Joyce Sports Research Collection Manuscripts

A collection of materials on the All-American Girls Baseball League, a women's professional league active in the Midwest from 1943 to 1954. The greater part of the collection consists of records preserved by Dr. Harold T. Dailey (1894–1971), a South Bend, Indiana oral surgeon who served the league's South Bend Blue Sox franchise in various executive capacities. Much of the Dailey material is included in a set of ten loose-leaf notebooks totaling over 1,100 leaves. The notebooks were apparently intended as a documentary history of the league, and perhaps as source material for a narrative history that Dailey never wrote.

Included are minutes of the meetings of the AAGBBL Board of Directors, financial information, and player information and statistics, as well as correspondence, newspaper clippings, printed ephemera, and photographs. Notebooks are arranged chronologically and cover the full span of the league's history—with an emphasis on the South Bend franchise.

The AAGBBL Collection also incorporates other components, including papers of league manager D. C. "Chet" Grant; several groups of player questionnaires; and league-related printed matter. MSSP 0014

1 vol., 37 cm., 250 leaves, with 200 pages of manuscript entries in various hands; 14 additional manuscripts; 1 clipping: A collection of records, mostly financial, of the Birmingham (Alabama) Black Barons, 1923 to 1930. During this period the Barons were an elite African American team, affiliated with the Negro Southern League (1920–23, 1926) or the Negro National League (1924–25, 1927–30).

The most significant item in the collection is a bound cash book, showing the club's financial accounts with each of its players for the seasons 1926 through 1930. Individual player accounts for a given season typically occupy two facing pages; each credit (usually in the form of salary) and debit (cash advances, equipment charges, fines, etc.) is indicated. Among the notable players in the ledger is Leroy "Satchel" Paige. A few non-player accounts are also noted.

In addition to the ledger, the collection includes a few team-related letters, receipts, and other records. MSSP 0001

The Negro Leagues Pennant Collection consists of more than ten felt pennants for African American baseball teams that played in the organized Negro Leagues during the 1930s and 1940s. The teams represented in the collection include the Homestead Grays, the New York Black Yankees, the New York Cuban Stars, the Baltimore Elite Giants, the Newark Eagles, and the Philadelphia Stars. The pennants contain no information about their origin or date of creation. Several of the pennants share the same design and graphics suggesting a common manufacturer. MSSP 10079

This small collection consists of legal documents and correspondence related to Curt Flood’s lawsuit, Flood v. Kuhn against Major League baseball’s reserve clause in the early 1970s. The legal documents include official court papers from the Appellate Court case in the Second Circuit of Appeals (1971) and the Supreme Court decision (1972) against Flood. The correspondence largely consists of letters to and from the law firms Arnold & Porter and Wilkie, Farr, & Gallagher, who represented Bowie Kuhn (the Commissioner of Baseball) the National League, and the American League. MSSP 10008

[.25 cubic feet] This collection consists primarily of 43 letters addressed to the West Philadelphia Base Ball Club (organized June 6, 1865) during the season of 1867 with a few letters from 1866. Many items are challenge letters or letters otherwise scheduling matches. There is also a 6-page letter from the Excelsior Base Ball Club of Milford, Delaware, inquiring about a player named Fisher, who pitched for the West Philadelphia Base Ball Club and another team during the 1867 season.

Most of the correspondents are from the Philadelphia area and include letters from the Olympic Base Ball Club, the Keystone Base Ball Club, and the Quaker City Base Ball Club. There are also letters from the Atlantics of Brooklyn and the New York Mutuals. In addition to letters from other Base Ball Clubs, the collection includes a small number of other correspondence, including a letter from the Ladies of the Seamen’s Relief Association (Philadelphia) requesting support for a fundraiser. Included among the letters is also a draft of the West Philadelphia Base Ball Club's letter of application to the National Association of Base Ball Players, the game's first governing body. The corresponding secretary for the West Philadelphia club in 1867 was A. C. Hamer. Materials include letters and a telegram. MSSP 0002.

Financial records related to the Detroit Tigers American League professional baseball team.Two bound accounting ledgers document the business operation of the Detroit Base Ball and Amusement Company and its successor the Detroit Base Ball Company. Entries in the ledgers record income and expenses for a wide variety of transactions, including player salaries, spring training trips, world series games, routine business matters, and other subjects. Among the notable names in the ledgers are Ty Cobb, Sam Crawford, and manager Hughie Jennings. Formats include account books. MSSP 0016.

This collection consists of 16 broadsides and advertising fliers promoting baseball games of the amateur Richard K. Fox Baseball Team during the 1909 season. The Richard K. Fox Baseball Team represented Fair Haven in Monmouth County, New Jersey. In addition to information about games and schedules, most broadsides include a picture of a player or another image related to the team, as well as humorous text. The reverse of most prints contain additional humorous text, images, and/or advertisements. MSSP 10065

About 80 items: A small collection of personal items preserved by Hall of Fame second baseman Johnny Evers (1881–1947) and by his son, John J. Evers, Jr. Many of the items derive from the European tour undertaken by Charles Comiskey, John McGraw, and members of the Chicago White Sox and New York Giants in 1924. Evers participated as manager of the White Sox.

The collection includes a few manuscripts, 59 photographic prints, clippings, books, and realia, including five signed baseballs. MSSP 0015

One Jackie Robinson doll wearing a Brooklyn Dodgers uniform. The doll is a 13-inch tall, fully jointed composition doll, molded with painted hair and painted facial features. The doll is wearing a blue Brooklyn Dodgers hat with with a white “B” logo, a blue warm-up jacket that reads “Dodgers” in white script, a gray jersey that reads “Dodgers” in blue script on the front and the number “42” in blue on the back, gray pants, blue socks, and black shoes with laces.

Original accessories with the doll include a wooden bat, a hard plastic baseball, a cardboard hang tag in the shape of a glove that reads, “The Jackie Robinson Doll” with a photo of Jackie Robinson on the front and “MF’d by Allied Grand Doll Mfg. Co. Inc., Brooklyn 5, NY” on the back. MSSP 10083

The collection consists of materials on Major League Baseball's 1989 investigation into the gambling activities of Cincinnati Reds manager Pete Rose, which resulted in the placement of Rose on Baseball's permanently ineligible list.

These materials consist primarily of photocopied documents and news clippings assembled in 1989 by journalist Jim Newton of the Fort Hamilton (OH) Press . Included are copies of MLB investigator Thomas Dowd's report about Rose's activities, including the many attendant volumes of exhibits; transcripts of interviews conducted by Dowd; legal documents from Peter E. Rose v. A. Bartlett Giamatti, et al and United States v. Thomas P. Gioiosa; and copies of newspaper articles tracking the case from March to September, 1989. MSSP 0017.

The collection consists of material related to the International Women’s Professional Softball Association (IWPSA) during the league’s existence from 1976-1979. The collection contains printed material by and about the IWPSA and its member teams, including media guides, programs, yearbooks, and brochures. MSSP 10076

The collection contains material related to the Chicago-based National Girls Baseball League, a professional league that rivaled the All American Girls Professional Baseball League. The collection chiefly consists of copies of the official magazine/program of the National Girls Baseball League published under various titles from 1949 to 1953 by Publishers, Inc. (1949) and by Merrell Features (1950-1953). The programs typically contain pictures, biographies, articles, and statistics about the players and the teams in the league. The programs also include information about coaches and administrators, other information about the league, and advertisements. Particularly in 1949 and 1950, the league published several variants of many issues with different players on the cover but with substantially the same inside content. The publication was available on a subscription basis and for purchase at games. Formats include programs, magazines, and ephemera. MSSP 10071

36 letters and telegrams, some with enclosures; 6 newspaper clippings: Correspondence relating to the New York Yankees' efforts to encourage state legislation (primarily the 1918 Lawson Bill) to permit Sunday baseball in New York. Many of the letters are directed to Yankees president Jacob Ruppert, by politicians responding to the club's inquiries about their stance on the matter. There are also carbon copies of letters from the Yankees, and several items to and from Brooklyn Dodgers president Charles H. Ebbets. MSSP 0010.

This collection consists of more than 120 pieces of fan mail written to baseball player Joe “Shoeless Joe” Jackson in the years after his retirement. The correspondence was in the form of letters and postal cards and nearly all of the letters include the original mailing envelopes. Most of the letters are fan requests for autographs. Some of the autograph requests reference an article about Jackson that appeared in the October 1949 issue of Sport magazine, titled "This Is the Truth!". The article included Jackson’s home address prompting a large number of letters. Much of the correspondence was written by children and teenagers, and some of the autograph requests list other former baseball players the authors had collected autographs from. Only a few letters explicitly reference the Black Sox scandal that ended Jackson’s career in major league baseball.MSSP 0019.

Cast iron mechanical bank featuring stereotypical representations of three African American baseball players. The metal bank includes a pitcher, a batter, and a catcher all with moveable parts. The fully-functioning spring-loaded bank operates by placing a coin in a slot in the pitcher’s hand and rotating the pitcher’s arm backwards (which also bows the pitcher’s head) to set the arm. Pressing a lever behind the catcher, causes the pitcher to “throw” the coin, the batter to swing the bat, and the coin to be deposited in a revealed hole in the catcher’s chest. The coin drops to a compartment below the field. All three players wear garish brightly colored mismatched uniforms and their exaggerated facial features are typical of the stereotypical and offensive portrayals of African Americans in the late nineteenth century. MSSP 10098

An accumulation of around 400 different pieces of published sheet music relating to baseball. The relationship may reside in the music's title or lyrics, in the sheet's cover graphics, or in some other identification with the game. Examples bear copyright dates ranging from 1860 to 1992. Baseball themed sheet music was especially common in the half-decade before World War I. EPH 7502

Lawrence A. Bucynski Baseball Correspondence includes nine pieces of correspondence from the summer of 1949 between baseball player Lawrence Bucynski, George Trautman, the President of the National Association of Professional Baseball Clubs, and the Abbeville (Louisiana) Athletics of the minor Evangeline League. The letters discuss a salary dispute between Bucynski and the Abbeville baseball team. Formats include letters and telegrams. MSSP 10141

One game manufactured by Johnson Store Equipment Co. Baseball board game. Pieces missing. EPH 5056

Baseball board game with abacus-style scorekeeping system. Pieces missing. EPH 5054

1 vol., 36 x 40 cm., 280 leaves, with 20 pages of manuscript entries. The printed column headings in this oversized volume read: Date / Player / From Club / Agreement / Class / Cost / Exchange / Remarks. The book includes transaction details in manuscript on some 175 players whom the Athletics either contractually controlled or (presumably) tried out during the 1920, 1921, and 1922 seasons. MSSP 0021.

2 vols., 45 cm., 149 and 151 leaves, with a total of around 590 pages of manuscript entries; 34 additional manuscripts associated with the 1934-40 book: Two cash books detailing the finances of the Philadelphia National League baseball club (the Phillies) from March 1922 to July 1928, and from November 1934 to June 1940.

During these years, but especially in the 1930s under Gerald P. Nugent, the team was notable for its poor play, decrepit park, and financial insolvency. The two books are similar in format. Income and expenditures are itemized in daybook form. A typical in-season month—July 1937—contains nearly 100 lines of identified expenditures, some of which are further annotated. These include payroll (players' salaries are lumped together), travel costs, equipment, gate receipt payouts, fees, etc. On the revenue side, there is for in-season months a game-by-game breakdown of income, especially with regard to ticket pricing. The later book's 30-odd enclosures include receipts for income from high school football games. MSSP 0009.

6 vols. Five of the six volumes in this group (for 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, and 1952) are Indians payroll ledgers, with figures entered for each semi-monthly pay period. The hundreds of named employees include players, office workers, scouts, ground crew, ushers, ticket takers, and police. Each volume contains about 200 pages of content, plus inserts; pages measure around 35 x 42 cm. Four of the five volumes are disbound. The 1940 volume (21 x 29 cm., around 250 pages of content plus inserts) is more various in content than the other five. It includes club income and/or expenditures, in daybook form, relating to salaries, ticket sales, uniforms and equipment, travel, stadium maintenance, advertising, and a host of other categories. A closing statement indicates that the Indians made a net profit of $169,291.58 in 1940. MSSP 0022.

1 letter (4 pp.): Ora W. Harvey (1840–1921), a native of Marlboro, Cheshire County, New Hampshire, served in 1862–63 as a private in Company A of the 46th Massachusetts Infantry, a nine-month regiment. The letter, written on April 15, 1863, from New Bern, North Carolina, is notable for its discussion of camp recreations, especially baseball. MSN/CW 5026-1.

1 letter, w/envelope: A challenge letter sent by the Northern Light Base Ball Club of Berlin, Massachusetts, to the first and second nines of the Peerless Base Ball Club of Hudson, Massachusetts, July 29, 1867. MSSP 0003.

6 containers. Research notes and other materials accumulated by Marshall Smelser while writing his 1975 biography of Babe Ruth, The Life That Ruth Built. Included are 1) a file of approximately 1,500 index cards, chronologically arranged, indicating the news and feature stories on Ruth that appeared in The New York Times, 1914-1969; 2) a file of approximately 6,500 index cards of facts and observations pertaining to Ruth, with sources, arranged by chapter (i. e., in the sequence in which the relevant material appeared in the book); 3) a collection of 74 photographs relating to Ruth, most of which appeared in the book. Smelser was a long-time professor of history at the University of Notre Dame. Gift of Marshall Smelser, 1977. MSSP 0023.

2 vols., 14 and 15 cm., 52 and 70 leaves, with 16 and 65 pages of entries in Wagner's hand. Two small volumes of the daily calendar type, dated 1904 and 1910, used as notebooks by Pittsburgh Pirates shortstop and Hall of Famer John Peter "Honus" Wagner (1874-1955). Content consists mostly of accounts, addresses, and other brief notations. The 1910 volume contains several crossed-out copies of a rudimentary will, whose wording suggests that Wagner feared for his life, perhaps at the hands of gamblers. MSSP 0020.

6 letters, some w/envelopes: A group of letters written to recently resigned Cleveland Indians player-manager Tris Speaker. The correspondence expresses support in the wake of newspaper revelations that Speaker and Ty Cobb had been accused of fixing and betting on a game in 1919. Five of the letters (December 22–25 1926) are from fans; the other is from former player George Stovall. MSSP 0006-1 to MSSP 0006-6.

3 letters: A group of three personal letters written during a 1914 preseason exhibition tour by Pittsburgh Pirates player Max Carey (Maximilian George Carnarius, 1890–1976). The letters are addressed to Carey's wife, Aurelia Behrens Carey. MSSP 0005.

1 vol., 28 cm., 103 leaves; mimeographed typescript with manuscript annotations: An annotated copy of the Arthur Mann/Lawrence Taylor script for Eagle-Lion Films 1950 biopic, The Jackie Robinson Story. MSSP 0008.

1 vol., 36 cm., 106 leaves, with 57 pages of manuscript entries: A ledger for the fiscal years ending in 1889 and 1890 partly filled with the financial records of an unidentified late-nineteenth century manufacturer of baseballs. The company made more than thirty different makes of ball, from the "American League" (wholesale about $7.00 per dozen) to the "I.X.L." (24 cents per dozen).

Records include itemized cost estimates for each make of ball; sales to specific vendors; and yearly inventories. MSSP 0013.

1 vol., 16 x 10 cm., 74 leaves, with 39 pages of manuscript and clipped baseball box scores: The notebook of an unidentified big league scout, kept on a trip through the Southeast and Texas in May and June 1930. The book contains box scores of minor league games attended, with attendant notes on individual players. MSSP 0007.

1 letter (2 pages): An April 21, 1915, letter written by Montague Lyon of Lyon & Swarts, St. Louis, counsel for the Federal League of Professional Baseball Clubs. Lyons wrote to American League counsel George H. Williams to outline a five-point program that would lead to "the final and full adjustment of their [the Feds] legal difficulties with organized baseball . . . ." MSSP 0011.

1 document, partly printed: A completed major league transfer agreement, documenting the sale of player Edward ("Jeff") Sweeney (1888–1947) from Richmond to the New York Yankees for $300.00. The document is signed by Yankees president Jacob Ruppert. MSSP 0004.

15 letters: A group of 15 short letters written by as many different veterans of the Negro Leagues, responding to an autograph collector. MSSP 0012.

1 letter (1 page), with envelope. A typed letter signed of 29 December 1936 directed by Philadelphia Athletics owner/manager Connie Mack (1862-1956) to actor Frank Sheridan. Mack notes that he is in no financial position to retire and regrets "to a great extent that it was necessary to dispose of my star players." MSSP 0018.

A collection of 120 open reel audio tapes, most about forty-five minutes, of interviews conducted by Lawrence S. Ritter for his seminal oral history The Glory of Their Times (1966). From 1963 to 1965 Ritter sought out and interviewed players of the 1900-1930 era, editing the resulting tapes into one of the most entertaining and significant of all baseball books. These tapes are copies of the originals, which are now in Cooperstown. Gift of Lawrence S. Ritter. BAS 896

Included are team-signed, group-signed, and single-signature balls; signatures of close to fifty Hall of Famers are represented. An illustrated on-line catalog of elements of this collection may be viewed on this website. Gifts of John J. Evers, Jr; Emmit Jennings; Mike Ravine. BAS 875