SPORTS

Stovey was name of success in 19th century

Bill Ballou
Telegram & Gazette
Harry Stovey received votes for the Hall of Fame in 1936, his only year on the regular ballot.

Two of the most significant baseball players of the 19th century played in Worcester, but never together. Both had the same baseball last names, Stovey, but were not related. Both actually played under different last names than their birth names.

Harry Stovey was a terrific player, George Stovey probably would have been a terrific pitcher given the chance, but he was a Black man in an increasingly white baseball world.

George Stovey

One issue with 19th century baseball was that its owners, managers and players knew how good African Americans were at the game. They helped teams win and even back then that was all that mattered.

Or almost all.

George Stovey was one of the best southpaws of his time — perhaps the best African American pitcher — but rarely was able to show it in integrated baseball, which the game was to a small extent until the late 1880s. Stovey was possibly the last Black player in organized baseball of that era, but was most certainly one of the last.

Like Satchel Paige decades later, Stovey — there is evidence he was born George Stover — pitched mostly for independent teams, one of the best being the Cuban Giants. Baseball wanted Black players for their talent, but did not want to admit they were Black, so they were often called Cubans.

The 1888 Worcester Colts of the New England League got off to a slow start under manager Walter Burnham, whose team needed pitching. On May 30, he sent for Stovey, who was home in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. Stovey asked for $50 in traveling money, but Burnham only sent him $10. The pitcher came anyway, but was detained in New York City in a tawdry episode in which he was arrested — purportedly for drunkeness — and the police refused to believe he was a professional ballplayer.

Newspaper accounts of the incident were disgusting, using every vile, jaded description of African Americans. Stovey eventually arrived in Worcester after all and immediately commenced to help the Colts turn their season around.

He won his first five starts, beating Lowell, Manchester, Lowell, Manchester and Salem, in that order. All were complete games, and Stovey allowed 20 runs in 45 innings. Then he lost his next five starts in a row, allowing 43 runs in 45 innings. The worst was a 12-11 loss to Lynn in which he gave up seven runs in the ninth.

On July 11, Stovey and the Colts beat Manchester, 15-9, to lift his record to 6-5. It was his final game in a Worcester uniform. He was released on July 15. His stint with the Colts was a substantial national story. Baseball’s color line was in the process of being drawn, and Stovey was one of the best of the African American players.

One reason for his release was that he was “headstrong,” a term often used in those baseball days to describe a Black player who expected to be treated as an equal on a team. He was described as having a drinking problem, as did much of the baseball world back then. One paper claimed that Stovey’s teammates did not want him around and purposely made errors to derail his performance, but that is hard to prove.

He allowed 35 hits in his first 45 innings, 79 in his final 54. Stovey was probably badly overused, working 11 consecutive complete games. Perhaps he needed an opener.

After being released by Worcester, Stovey went on and pitched for the Cuban Giants and was eventually finished as an athlete by 1900. He settled in his hometown of Williamsport and became active in baseball circles there as an umpire and was equally active in organizing youth leagues.

In the 1920s, one of his occupations was bootlegger. He was given a suspended sentence after being caught. George Stovey, arguably the best African American pitcher of the 19th century and once a starter for Worcester, died in Williamsport in 1936.

Harry Stovey

He grew up in Philadelphia, one of baseball’s warmest hotbeds after the Civil War, and came north in his early 20s to play for Clinton native Frank Bancroft in New Bedford. When Worcester entered the National League in 1880, Stovey joined Bancroft up here.

Stovey’s real last name was Stowe. He changed it so his mother would not find out he was playing baseball. Stovey was easily the best position player for Worcester’s three seasons in the National League, and as a rookie in 1880 led the league in triples with 14, homers with six and extra-base hits with 41. He was second in runs scored; RBIs were not kept as an official stat back then.

An outfielder, Stovey played in 242 of the 252 games Worcester played in the National League and also served as player-manager for part of the 1881 season as the franchise began to fall apart. His career average for the Worcesters was .277, and he totaled 13 homers, 31 triples and 59 doubles in an era where bunting prevailed and lunch angles were more important than launch angles.

Stovey’s best season may have been 1882, the team’s last before being thrown out of the National League. For a terrible team — it was managed by a former sportswriter, Freeman Brown, so what could you expect? — he hit .289 for a club with a .231 average and had 28 extra-base hits.

After the Worcesters were evicted from the National League, Stovey went home to Philadelphia and played for the rival American Association for seven very successful seasons. His career went downhill when he turned 35 in 1892 while with Boston of the National League, and his final year in the majors was 1893. He finished with a .288 career average in 1,489 games.

In 1895, Stovey joined the New Bedford police force and had a long career there as successful as his one in baseball. He retired, known again as Harry Stowe, as a captain in 1925.

Harry Stovey could hit for power and ran well. He was a standout defensive player with a great arm who once finished second in a throwing contest with a heave of 369 feet. He received votes for the Hall of Fame in 1936, his only year on the ballot, and has been considered on the “pre-integration” Hall of Fame ballot by the Veterans Committee.

He was 80 when he died in New Bedford in 1937.

—Contact Bill Ballou at sports@telegram.com.

Harry Stovey received votes for the Hall of Fame in 1936, his only year on the regular ballot.