PART ONE

While looking for stories about relatives on the pages of old newspapers – via www.fultonhistory.com – I came across one that told how a relative, Mickey Major of Auburn, NY, was arrested in 1913. His crime? Playing baseball on a Sunday. My interest was piqued; I had to know more about this incident. Little did I know how complicated and fascinating this story would become.

"Sabbath breaking" was the popular term for the charge leveled against those who violated the Sunday laws (or blue laws). Such laws had been in effect throughout the country for decades, probably since before the United States was founded, but by the 20th century these laws were becoming about as unpopular as Prohibition would be during the 1920s. Very often these laws were ignored, particularly when it came to baseball, which was, without doubt, our national pastime. That is, the laws were generally ignored when it came to amateur games. In the 1800s there were no major league baseball games on Sundays.

In 1902, three cities pioneered the movement to legalize Sunday baseball – Chicago, Cincinnati and St. Louis. The five major league teams involved – the Cubs, White Sox, Reds, Browns and Cardinals – did so to make money. Sunday was the best day to draw a crowd because your typical baseball fan worked the other six days of the week. Baseball was a great cure for what ailed them – and what ailed them was being cooped up at a low-paying, uncomfortable, often dangerous job for more than 50 hours every week. They had a rooting interest in their home team, and, besides, baseball was played in the great outdoors. A game was a great place to forget your troubles.

And for those whose favorite recreation was playing baseball, Sunday afforded the best opportunity, sometimes the only opportunity. There was, of course, no such thing as night baseball in those days. So your playing time was a lot more limited than it is today.

With kids, it was a slightly different matter. Most of them could play any day of the week. But baseball wasn't just a kids' game. This fact was not appreciated nor fully understood by those who tried to prevent it from being played on Sundays.

COMPLICATING matters was the growth of cities where life was far different than it was in rural America. In some ways, the gap between city and country residents was as wide as was the gap between the North and the South at the time of the Civil War. What happened in 1913 in Auburn, NY, a small city, to be sure, happened in part because of resentments that people in a nearby rural area held against city folks.

The effort that summer to enforce the law against Sunday baseball eventualy concentrated on one park. It was located in the town of Fleming, just outside of Auburn, to the south. This field must have been the area's best baseball facility, though I haven't found any such mention in the articles I've read.

I base that opinon on the fact that for several weeks after the arrests Auburn's two best-known teams were determined to play Sunday games on this field. Eventually they moved their games to a park within city limits where police and civic officials tended to overlook the blue laws. These two teams were semi-professional, which made them prime targets. It was one thing to have fun on Sundays, quite another to charge admission to those who wanted to watch.

That was a big reason reglious groups opposed Sunday baseball for major league teams. These teams were up front in admitting their motive was profit. That was unacceptable because people weren't supposed to work on the Sabbath, much less get rich.

That Sunday baseball flourished in the three cities that had legalized it was an outrage to some folks who viewed the sport's popularity on the Lord's Day as an indication of moral decay. They figured they could attack this decay by eliminating the temptation that caused it.

OTHERS VIEWED Sunday attendance in those three major league cities as proof of great public support for Sunday baseball. Many lobbied for changes in the Sunday laws elsewhere, but most politicians preferred to duck the issue. In 1914 a bill would be introduced in the New York State legislature to allow communities to decide for themselves whether to allow Sunday baseball. There was much public support for the bill, which led to expectations that led to frustration on the part of baseball supporters when that bill went into limbo.

In 1917, manager John McGraw and his Giants baseball team took matters into their own hands and defied New York law by attempting to play a Sunday game at home against the Cincinnati Reds, managed by former Giant pitching star Christy Mathewson. The effort failed when police arrived and arrested both McGraw and Mathewson. Such arrests almost always resulted in a painless slap on the wrist – few people were ever thrown in jail for playing baseball – but they were enough of a threat to keep the Giants honest for the rest of that season and all of the next.

As for Mickey Major, he was a sports hero to my father and other members of my family. When he and his teammates and their opponents were arrested, they were a test case. Baseball had long been played on Sundays in the Auburn area without interference from police. But in 1913 a church group set out to have the Sunday laws enforced, making those baseball players tools in what was a losing (and often amusing) crusade.

Cayuga County's Bible School Union achieved early success, annoyed a lot of people, and eventually lost their battle. Since several of its members were associated with the Prohibition Party, the group probably claimed a larger victory six years later when the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was passed. On the other hand, that was the same year the New York State legislature finally approved the Sunday Baseball Local Option which was signed into law by Gov. Al Smith. When the 1920 season began there was Sunday baseball in every major league city except Pittsburgh and (not surprisingly) Philadelphia and Boston.

Like attempts to prevent Americans from having fun on Sundays, efforts to stop them from drinking alcoholic beverages would boomerang in ways Prohibitionists did not anticipate. Many scholars feel that in the long run Prohibition may have been the best thing to happen to the liquor, wine and beer industries. Any parent will tell you one of the surest ways to prompt your child into doing something is to forbid that child from even thinking about it.

BUT I DIGRESS. My initial interest was in what happened to Mickey Major and his teammates. Turns out that during Auburn's baseball war of 1913 they were the only casualties, though all they suffered was a temporary inconvenience. The story became much bigger – and sillier – than I had imagined, and Mickey Major played a smaller role than several of the others who were arrested at that game.

The story is told over several pages.

The first sign of trouble came on May 11, 1913 when Arthur O'Connor, manager of a team called All-Auburn, was arrested for playing baseball on a Sunday. O'Connor, who seems to have been a cunning, intelligent man, was certain baseball would prevail, so he and his team took the field again the following Sunday in defiance of a law that hadn't been enforced in the Auburn area in a long time. Because their manager had been the only person arrested on May 11, his players may have felt they weren't at risk even if the local sheriff showed up again.

I found four accounts of what happened on May 18. These stories were published in Auburn and Syracuse newspapers whose readerships were keenly aware a baseball battle was brewing. However, none of the four newspapers considered the sport worthy of the front page. I also have a feeling that, as I would notice during my many years in journalism, news reporters and sports reporters lived in different worlds. I sensed some of the stories were written by people unfamiliar with the players involved, so unfamiliar that there was some confusion over who was playing that day and who was merely a spectator.

I have put together a composite story of the May 18 incident because in each account there was information lacking in the other three. My own bias in this matter should be apparent, and will become moreso as the story unfolds.

BACKGROUND: The teams involved were made up of young adults – Mickey Major, at 34, was at least ten years older than most of the others on the field that day. Perhaps the best known of the players was another man must have been in his 30s, Harry "Zip" Northrup, who had played at least briefly years before with the Cuban Giants, a black team famous in the history of Negro baseball. As far as I know, Northrup was the only African-American on the field that day. His race was never mentioned in the stories about the arrests and the long legal battle that followed.

Some of the others on the field that day also were considered area sports celebrities, including "Laughing Larry" Barry, perhaps Central New York's best pitcher; Lester "Lutz" Worfel, a young pitching prospect who had previously turned down offers by professional teams; Thomas "Tad" Gaughan, a versatile athlete who had a very strong following in Syracuse and Watertown where he had played and managed, and John Haddock, about whom a book could be written.

In 1913 they played for two Auburn-based teams that were members of a semi-professional league that included teams from five New York cities. The league had announced several weeks earlier that all games would be played on Sundays and holidays. This decision was made because managers of teams in Buffalo and Rochester said their players were not available on Saturdays, perhaps because many of them worked that day. Even if players worked half-days on Saturday, it would be difficult in 1913 for a team from Buffalo to travel to Auburn or Syracuse in time for an afternoon game.

Here are headlines that appeared over three of the four stories I used to explain what happened on May 18. (I have not passed along the headline from the Auburn Semi-Weekly Journal because only the person who wrote it could explain what the heck it was supposed to mean.) I believe these headlines say something about the papers that published them. The Auburn newspaper seems to side with the players; the Syracuse newspapers treated the churchmen as the victims. The story behind the headlines seems like something from an old movie.
Auburn Citizen, Monday May 19, 1913
GAME WAS STOPPED

And Players Were Arrested
for Sunday Ball Playing.

CROWD GOT AFTER SPECTATOR

Who Was Also One of the Men
Who Are Determined to
Stop the Sport
 
Syracuse Journal, Monday, May 19, 1913
SYRACUSAN SAVES
CHURCHMAN FROM
CLUTCHES OF MOB

Larry Barry Rushes to Aid of
Austin Devoe When
Attacked With Club

GAME ENDS WITH RIOT

Angry Fans Pummel Law
Enforcement Committee
When Game Stops.
 
Syracuse Post-Standard, Tuesday, May 20, 1913
3 CHURCHMEN INJURED
WHEN OFFICER ARRESTS
AUBURN BALL PLAYERS

Rev. Victor F. Britten, Dr. C. H. Bresee
and Austin Devoe Roughly Handled by
Crowd at Sunday Contest – Eighteen
Warrants Issued.
 
On a typical late spring Sunday afternoon in Auburn, NY, in 1913, you could expect to find baseball games being played on fields throughout the area. And if you happened to pass a golf course, you’d see people playing a round. I mention golf because it eventually enters this story, as does cricket, believe it or not.

What happened during one particular baseball game did not come as a complete surprise. The estimated size of the crowd – 1,000 spectators – was typical for a game between these two Auburn-based teams, All-Auburn and Norwood.

The teams were members of the New York State Amateur Baseball League which had scheduled a full summer of Sunday games. Almost all of those games would be played without incident.

On May 18 All-Auburn and Norwood were in the midst of a five-game pre-season series. This was to be game number four, the first three contests having been close and exciting, two them going extra innings.

Coincidentally, the season schedule was published in the Auburn Citizen on May 19, next to the story about the game in question. This was like waving a red flag in the faces of the anti-baseball crusaders.

Among the crusaders was the Law Enforcement Committee of a group known as the Bible School Union (aka Sunday School Union). The committee (or a sub-committee of that committee) attended the game and remained there for one inning, presumably to verify that a game indeed was being played. Committee members were well known in the community. They included two ministers mentioned in the Post-Standard headline, Victor F. Britten and C. H. Bresee. Apparently they weren't required to get the names of the men who were playing that game, which is interesting in view of what other interested citizens would be told by the judge who issued John Doe warrants against the baseball players.

THE GAME was played at Norwood Park, located south of Auburn, just outside the city limits, next to St. Joseph Cemetery, in the town of Fleming. However, when the members of the Law Enforcement Committee left the game, they did not visit the Fleming town judge. They went instead to the home of a judge in the town of Owasco, located east of Auburn. This judge, Isaac E. Pearson, was actually closer to Norwood Park than was the Fleming judge. Pearson issued the warrants against the unnamed players, but advised the committee he had no jurisdiction in the case. Once arrested, the players were to be taken to the home of the town of Fleming justice of the peace, Frederick H. DeGroff.

The Sunday game was a one-sided affair. When the home team, Norwood, came to bat in the bottom of the sixth inning, they trailed, 8-0. All-Auburn pitcher Larry Barry, who had gone nine innings the day before, certainly wasn't tired. In fact, he was working on a no-hitter. He had given up no walks, but did not have a perfect game going because his teammates had committed three errors.

Norwood outfielder Joseph Conroy was at bat when Constable Fred Buchanan and the Bible School Union committee arrived. Here the constable appears to have made a huge blunder. He allowed one of the committee members, Austin Devoe, to accompany him to the pitcher’s mound, where Buchanan proclaimed the game was over. The crowd, knowing what was about to happen, started gathering along the sidelines.

All-Auburn manager Arthur O’Connor, who had been arrested at a game the previous Sunday, attempted to calm both his players and the spectators. According to the Syracuse Journal account, O’Connor said, “We had better stop the game, boys, for the constable is right. Don’t make any trouble, boys, just be quiet and go back to your seats and we will fix this matter all right.”

O'Connor asked the constable to remove Devoe from the field, but Devoe refused, and insisted Buchanan start making arrests.

THE CROWD, which had started to retreat, reversed itself upon hearing a self-serving announcement by Devoe, who had been nominated as the first Prohibition Party candidate for mayor of Auburn in the fall election. Devoe, standing next to the constable, shouted, “Here is one who stands for law and order!”

For many in the crowd it was bad enough that the game was being stopped. They were in no mood for a political speech from one of the men responsible.

All hell broke loose. About 200 spectators went after Devoe and other members of the Law Enforcement Committee. A ticket booth was torn down as some in what was now an angry mob grabbed pieces of lumber to use as weapons.

The Auburn Semi-Weekly Journal said, "The largest mob of enraged fans ever seen on a baseball field around Auburn was that which surrounded the committee of the Law Enforcement Committee of the Sunday School league at Norwood Park yesterday afternoon ."

The Syracuse Journal said none of the churchmen was seriously injured, though their clothing was torn and they were beaten with sticks and umbrellas. All three newspapers said Devoe was the favorite target, his hat being flattened in the initial charge. The man himself might have been severely hurt if it weren’t for Barry, the pitcher whose no-hit attempt had been interrupted. Barry took charge and summoned several cooler heads who set up a protective barrier around Devoe.

BUT DEVOE wasn’t out of danger. When he ran for his carriage, which apparently was parked on the field, some in the crowd went after him. According to the Auburn Citizen, “After seating himself in his carriage they formed around his wagon, jeering him, holding the wheels, throwing sticks and other misisles and eventually forced him to drive around the field before he was allowed to drive out the gate into the roadway. A still greater crowd collected when Mr. DeVoe stopped to wait for a friend and several attempts were made to turn over his light wagon. However, a few of the more sensible ones appealed successfully to the crowd and urged Mr. DeVoe to drive away, which he finally did."

The players were granted permission to change their clothes before they were taken to the home of the town of Fleming judge, Frederick DeGroff, who lived a few miles away. Most of the players made the ride on an old hayrack. The rest were driven by managers Arthur O’Connor and Harry Gunnell, who rounded up some fans to act as bondsmen, if needed.

The flavor of rural life in 1913 is nicely captured in this passage from the story in the Auburn Semi-Weekly Journal:

"It was some little time before the players were ready for the trip to the home of Justice of the Peace DeGroff, but the party was finally started at 5:30 o’clock. Some of the players, with Manager O’Connor, went on ahead in a big automobile, while the rest of the team was obliged to ride over the hills in the Owasco patrol. The team of horses drawing the improvised police wagon appeared to be in a tired condition and a prominent Auburn lawyer standing near suggested that the owner be prosecuted for cruelty to animals.

"The ride to the home of the Justice in the wagon was long and weary. The speed laws are stringent in the town of Fleming. The patrol driver talked with the horses kindly in an effort to make the journey before nightfall, but the team would not listen and persisted in walking. At 7 o’clock the players arrived at the home of the Justice."

Court was convened in the parlor.

APPARENTLY conflicts of interest were allowed. The inexperienced Justice DeGroff had as his chief advisor Charles S. Post, a former justice of the peace, but also one of the complainants in the proceedings. DeGroff said up front, “If there is any law preventing it, there will be no Sunday ball playing in the town of Fleming.”

According to the Auburn Citizen:

“After considerable parley, the names of the 18 players in the game were taken down and a trial by jury for each individual was demanded, after Manager O’Connor, acting as spokesman, had pleaded ‘not guilty’ for them.

“They were charged with violation of Sections No. 2141 and 2145 of the Penal Law, which deals with Sabbath breaking and playing baseball on Sunday. Attorney Anderson raised the question of the jurisdiction of the court and reserved the right to ask for a change of venue from Fleming to Auburn. The attorney declared that Justice DeGroff was hasty in expressing an opinion against Sunday ball playing.

“After an hour’s session, the players were released on their own recognizance until Thursday, at 2 o’clock, at which time they will be formally arraigned and released under bonds. A general bond of $200 for each team, the manager responsible for their appearance when wanted, will probably be made out on Thursday."

ATTORNEY Richard T. Anderson, already representing O’Connor, was on hand to speak on behalf of the players.

Attorney Henry D. Parsell represented the Bible School Union. The Syracuse Journal account included this intriguing tidbit: It was Parsell “who wrote the letter to Governor Sulzer protesting against the Knights of Columbus Bazaar.” That bazaar was a big event in Auburn, but so far I have found no other mention of Parsall’s protest, so I’m unsure whether the man was anti-Catholic or objected to the bazaar on grounds that it may have featured games of chance. Catholicism would play a role in the eventual resolution to the problem of Sunday baseball in New York

Players arrested were:

From the All-Auburn team: Lawrence “Larry” Barry, pitcher; John Budka, right fielder; John Donovan, center fielder; Thomas "Tad" Gaughan, catcher; John Haddock, first baseman; Jones, second baseman; Michael “Mickey” Major, left fielder; Thomas McCollum, shortstop; Barney Smith, third baseman;

From the Norwood team: Arthur Adams, third base; Jack Bannon, catcher; Clarence Bradford, second baseman; Joseph Conroy, left fielder; Coyne, center fielder; George Dreythaler, right fiedler; Harry "Zip" Northrup, first baseman; Sidney Potter, shortstop; Lester "Lutz" Worfel, pitcher.

Also arrested for riot were John Corkery, John Erhart, John Smith and John White, apparently spectators, though Corkery was the only one who would be identified as such in future stories.

[Some of the above names may be incorrect because newspaper accounts did not always agree on the spelling or, in some cases, the player's first name. Nowhere did I find complete list of the players arrested or later indicted. I put together the list from a published box score and several stories about the cases which would continue into the fall, producing retaliatory cases that were heard in 1914.]

ANOTHER GAME was scheduled for the following Sunday, but despite statements from the managers that they intended to go ahead and play, that contest and every other baseball game in Auburn was either postponed or stopped by police. At least, that's what sheriffs claimed. I found a story about one game that was played that Sunday in Auburn.

The Cayuga County sheriff's department, after patrolling the city of Auburn that Sunday, was not pleased. Sheriffs felt anything within city limits should be handled by the Auburn police department. The Bible School Union preferred working with the sheriffs, saying they didn't receive cooperation from city officials, some of whom were openly in favor of Sunday baseball.

And by June, Sunday baseball pretty much returned to city parks. Not so the town of Fleming where Norwood Park became the primary (perhaps only) target of the Bible School Union crusade. As they would until the bitter end, these church people claimed they were simply attempting to enforce the law, but from my reading of what happened, I think their battle became increasingly personal, directed more at the players of two teams than at the law they may have broken, though what riled the Bible School Union more than anything was one of the lawyers who had come to the defense of the players – and would become the chief spokesman in favor of Sunday baseball.
 
The saga continues . . .
 
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