Hairston. They got into pushing each other around, but there wasn’t really a fight.

  May 18

  The Clowns came out today ready to play. They got a three-run lead and held it to the seventh inning. All their fans were screaming and carrying on. In the top of the eighth, Piper said he wanted to see what we were made of, and I knew he wanted to win bad.

  Johnny Britton bunted the first pitch down the third baseline and beat it out. Everybody expected Herman to swing away, but he bunted, too, and got thrown out at first. When he came back to the dugout, Piper gave him a look that would have curdled milk. Wilson got up next and slapped a ball into right field for a double. That put men on second and third, and they walked Piper, which made him mad. He was even madder when the umpire called Ed Steele out on strikes.

  The first pitch to Joe Scott was down in the dirt for a ball. The next one was high, but the ump called it a strike, anyway. The next pitch was a curve, and Scott must have missed it by a foot.

  You could see the ball was dirtied up. Piper called time-out and asked to see the ball. The umpire told him to shut up and get back on base, and Piper said he had a right to see the ball. By this time a bunch of Clowns were standing around the mound and by the time they produced the ball for Piper to see, it was a snow-white, brand-new ball. Piper complained to the umpire again and was told to get back on first base again. Soon as Piper got back on base, the pitcher started his pitching motion and Scott backed out of the batter’s box.

  I love to see Joe Scott when he gets mad, because the veins on the side of his head get swelled up and his eyes start bulging. He got back in the batter’s box and hit the plate with the end of the bat.

  Their pitcher, Bill Cathey, shook off one sign, then went into his full windup motion. He looked like he was going to throw fire up to the plate but, when he came around, it was that same curveball again. Only this time the ball was white, and Scott lit into it. Man, he hit that ball a ton and a half! Their left fielder just stood out there and watched the ball go over his head. He didn’t move because that ball was deep in the stands. Scott nodded his head up and down all the way around the bases. We were ahead 4 to 3.

  When Piper got back into the dugout he said that anybody who made an error for the rest of the game was going to have to fight him right there on the field. The game ended with us winning 5 to 3.

  May 20

  Today we played a team in St. Louis called the Hops. They were an industrial league team and couldn’t play at all the way I figured. Their pitcher was pretty wild and walked every other man he faced. When he slowed his ball down so he could get it over the plate, we were knocking it silly. I could have hit the guy easy. I know it. By the fifth inning we were ahead 12 to 0, and Piper told the guys to ease off. He didn’t want to embarrass the team we were playing. If you embarrassed an amateur team, they wouldn’t want to play you again.

  Even when we eased off we were scoring runs. Pepper came in and hit a pop-up. The ball must have gone a mile high, and their second baseman missed it and Pepper started laughing. The final score was 18 to 2, but that wasn’t the most exciting thing that happened. The stadium we played in had two dressing rooms, and we were changing clothes in one of them when these two white guys came in and stood by the door. One of them had a pistol stuck in his belt. I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

  They asked us did we have a lot of fun making their boys look bad. Piper said it was just a game and there was nothing to it.

  The guy with
the pistol told us to stick around if we wanted to play another game. He said he had some of his friends coming over and they played some pretty good baseball.

  When the two guys left, everybody started grabbing their clothes. I asked Piper if we were going to play another game, and he told me to shut up and get the equipment on the bus.

  I could tell by the way everybody was grabbing their stuff that Piper wasn’t playing. We grabbed our stuff, put it in whatever bags we could find, and headed for the bus. Guys didn’t even stop to change their clothes.

  Charlie Rudd was sleeping on the bus when we got to it. Piper didn’t even have to say anything to him. When Charlie saw us getting on in our uniforms, he started the bus up and, as soon as everybody was on, he moved it out.

  I had seen that kind of thing before. Those guys weren’t really mad about their team losing. They were just the kind of guys who knew that they could talk to black people any way they wanted to and wanted us to keep that in mind. Daddy said what they wanted us to remember was that we were supposed to stay “in our place.”

  May 21

  The team gets paid twice a month for the regular games they play. When they play games like the one in St. Louis, which was just an exhibition game, they split the gate with the people who own the stadium and with the other team.

  After the St. Louis game, Piper counted out the money and saw that the Barons’ share was two hundred dollars. That came to eight dollars a man.

  I only get a hundred dollars a month regular pay, but I get a full share of the split-up money and was pretty happy to get the eight dollars.

  Afterward, Pepper, Alonzo Perry, Bell, Piper, and Sam Williams played tonk, and Pepper lost his eight dollars. I’m glad I wasn’t playing. I can’t see working for money and then losing it in a card game. They play a lot of cards on the road. The games they play mostly are tonk, poker, and whist.

  May 22, morning

  Kansas City has a white owner, Mr. Wilkinson, and all the players like him a lot. He came to Street’s, the hotel we were staying in, with a Colored reporter from the Kansas City Call. The reporter was asking him and Buck O’Neil what they thought would be the future of the Negro Leagues if the major leagues kept taking players. Mr. Wilkinson, who’s pretty old and wears thick glasses, said the Negro Leagues would last as long as the south lasted.

  The reporter from the Call, whose name was Davis, asked Mr. Wilkinson if he thought the south would last. Mr. Wilkinson looked at him and asked him to repeat the question, and he did. Then Mr. Wilkinson said that the south would last a lot longer than some people thought it would. Buck O’Neil said that the Negro Leagues could be just like the minor leagues and could even get support from the major leagues.

  Afterward everyone was talking about how nice Mr. Wilkinson was and how he was one of the first people to have night baseball. But I was thinking of the reporter from the Kansas City Call. I asked him how he got his job, and he said he had gone to college and worked on the college magazine. He asked me if I wanted to be a reporter, and I told him I was thinking about it.

  May 22, evening

  Piper told me to write down why we had lost, only he didn’t say lost — he said we had our butts kicked. He said he was going to send what I wrote down off to the Birmingham World and see that they publish it.

  We were sitting in the dugout between games and Piper was mad. Piper was a man who could get mad in a heartbeat. Before the game he was talking about how we had to establish something against the Kansas City Monarchs. What happened was that Kansas City established something against us.

  We went down one two three in the first inning. Jim LaMarque, their pitcher, was throwing hard and throwing strikes. In the bottom of the first, with Bankhead pitching, their first two batters walked. That was Curt Roberts and Herb Souell. Bankhead got Gene Baker to pop up, but then Elston Howard hit a line drive into the stands, and they were ahead 3 to 0. Piper called a meeting at the pitcher’s mound and told everybody to tighten up their defense. The next batter, Hank Thompson, got a triple and Willard Brown got a single and we were down by four runs. Piper took Bankhead out and brought in Jehosie Heard and Buck O’Neil got a double off his first pitch.

  Kansas City was just good. Okay, that was one thing. But when Piper came into the dugout after the fifth inning (we were losing by eight runs then) and Bankhead was looking at a newspaper clipping, things got ugly.

  He yelled at Bankhead because he was reading in the dugout instead of paying attention to the game. Somebody had given Bankhead a newspaper clipping about Jackie Robinson stealing home against Pittsburgh.

  Piper blew up. He got the clipping from Bankhead and threw it on the floor of the dugout. We lost the game big time.

  Jimmy Newberry pitched the second game and we won. Britton hit a ground ball to Souell with two outs in the ninth and the Monarch’s third baseman let it go through his legs. Two runs scored and we won 4 to 3.

  Nobody said anything when we got on the team bus and went back to the hotel. We were playing in Kansas City, Missouri, but the hotel was across the river in Kansas City, Kansas. We ate at the Blue Sky Diner down the street from the hotel and the food wasn’t that good. They served white gravy with their chops, and it was greasy. Bill Greason said the only thing they could make in Kansas City was steak and barbecue and I believe him. Piper finished eating first, paid, and left. Then the team relaxed some.

  Some of the guys went downtown to a jazz club. I wanted to go, too, but Piper keeps an eye on me and he had told me to stick with Bill Greason. I told Bill we should go to see if we could hear some good, fast jazz and check out the ladies. Instead we went back to the hotel.

  There was a phone in the lobby, and I called home. I don’t know why I did and I really didn’t have anything to say. Rachel answered, and I told her to put Mama on. She asked me where I was and I told her in Kansas City and she started asking me what Kansas City looked like. I told her to shut up and put Mama on. She said for me to beg her.

  Right then and there I decided not to ever get married. I couldn’t imagine myself married to no woman like Rachel. When she did get Mama on the phone, I just asked her how everything was going and she asked me what Kansas City was like, the same as Rachel.

  I was glad to talk to Mama. After I hung up I thought of something else to say and almost called back. Traveling was nice. Home was good, too.

  May 24

  Lost two games against the Chicago American Giants yesterday. Greason said that it would be wise for us to keep a clear distance away from Piper, who does not like to lose. We lost the first game 7 to 5 and the second game 5 to 3. I think everybody is just tired. Piper was yelling for everybody to run out their ground balls. Jimmy Zapp struck out and ran to first base, and everybody had to smile at that, even Piper.

  Tonight we played a night game against the Monarchs in Louisville, Kentucky. The field was small and kind of dark, but the Monarchs had their own night lights, which they could move from ballpark to ballpark. Very nice.

  We won the game 5 to 4. Instead of being glad, Piper just said that we should have won all our games against the Monarchs. But I think he’s wrong, because the Monarchs are one good team.

  “Pijo,” which is what they call Clarence King, said that his brother’s dog had had puppies and asked if anybody wanted one. I said yes and hope that Mom is going to let me bring it home.

  The newspaper is going on about how Truman is going to integrate the army. Bell said it didn’t mean anything, because the war was already over, but Perry said it meant a lot, and he explained that the two biggest things they had in the United States were the armed forces and major-league baseball. They had baseball integrated and if they integrated the army it was going to mean that Negroes were going to be equal for the first time.

  I couldn’t help wondering what that meant. A lot of people were saying that the Negro Leagues were going to fold up beca
use people wanted to see integrated baseball. I wondered if integration in everything would mean there would be nothing Negro anymore.

  We had to travel to Memphis, Tennessee, and after packing up the equipment I went with Charlie to get the bus gassed up. Then we picked up the team and started. We had bought some barbecue ribs from a Colored restaurant, and just out of town we stopped for some pop and coffee from a white diner. We had to go around to the back to get them. The ribs were good, and we ate them on the bus.

  May 25

  It took us two hours short of forever to get to Tennessee. A lot of the problems getting there were because of Jimmy Zapp, who had to keep stopping and finding a place to go to the bathroom. He said he must have eaten something bad, but Bill Powell said that the Zapper had eaten so many barbecued ribs that if he had saved the bones he could have built a small house for himself.

  It was morning when we finally arrived, and we took a vote if we wanted to get hotel rooms or sleep on the bus to save money. Everybody voted to go to sleep on the bus, and Charlie parked in a Colored park. A state trooper at the park asked us who we were, and Charlie told him we were the Birmingham Black Barons, the best baseball team in the south. The trooper said he had gone to a few Negro games about three years before, when Josh Gibson was playing. He asked Charlie if we played with a regular baseball, and Charlie said sure we do. Perry threw the trooper a ball. The state trooper looked it over and shook his head. He said he still didn’t see how in the world Gibson could hit a ball as far as he did.

  Perry asked the trooper if he had ever heard of Babe Ruth and, when the trooper said he had, Perry told him that Ruth was the white Josh Gibson, only a little smaller.