Pinstripe Empire

by Marty Appel

  Herman Long’s defection to New York after thirteen years in Boston was a tough blow for National League fans. Four times he had batted .300 for the Beaneaters, and with Fred Tenney, Jimmy Collins, and Bobby Lowe had been part of what was called the Big Four. But his stay in New York lasted only two months.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” as a PA announcer might say today, “these are your 1903 New York Americans!”

  The team opened its season in Washington on Wednesday, April 22, with a lineup of Davis in left, Keeler in right, Fultz in center, Williams at second, Ganzel at first, Conroy at third, Long at short, O’Connor catching, and Chesbro pitching.

  Getting uniforms made quickly was a challenge, but it was accomplished thanks to the experience of the A.G. Spalding company, provider of team uniforms. Griffith himself had a hand in designing the look, a look that some considered gaudy and inappropriate for a stately New York franchise.

  The players wore navy-blue wool jerseys and knickers with four buttons down the front to midchest. On each side was a white letter: N on the right, Y on the left. They wore white belts and gray wool socks. The caps were also dark blue with white stripes emanating from the top center, and no lettering.

  Over time, the Highlanders hitters came to use the N.Y. letters to signal baserunners whether they would be swinging on the next pitch—touching the Y for “yes” if swinging, or touching the N for “no” if not—as they plotted hit-and-run plays.

  The New Yorkers lost their opener 3–1 to Washington pitcher Al Orth, with Williams driving in Keeler for their only run, in the first inning. The game took an hour and forty-five minutes and was played before 11,950 witnesses to history, a sellout. Farrell sat with Ban Johnson.

  The next day, they beat Washington 7–2 for their first victory, with Howell getting the win.

  AFTER FINISHING THEIR first road trip at 3–4 on April 29, the team took the train from Philadelphia to New York for the big home debut the next day.

  Would the Americans be a hit with the public? Would fans find their way to Washington Heights?

  An overflow crowd of 16,243 passed through the revolving turnstiles of Hilltop Park, with each fan receiving a small American flag to wave. (The team’s first “promo day”!) “Street fakirs, selling everything from a fake score card … vied with each other as to who had the most vigorous and resounding lung power,” wrote Sam Crane in the Telegram. The crowd was almost totally adult males, most in coats, ties, and hats, a style that would be the norm at New York baseball games for decades to come. Many watched for free from perches across the street on Broadway known as “Rubberneck Flats.” While not a record-breaking crowd, (18,675 had seen a Philadelphia-Chicago game the summer before, in which Rube Waddell beat Clark Griffith 2–1), it was certainly enough to bring satisfaction to Johnson, Farrell, Devery, and Gordon. Clearly, fans wanted to see American League baseball, were curious about the new team, and had no trouble finding their way up-town. This was going to work!

  The players from both Washington and New York exited their new, unfinished clubhouses beyond right-center field and lined up at 3:00 P.M., set to parade toward the infield, each also holding a small American flag. Ropes were drawn across the back part of the outfield, with any ball hit in there counting as a double. The box-seat crowd paid a dollar each to sit on movable folding chairs; eight thousand others filled in the grandstand benches at fifty cents each. Smaller bleachers, along the outfield, held an additional twenty-five hundred at twenty-five cents each. All the seating was placed over concrete foundations.

  The opening lineup at the American League Grounds was the same as the road opener, except Courtney was at short instead of Long. Washington’s star was Big Ed Delahanty, who would die in a mysterious fall off the team train crossing near Niagara Falls two months later.

  For a home uniform, the Highlanders reversed things. A white wool uniform went with blue socks, a blue belt, and a blue collar. Again there were buttons halfway down the chest, with a blue N on the right and a blue Y on the left. The cap was white with a blue visor and blue stripes originating from the top center. Although the weather was perfect for late April, the Highlanders wore maroon coats over their uniforms for the parade across the outfield at the start of the game.

  The gates opened at 1:00 for the 3:30 game, with live music provided by the 69th Regiment Band under the direction of Bandmaster Bayne, who led the crowd in singing “The Washington Post March,” “Columbia the Gem of the Ocean” (the most popular patriotic tune of the time), “Yankee Doodle,” and “The Star-Spangled Banner.” The crowd stood, cheered, and waved their flags. (Farrell wanted game times at 4:00 to accommodate the Wall Street workers; 3:30 was a compromise to the deadline needs of newspapers.)

  (In an oversight, rainchecks were not part of the ticket, and one day early in the season, the consequence of that was felt when fans at the hilltop were invited back—on their honor—after a game was called. Needless to say, thousands more showed up when word of free baseball spread, breaking down a fence and overrunning the field.)

  Joe Gordon was the prominent New York club official involved in the ceremonies. Farrell and Devery were present but did not take part.

  While the facility was reported as being only “half-complete,” the New York Times reported that “the diamond has been sodded and rolled until it looks as level as a newly covered billiard table, but the outfield is in a rough and rugged condition.” The Evening Journal used NEW PARK A MARVEL as a subhead.

  “There is a good deal of filling in to be done in right field and ground rules will be arranged in regard to the value of hits made in that direction,” reported the Times.

  Only six games have been scheduled for this and the following playing days, and then the teams will go over the circuit. It is hoped that by the time the players return from the Western trip everything, to the merest detail, will be completed and that the new club and its team will have a successful season in every respect.

  While the big gathering was not overdemonstrative, the absence of fault finding was in itself an assurance to the management that the patrons fully appreciated the difficulties which beset the new club, and due credit was given to the almost herculean efforts of the officials who had accomplished so much in such a brief time.

  The sod had not yet turned fully green in the outfield, but the infield was beautiful. Phil Schenck was lauded for his efforts.

  The hastily assembled park had the biggest seating capacity in the league and remained the biggest until Sportsman’s Park in St. Louis expanded to 17,000 in 1906. Boston’s Huntington Avenue Grounds rose from 9,000 to 12,500 in the decade; Chicago’s South Side Park seated 14,000; Cleveland’s League Park held 11,200; Detroit’s Bennett Park went from 8,500 to 10,500; Philadelphia’s Columbia Park went from 10,000 to 13,600; and Washington’s two American League parks held steady at 7,000. The Polo Grounds, just down Broadway, also had a seating capacity of 16,000 for its Giants.

  AS FOR THE first home game, Ban Johnson threw out the ceremonial first pitch to the umpire Tom Connolly, and the band struck up “The Star-Spangled Banner” just as Washington’s first batter was stepping in to hit. Then it was a 6–2 New York victory, played in ninety minutes. The Highlanders scored single runs in the first and second innings and added two in the fifth and two in the seventh. Keeler, who walked, was the first baserunner. Fultz had the team’s first home-field hit and scored its first run. Ganzel had the first RBI (not really a statistic that was yet maintained). The biggest cheers were reserved for Keeler. Chesbro went the distance for the seven-hit victory, holding Delahanty 0 for 5 as New York looked just like what Ban Johnson wanted them to be: world beaters. Everyone went home happy. American League baseball had officially landed on Manhattan Island.

  Chapter Three

  TO THE DISAPPOINTMENT OF Ban Johnson, the Americans weren’t more than ordinary in 1903. Griffith tried many lineups and relied heavily on Chesbro and Tannehill, but each step forward seemed followed by a step back. He himself got
in trouble early, arguing too vehemently with umpire Tom Connolly in just the team’s fourteenth game and finding himself suspended by Johnson for ten days. Keeler took charge.

  Ballpark improvements continued, but fans weren’t flocking to the Hilltop, as word spread that it was “unfinished” and “hard to reach.” The opening-day glitter quickly wore off.

  As for the play on the field, some questioned Griffith’s leadership. The sage eighty-year-old baseball historian Henry Chadwick wrote, “The failure to secure services of a team manager of [Ned] Hanlon-like experience and ability was at the root of their failings.” (Hanlon was the highly regarded Brooklyn manager.)

  Chadwick’s dismissal of Griffith’s work could not be taken lightly. No figure in baseball was as respected as the aging Chadwick, despite his being “just” a journalist. “Father” Chadwick was the man whose writings in the annual Baseball Guide and in an assortment of newspapers was always taken seriously. He is today the only journalist in the Baseball Hall of Fame.

  With Chadwick as the leader and Joe Vila as an early catalyst in the formation of the Yankees, the relationship between the team and the press was established early. From the humble beginnings to the entry of radio, then television, and then the Internet, it has been a marriage of necessity, with the requisite highs and lows of any marriage. Newspapers knew that coverage of the team would attract more circulation, thus enabling them to sell advertising at a higher rate. Teams knew that the coverage was free promotion for their product, and that they were in a much better position than other forms of entertainment such as Broadway or the cinema, where the show would get a review and then be forced to rely on paid advertising. Baseball, however, received daily free coverage, with each story helping to sell the product by reinforcing its importance and making the players celebrities.

  Over the decades, there would be times when the team hated its coverage, and there would be times when the newspapers would want to ignore the team. But in the end they needed each other. It was just good business.

  And so the teams regularly paid for the journalists to travel with them, covering most of their expenses. Not until the late fifties did the growing Long Island newspaper Newsday, under sports editor Jack Mann and reporter Stan Isaacs, decide that the free perks could be seen as compromising its role and tell the Yankees it would assume all the costs on its own. Other papers followed, with the New York Times forbidding its writers to serve as official scorers or to vote for awards or the Hall of Fame, let alone accept travel or Christmas gifts from the teams.

  The ’03 Highlanders were 17–23 after a win on June 9 when Ban Johnson helped to implement the first trade in franchise history. New York sent Courtney and Long to Detroit for Norm “the Tabasco Kid” Elberfeld.

  Kid Elberfeld, twenty-eight, the youngest of ten surviving children born to German immigrant parents in Pomeroy, Ohio, was a light-hitting shortstop of whom much was expected on defense.

  Tabasco sauce, made from spicy tabasco peppers, had been on American tables since 1868, and it provided a fitting nickname for this pepperpot of a figure, a five-foot-seven, 158-pounder who could spice things up.

  He was an immediate favorite with fans of the era who liked their athletes rowdy. He was the anti-Keeler, the bad boy that young fans were not supposed to emulate (which of course they did). At the same time, he would be high maintenance for the team and the league: He was known to pick fights, go after opponents with baseball bats, stomp on umpires’ toes, curse loudly, deliberately get hit with pitches and then charge the mound, earn suspension after suspension, and suffer through periods of indifference or questionable injuries.

  While he was not what Johnson felt was an American League player, Johnson knew the Kid would spark fan interest, and indeed Elberfeld was much influenced by McGraw himself, for whom he hoped to play in 1903. However, letting him go from Detroit to the Giants would have been seen as upending the peace agreement between the leagues, so he was forced to remain with Detroit until an intraleague trade beckoned. There he played for manager Ed Barrow, the Yankees’ future general manager. Barrow had just suspended the Kid a week before the trade for “loaferish conduct.” Rejuvenated by the move to New York, Elberfeld gave the team a quick lift and they won five of their first six games with him. In early July they won seven straight, went over .500, and began to play decent baseball, even while failing to move up in the standings.

  But the lineup would ultimately fail as often as not. Getting “Chicagoed” (shut out) ten times, they never really contended. The best they could say was that as a new team, finishing in the first division (fourth place, out of eight teams, ten games over .500) was an accomplishment. One newspaper reporter suggested that the failures of the season might be owed to the “unfit physical condition of some players.”

  Keeler’s .313 led the team but was well below his National League performances, while Chesbro (21–15), Tannehill (15–15), and Griffith (14–11) were too often just ordinary. Tannehill would be dispatched to Boston after the season and would win 43 games over the next two seasons there.

  In the end, Elberfeld was a bright spot, hitting .287, exceeding expectations at the plate.

  The Highlanders drew 211,808, seventh among the eight teams in the league, a disappointment after the big opening day. It meant they averaged just about 3,400 per game. (They played nine doubleheaders.) The euphoria of opening day faded.

  The Giants, meanwhile, with 61 victories from Christy Mathewson and Joe McGinnity combined, led all of baseball with 579,530, and one could say successfully headed off the American League’s threat to their territory.

  The Highlanders were just not a very exciting ballclub. And with only one exception, almost all of their next seventeen seasons would feel like 1903—some better than others, some disasters, but just not very exciting. Certainly it would be the case throughout the Farrell-Devery years, and of course through the years at Hilltop Park.

  The one exception was 1904.

  IN 1904, THE Highlanders made their home caps all white and put horizontal stripes on their socks. Like their annual spring training sites that were ever shifting (Atlanta in 1903–04, Montgomery in ’05, Birmingham in ’06, Atlanta in 1907–08, Macon in ’09, Athens in 1910–11, Atlanta in ’12, Bermuda in ’13, Houston in ’14, Savannah in ’15, Macon in 1916–18, Jacksonville in 1919–20, Shreveport in ’21, New Orleans in 1922–24), so too were tweaks to the uniform an annual event.

  In 1905 they had an awkward interlocking “NY” on both home whites and road grays. In ’06 they were back to their original look. In ’07, gray replaced navy as the road color. In ’08, a navy cap appeared for the first time. In ’09, the now familiar interlocking NY debuted on the sleeve. In 1910, the NY appeared for the first time on caps—red on navy at home, blue on gray for the road. In 1911 the words “New York” first appeared on road jerseys. In 1912, a pinstriped home uniform looking much like today’s debuted, accompanied by a pinstriped cap with a blue brim. But the pinstripes were replaced in 1913–14 by a solid white with the interlocking NY over the heart, and for the first time, the “New York” road grays were worn all season. In 1915, the pinstripes returned for good, but by 1917 the NY on the chest had vanished, not to reappear until 1936. (Babe Ruth never wore it.) The navy caps with the NY were used for a time only on the road, and full-time starting in 1922.

  The interlocking NY was designed by Tiffany and Company for the New York Police Department in 1877: It was used in a medal for a fallen police officer, John McDowell. Police symbolism was appropriate to Bill Devery’s legacy. There was a long-standing admiration between the New York police and fire departments and the Yankees, no better demonstrated than when George Steinbrenner created the Silver Shield charity to look after the families of fallen police and firemen.

  1904, THE FIRST year of a 154-game schedule, would produce the franchise’s first pennant race and the first great New York–Boston rivalry. Had New York won the pennant in ’04, it would have been an enormous triumph for
Johnson and by extension Griffith, accomplishing so much so quickly.

  But they didn’t win, so it didn’t become a year of great Yankee history, distantly connected to all the other championship teams. But it was the best of all the pre–Babe Ruth teams.

  Rumors that Griffith might be replaced by the Cubs’ Frank Selee were put to rest when Selee signed a new contract with Chicago in July. With that tension removed, New York and Boston battled back and forth, New York never going ahead by more than two games or falling behind by more than a game and a half.

  Al Orth, thirty-one years old and the man who beat New York in their first-ever game, came over from Washington to pretty much replace Griffith as a starting pitcher, going 11–6 while Griffith limited himself to just 16 starts. The spitball was Orth’s signature pitch, and some credited him with being one of its originators. He certainly helped to popularize it, along with Chesbro.

  An interesting pickup that season was forty-year-old Deacon McGuire, purchased from Detroit. He was the oldest player in the league, having debuted in 1884. The onetime Brooklyn star caught 97 games for New York, with Red Kleinow handling 62, including most of the final month.

  On June 17, Boston traded popular outfielder Patsy Dougherty to New York to play left field. The trade raised eyebrows: New York had surrendered only a utility infielder named Bob Unglaub. Was this the hand of Ban Johnson working to strengthen New York again? Dougherty, who had been feuding with Boston management, was the league’s leading run scorer, a statistic rated only below batting average by fans and players. Unglaub played only nine games for Boston. (He would briefly manage the club in 1907 and then was replaced by Deacon McGuire, whom by then New York had released.)