DEATH OF A BALL CLUB
Newark, Once Greatest, Killed By Progress
"Some day somebody should write the story of the life and death of the Newark Ball Club. It would be, I think, a fascinating story. Many a ball player on his way to greatness played in Newark. Many a ball player on his retreat from greatness ... or a close approach to it ... played there. It would go back a long way, this story. But, I think, it would hit its peak in 1937, because that year Newark had the most remarkable minor league club ever put together.
There were others that were reasonably close to it, of course. Grant Rice tells of the Augusta club of 1904, which numbered among its pitchers Nap Rucker and Ed Ciccote and, in right field, had a kid by the name of Ty Cobb. Some years later Jackie Atz had a club in Fort Worth that dominated the Texas League for a period of six or seven years. Soon after that, Joe McCarthy's Louisville club ruled the American Association. But I don't believe there ever was a minor league club quite on the level with the Bears of 1937.
Oscar Vitt was the manager that year. The complete roster isn't at hand but the players I recall so very easily. Joe Gordon was at second base, George McQuinn was at first, Babe Dahlgren at third (they couldn't find room for him at first base because McQuinn was already there), [Nolen Richardson at shortstop], Spud Chandler and Atley Donald helped with the pitching [along with Joe Beggs, Steve Sundra and Vito Tamulis], Buddy Rosar was back of the plate [along with Willard Hershberger] and, among the outfielders, was Charlie Keller [along with Bob Seeds and Jim Gleeson]. The Bears won the pennant by, roughly, twenty-five games, and went on to win the Little World Series. It wasn't long before most of them were hearing the roar of the crowds at Yankee Stadium.
One day out of that summer, I'll always remember. It was an off day for the Bears and Vitt had journeyed over to the Stadium to visit McCarthy. Gordon had been tagged for delivery to the Yankees in 1938 and Oscar said:
'He's ready, Joe. You know, I've been around quite a while and I've played with or against some of the greatest second basemen that ever lived. This kid may be the greatest.'
Well, Gordon wasn't quite that. But he wasn't too bad, you may recall. In his first year at the Stadium, he hit only .255. But he made twenty-five home runs, twenty-four doubles and seven triples and he was an acrobat at second base and he played a great part in the winning of five pennants by the Yankees over a span of six years. Chandler ... Donald ... Dahlgen ... McQuinn (although it took George a long time to get there) ... Rosar ... and Keller ... all helped to make history at the Stadium.
It seems to me that no other minor league group ever had such an effect on the fortunes of a major league team in the years that followed.
This phase of the Newark club began in 1932, when the Yankees first sent prominent players to it. And back of that was the story of an amazing deal that was put over in a hurry on the late Col. Jacob Ruppert, in 1931.
Jake was an astute business man and, as a rule, carefully weighed every proposition made to him and gave his answer only after long deliberation. But one day in 1931, after he and Ed Barrow, then the general manager of the Yankees, had decided they wanted no part of the new fangled farm idea developed by Branch Rickey in St. Louis, Ruppert bought the Newark club. The club was owned by Paul Block, newspaper publisher. Ruppert bought it after listening to a fast sales talk from Max Steuer, famous attorney of the time, who had among his many clients, Ruppert and Block. Ruppert, having agreed to buy the club, called Barrow and told him.
Barrow, having got over his amazement, told Ruppert the only thing he could do was to use the club as the basis for a farm system and that he had better hire a fellow named George Weiss, of whom Ruppert had never had heard, to direct the system.
Weiss, an experienced hand around the minor leagues, knew what to do with the players dug up by Barrow's staff of scouts, headed by Paul Krichell. Knew where to put them ... and where to get the seasoned minor leaguers to fit in with them. With Newark as his key point, Weiss built one of the most productive farm systems the game has known up to now. As a by-product of that system, Newark had its greatest ball club.
That was the beginning. The end set in when the Yankees, by that time under the joint ownership of Del Webb, Dan Topping and Larry McPhail, inaugurated night baseball at the Stadium and opened a Yankee ticket office in Newark.
The Newark club, in other words, was caught in the march of progress, which was stepped up when the Yankees began to televise their games. This is no knock on night baseball, a handy ticket office or television. But if you lived in Newark ... and maybe some of you reading this do live in Newark ... why should you go to see the Bears when you are close to Yankee Stadium, and can buy your reserved seat tickets just down the street or, if you do not want to make the journey to New York, can see the Yanks on television?
And so the Newark club died."
-Frank Graham, condensed from the New York Journal-American (Baseball Digest, February 1950)
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