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

  The state trooper gave Perry the ball back and said he had never seen anybody hit the ball like Gibson, and he was sure surprised that Negroes had the same kind of ball that whites had.

  We parked the bus and got a few more hours sleep. We changed into our uniforms right there on the bus before heading toward the stadium.

  On the way over to the stadium I wondered how that trooper could think that we used a different kind of ball. I said that to Piper, and Piper said that a lot of white people just don’t know what being a Negro is all about. That did not make a whole lot of sense to me.

  May 26

  When we arrived at the ball field all the guys were dead tired, but once they walked out onto the field it was as if they got new life in them. The Chicago American Giants were a good team, but not all that good. Piper, as usual, was talking about how the team needed to bear down. He said that on paper we were the better team, but the game was not being played on paper and we had better show some hustle on the field.

  The crowd was enthusiastic, but the park wasn’t nearly as nice as Rickwood. It seemed a little better when we won, 5 to 1.

  After the game most of the guys stayed at the hotel that Piper booked for us, but a few were staying with Negro families around town. Bill Greason wanted to see a cousin he knew and asked if I wanted to go, and I said no. That’s how I got to go to a pool hall with Herman Bell, Pepper, and Jehosie Heard.

  In the pool hall there was this tall guy who looked like he needed to be arrested for something! He wore a powder-blue zoot suit with wide shoulders, a blue snap-brim hat, and a white silk shirt that was open down the front. On his side he wore this gold chain that went from the front of his pants down the leg and into the pocket. He had a scar down one side of his face that started just in front of his ear, went down the side of his jaw, and disappeared under his ear. Bell said that he was a pool hustler and his name was Mambo. Anyway, this Mambo guy had a girl with him. She was wearing a little short tight dress and she started winking and making up to us as soon as she found out we were ballplayers. This Mambo guy pulled back his coat, and you could see he had a pistol in his belt. He said he thought it was time for us to go.

  I thought Pepper and Bell would have been all over him, but they just said they thought it was time to go.

  It was hot in Chicago, and the poolroom had been even hotter. There was a little breeze outside. I asked Pepper what that had been about. Pepper said a lot of girls flirt with ballplayers and they don’t mind a bit if they cause a little trouble.

  May 27

  I am so tired, I can’t see straight. My pencil broke, and I asked Jay Wilson could I borrow his and he told me no and to leave him alone. Jay’s not like that, but he’s tired, too. I’m missing home again but I am determined not to call every time I get a little lonely.

  Beat the Giants again. Quincy Trouppe is their manager and he catches for them. Piper said he was better than Campanella when he was younger. I never saw Campanella play, so I don’t know. I told that to Piper, and he told me to shut up, too.

  The bus broke down, and we are going to take a train to Atlanta.

  May 28

  This afternoon in Atlanta we played against a team called the Black Crackers. They were a good team, a lot better than we thought they would be, and we really had to play some good ball to come from behind and beat them. After the game we were tired, but the players were feeling good and a little loopy. Even Piper was relaxed. We got down to the train station, and he was talking to everybody about how we were looking like a real ball club.

  It was raining lightly, and we were in a good mood at the station. Then the train that would have taken us to Birmingham came in, but the conductor said we couldn’t get on it because they had taken the Colored car off for repair. What we saw on the train was a big group of white men who were going to a convention in Birmingham. The train was crowded, and they didn’t want us on. The next train wasn’t going to be leaving until nearly two o’clock in the morning.

  As good as we had been feeling, we came down in a big hurry. The Barons shuffled back into the station and into the Colored waiting room. We all just sat there for a while, with some of the players getting real mad at what had happened and others just stretching out on the benches. Then a fat, brown-skinned fellow came and asked us if were the Black Barons from Birmingham who couldn’t get on the train, and we said yes. He said he was from the First Baptist Church and his congregation would love for us to spend the night at their church. He had a bus, and so we went to his church and had a good time. They fed us and treated us really nice.

  I wanted to say something to Piper that maybe just winning ball games did not mean all that much at times, but I don’t think he would have understood. I think what he would have said was that when you played ball you could win or lose depending on how good you were and how the ball bounced. Being black did not make a difference.

  May 29

  Home and Rickwood Field never looked so good. When I got home I gave Mama a big kiss, and she told me not to get upset with my room. I didn’t know what that was supposed to mean, but when I got to it the whole place stunk like cocoa butter. Mama had let some of Rachel’s friends stay over, and two girls had slept in my room and left some of their hair stuff on my dresser. I told Rachel she should keep her friends out of my room, and she said it wasn’t my room anymore, that Mama just lets me stay there when I come to visit. I got mad and wanted to say something to her but I couldn’t think of anything to say. I felt too bad about what she had said.

  We were playing the Clowns again. This guy named Andy Mesa was on first, and Tatum, their first baseman, hit a single just past Piper. Okay, so Mesa goes tearing around second base and bearing down on third, and everybody starts yelling because they know he’s going to try to score all the way from first on that little dinky single. Bobby Robinson comes in and scoops the ball up and fires it in to Bassett, who’s catching. Mesa is round third and coming down the line. Bassett, he’s got the line covered, the plate covered, and he’s waiting with the ball when Mesa plows into him.

  The umpire called Mesa out, and we went over to Bassett, who was lying on the ground, to see if he was all right. He was lying there grinning and holding the ball, and we all went back to the dugout. But when Bassett came back to the dugout, he was rubbing his arm. When Piper asked him if he wanted to come out, he didn’t say anything, just grumbled under his breath the way he does sometimes. Piper told Bell to put the catcher’s gear on.

  I saw Bassett’s arm. It was scraped up something terrible and bled right through his uniform.

  Charlie Richards, who is white and is the clubhouse boy for the white Barons, got a bandage for Bassett and helped put it on. Charlie comes to a lot of the Black Barons’ games because he likes good baseball.

  I asked Mom if it would be all right to take a dog from Pijo, and Daddy said yes even before she answered. I went over to Pijo’s house and got the puppy. Pijo’s sister is a little, kind of nervous, woman with a nice voice. She told me to take good care of the dog, which I would have done, anyway. On the way home he peed on me. I was going to name him “River” but I decided to name him “Skeeter” instead. No special reason except that I just like the name.

  May 30

  Played a doubleheader against the Memphis Red Sox here in Little Rock. We played well and split the games. The whole team was invited to a church picnic, but we have to play the Red Sox again in a few days back in Birmingham so we left as soon as the second game was over.

  On the bus we played whist and me and Piper played the first game against Jimmy Newberry and Alonzo Perry. We were playing rise and fly style, meaning that whoever lost had to get up and let somebody else play against the winners. Guess who got mad at me when we lost???? Piper said he knew a blind monkey who could play cards better than me, and I did not think that was a good thing to say.

  Life on the road can be bor
ing. I like seeing all the cities but bouncing along in the bus or sleeping on some hard bed in a cheap hotel is not my idea of paradise. If I go to college I would have more things I could do. On the other hand if I played good enough to get into the major leagues I could play there for a while and then go to college. I told that to Bill Greason, and he said he could just imagine my face on a baseball card. Piper said I should stick with baseball cards because I sure couldn’t play regular cards. He didn’t have to say that.

  June 1

  It rained, so I spent the day cleaning up all the equipment. It all looks good, and Piper said I was a good equipment manager. I asked him if he thought I would get into a game soon, and he said yes. Aunt Jack tried to get Daddy and Mommy to go to a concert given by the Wings Over Jordan Choir. They had just come back from entertaining soldiers in Europe, and everybody was saying how good they were. Nobody went with Aunt Jack, and she made a speech about we were old-time Negroes and it was time for a new Negro in America.

  Joe Bankhead called me and said that Piper had cut him from the team. He was mad. Then he cried.

  I had a talk with Rachel. I told her it was okay for her to let her friends use my room while I am on the road but not to let them go into my stuff. She said she might sleep in my bed. The girl is pushing me.

  June 2

  Ed Steele said I would not believe New Orleans, and he was right. It is the biggest city in the world. We got in and went to a hotel called Pascals, or something like that. All day long we walked along Canal Street and then went over to what they call the French Quarter. Bill Greason said a man could lose his soul in New Orleans and not even notice it. I said uh-huh, but I don’t know what he meant by that.

  June 3

  We are playing the Memphis Red Sox, and they are traveling with us. Their regular bus broke down, and they’re traveling in three cars that break down every five miles. Some of them wanted to ride in our bus, and Piper said no. It has to be hard riding seven guys to a car, which is what they are doing, but one of their guys said it wasn’t so bad. He said he was making more money than anybody he knew. All the time he was talking he was also chewing on a big cigar and showing off a flashy ring that he wore on his pinkie. When the Memphis player left, Pepper said that his cigar was probably smarter than he was.

  June 4

  We have won two games against Memphis and lost one because of a bad call. In the game we lost the score was 6 to 5 in our favor, and we only needed one more out in the ninth. The Memphis left fielder tried to score from third on a short fly ball, and Jim Zapp threw a perfect ball to Bell. The guy was out by about a mile and a half, but the umpire called him safe. I couldn’t believe it.

  June 5

  Lots of excitement this week. Word got around that there was going to be a protest demonstration in downtown Birmingham. They are going to protest against Carroll’s Restaurant, which doesn’t serve Coloreds anymore.

  Carroll’s did not really ever let Negroes eat in their restaurant. They had their tables and they had a counter the cash register sat on. If you were a Negro you could give them an order for food to take out, then sit on one of the chairs along the wall until they brought it out in a sack. When they fixed the place up they took away the counter, and now they said they didn’t have takeout food, either.

  Elder Williams, from Sixteenth Street Baptist, wants to have an outdoor meeting over in Gadsden Park, but I heard Daddy saying that a lot of people are kind of nervous about it. President Truman is doing a lot for Negroes, and people do not want to make trouble.

  I am all for having a protest demonstration. As far as I am concerned there isn’t any reason for anybody not to serve Colored. And yet just about anywhere you go you see the COLORED and WHITE signs telling you where you can go and can’t go.

  I got to the park early for the game against the Monarchs. The dirt at Rickwood is really good, and some men from the Boston Red Sox were there packing some of it in boxes. They were going to take it to Boston to rub the balls with during the game. The white Barons are the farm team of the Boston Red Sox.

  We played the Monarchs, and Ed Steele hit a low line drive that hit second base and bounced straight up in the air. The Monarchs’ second baseman got the ball and tried to get Ed out when he rounded first base. He hit Ed with the ball, and when Ed took off and ran to second, their first baseman threw the ball and hit him again. It was an accident, but that didn’t stop Ed from getting mad.

  June 7

  Sunday we won a doubleheader against the Monarchs. The first game was 4 to 3 and the second 5 to 4.

  Today we played a day game against Howard University and creamed them with Yours Truly playing right field for three innings. I caught one fly ball and got a single. Piper said I looked good up at bat. On the bench the guys were talking about whether we were Negroes, Colored, or Afro-Americans. Pepper said they could call him anything they wanted to as long as they did not call him late for dinner.

  Then we played a night game against the Monarchs (with me on the bench) and won 7 to 3.

  June 8

  Rachel is going to take piano lessons from Mr. Parrish. She was taking lessons from Sister Purvis, but the only thing Sister Purvis knew was church music, and Mama asked Daddy if he would pay for lessons from Mr. Parrish and he said okay.

  Rachel said she wanted to learn how to play jazz music. When Aunt Jack heard her say that, I thought she was going to have a two-toned fit.

  “Just ignore her,” Mama said. “We ordered her some sense from Sears Roebuck, but it ain’t got here yet.”

  Oh, yes. I asked Daddy about the question of being Colored, or Negro, or Afro-American. He said he was so busy running from nigger that he hadn’t had a chance to grab anything else.

  June 10

  The bus broke down again. Mr. Hayes got some friends of his to drive the team up to East St. Louis, Illinois, where we played in a dinky little park. Ed Steele got hit by a pitch again, and Pepper said that he must have a magnet in his head that attracted baseballs, and Ed said some things to Pepper that I will not put down in this journal.

  Charlie met us with the bus in Centralia. When we were on the bus Jimmy Newberry and Joe Scott started talking about the protest against Carroll’s again, with Jimmy saying that the Black Barons should lead it.

  Jimmy Zapp said he thought that people’s hearts were changing and that segregation couldn’t last forever.

  “Yes, it can,” Joe said. “During the war they had some black soldiers from the Ninety-Second guarding German prisoners over in Kentucky. The prisoners were out cleaning the roads. You know they had to take the prisoners into diners to eat and they let the Germans in to eat but the Colored soldiers had to eat outside. Now, if they let the enemy eat in the diners and kept our boys out, you know they mean to keep it that way.”

  June 14

  When we got home Mama had a sty on her eye. Aunt Jack put a potato in some cheesecloth and put it on the sty.

  I told Daddy what Joe had said. He listened to me real careful and then he said there were so many things wrong with the world and that there weren’t a lot of good answers to all the questions I had in me. He said he was sorry, as if he personally had done something wrong.

  June 16

  The Birmingham Black Barons are the best team in the league. We are drawing good crowds at Rickwood and every place else.

  I heard Mr. Hayes say that the Newark Eagles were having trouble big time. The Eagles don’t have their own field, and they also face competition from the New York Yankees, the New York Giants, and the Brooklyn Dodgers, as well as the New York Black Yankees, and Cuban Giants. That was just too much competition.

  We played an exhibition game against the Alliance Stars up in Columbus and won easily, 9 to 2. I pinch-hit for Perry, who was pitching, and got a walk. Also, Wiley Griggs, who talks so bad all the time, got into a fight and he swings like a girl!

  June 17<
br />
  Indianapolis again. When we were driving in there was a big sign on the side of the road. It said, WELKOME TO KLAN KOUNTRY. The three Ks were larger than the other letters and colored red. Pepper said that the Ku Klux Klan wanted everybody to know that they were around in Indianapolis. Bill Greason said it was a miracle that an organization that did so many evil things talked so much about being Christians.

  We played a four-team doubleheader. Indianapolis played against the Monarchs in the first game, and we played against the Newark Eagles in the second game. Newark looked good, and Piper wanted us to look good, so he pitched Bill Powell. They had a guy named Monte Irvin, who they said was a cinch to go up to the major leagues. I had a chance to talk to him, and he was a nice guy. He had a way of smiling at you that made you smile back. I watched him in the field and he was all right, nothing special, and I was anxious to see him bat.

  Piper told Powell that the only thing Irvin couldn’t hit was a low inside pitch. Powell’s first pitch was low and inside and fast. Irvin hit it against the left-field wall so hard, it bounced halfway back to the infield and Irvin ended up on second. Powell looked over at Piper, and Piper just shrugged.

  Jimmy Wilkes was the next batter, and Powell pitched him a slow curve. Wilkes hit the ball so far out of the park, I thought it might go all the way to Birmingham. We lost the game 6 to 0, and Piper was mad again. That man really hates to lose.