Did Bill Veeck Lie About His Plan to Buy the Philadelphia Phillies Before the 1943 Season

Did Bill Veeck really have a plan to integrate Major League Baseball as early as 1943? Some fans and baseball writers will repeat without question or criticism Veeck's boast concerning his alleged attempt to buy the hapless Philadelphia Phillies after the 1942 season. Veeck first made this claim in is 1962 autobiography, "Veeck, as in Wreck."

 

Veeck's Plan to Integrate Baseball

 

Veeck asserted that he worked with others, including Harlem Globetrotters owner and sports agent, Abe Saperstein and an African-American sports editor of the Chicago Defender, Doc Young, to field a baseball team made up of Negro League All-Stars, such as Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson. Once he had bought the Phillies, Veeck would have replaced all of the players with a baseball team made up entirely of these Negro League Stars. Had the plan been successful, Veeck boasted that he would have turned the Phillies from a perennial basement dweller to a pennant winner.

 

Efforts to Keep Baseball Segregated

 

According to Veeck, however, there was one problem with his plan. Out of courtesy, he informed Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis of his plan. Once Landis knew of the plan, he took decisive steps to ensure that the Major Leagues would remain segregated. Specifically, according to Veeck, Landis ordered National League President Ford Frick to buy the Phillies from team President Gerald Nugent before Veeck could close the deal. In this way, Landis thwarted Veeck's plan, ending a prime opportunity to integrate baseball years before Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier with the Brooklyn Dodgers.

 

Veeck the Self-Promoter

Embed from Getty ImagesVeeck's tale certainly makes for a good story. It casts Veeck in the light of hero, standing up for equality and civil rights against the bigotry and discrimination that had existed almost since the inception of Major League Baseball. And Landis was cast as the clear villain, ensuring that no one would break the evil of segregation that plagued baseball, at least while Landis had anything to do with it. It was a tale of mythical proportions.

Except, there has always been one major problem with Veeck's claim. The only evidence to support this tale was Veeck's word itself. There were no newspaper reports from 1942 or 1943 with details of such as plan. There were no accounts from the major players in the melodrama, such as Landis, Frick and Nugent, which would seem to support and corroborate Veeck's tale. To believe the story, you had to believe Veeck himself. And Bill Veeck had a penchant for self-promotion.

 

Seeds of Doubt

 

In 1998, the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) published an article that essentially called Veeck a liar.  The authors of that article, Larry Gerlach, David Jordan and John Rossi, claimed that there were no contemporary sources to support Veeck's claim. Based on this lack of evidence, the authors concluded that Bill Veeck's plan just did not exist. This conclusion was seemingly backed up by the sheer weight of their credentials as authorities on baseball history. Gerlach was the President of SABR at the time, and a professor of history at the University of Utah. Jordan was a noted author of biographies of key figures in baseball history. And Rossi was a professor of history at LaSalle University. 

A few years later, another noted baseball historian, Jule Tygiel, published an article through SABR's journal, The National Pastime. Tygiel dismissed the claim that there were no contemporary accounts of Veeck’s plan in the press prior to 1960.  Tygiel noted that there were some accounts as early as 1946 which appeared to support at least portions of Veeck's story.

 

So, baseball history buffs are left with a question. Did Bill Veeck lie about his plan to buy the Phillies and staff the baseball team with All-Star Negro League players?  To answer this question, let's take a look at Bill Veeck himself, the state of the Phillies in 1942, and what evidence exists that could support Veeck's story.

Who Was Bill Veeck, and What Was His Impact on Professional Sports?

 

Bill Veeck was the son of a sportswriter, William Veeck, Sr.  The elder Veeck had become a baseball executive, having served as the President of the Chicago Cubs.  Bill Veeck grew up in the world of professional baseball.  He worked his way up in the business of baseball, selling tickets and popcorn at Cubs games in his youth, serving as a junior groundskeeper and later selling concessions for the Cubs’ crosstown American League rivals, the Chicago White Sox.

 

Bill Veeck would go on to become a baseball executive and owner himself.  Veeck forever changed the way baseball was marketed and promoted to attract more fans to come out to watch baseball games. His strategy was to make a trip to the ballpark a spectacle full of excitement.  He accompanied this through a number of promotions aimed at drawing the average fan more into the game. 

Bill Veeck’s Promotions

 

Veeck began his career as a baseball executive by serving as the Treasurer for the Chicago Cubs.  While working for the Cubs, he came up with the idea of growing the iconic ivy on the outfield wall at Wrigley Field.

In 1941, Veeck became partners with former Cubs player Charlie Grimm to buy the triple A level minor league team, the Milwaukee Brewers. As Grimm served as the team’s manager, Veeck set about devising ways to fill the seats at the ballpark.

While serving as the chief executive of the Brewers, Veeck pioneered a number of promotional activities. He formed a rustic band that played before the games.  He gave away live animals during the games.  He scheduled morning games to allow night shift workers to attend. He held weddings at home plate.

 

Veeck claimed that he installed a screen in right field to protect against the cheap home run by left handed power hitters.  But the screen was movable.  Veeck relished in spinning yarns of how he would manipulate the placement of the screen based on the hitting tendencies of the opposing hitters.  Veeck even claimed that in one game he went so far as to put the screen up when the away team was batting, but take it down when the Brewers batted.  According to Veeck, his actions resulted in an immediate rule change the next day.  Perhaps foreshadowing Veeck’s predilection to exaggerate his own exploits, SABR researchers have been unable to find any evidence to support the details of Veeck’s story concerning the outfield screen.

 

All the while, Veeck made sure that the Brewers fielded a good, quality baseball team. In the five years that Veeck owned the Brewers, the team won three American Association pennants.  His promotions were meant to compliment the game, not supplant it.

 

Bill Veeck, Major League Owner: The Cleveland Indians

 

Bill Veeck allegedly attempted to buy the Phillies after the 1942 season. This is a story we will flush out below.  But in 1946, Veeck succeeded in joining the ranks of major league owners, when he bought the Cleveland Indians. Veeck immediately put his experience devising promotions for the minor league Brewers to work. He brought key innovations to the way major league baseball would be promoted.  Indians games would now be broadcast on the radio. Veeck created excitement with fireworks after the game.

 

And just like his stint in Milwaukee, Veeck did not forget the baseball. Future Hall of Famer Bob Feller had come back from his military service in the Second World War, and reasserted himself as a dominant pitcher. Veeck succeeded in integrating the American League, acquiring another future Hall of Famer, outfielder Larry Doby, from the Newark Eagles in 1947. He also brought on board legendary Negro League pitcher Satchel Paige in 1948. Veeck's work culminated in a World Series championship for Cleveland in 1948.

 

Sadly, Veeck had to sell his interest in the team in 1949 in order to conclude a property settlement when he divorced his first wife.

 

Bill Veeck and the St. Louis Browns

 

Veeck was determined to get back into the game as a Major League Baseball owner. He accomplished his goal when he purchased the St. Louis Browns in 1951. He brought the same penchant for wacky promotions to the Browns, in an effort to drum up attendance, and force his cross-town rivals, the Cardinals, to relocate.

 

Embed from Getty ImagesIn 1951, Veeck hired little person, Eddie Gaedel to act as a pinch hitter. Gaedel stood 3' 7", causing consternation for pitchers trying to find his strike zone.  In his one and only at-bat, Gaedel walked on four pitches. Veeck joked that he warned Gaedel that there would be a man with a rifle in the stadium, and that under no circumstances should he swing at any pitch.  Baseball owners, however, were not amused at the stunt, and voted to instituted a minimum height for major league players.

In the same year, Veeck orchestrated “Grandstand Manager Day.” In a game against the Philadelphia Athletics, fans were given signs that said "yes" or "no." At key points in the game, such as in determining whether to pull the pitcher, the audience was prompted to make a choice on what the Browns should do.

Such publicity stunts did little to make the Browns the dominant team in the St. Louis market. Veeck's dream of monopolizing the baseball market in St. Louis, however, came to a halt in 1953. The Cardinals had always been the more popular team in St. Louis. But in 1953, Anheuser-Bush bought the team, and brought with them the resources of a major beer company. The move also succeeded in thwarting a bid to move the Cardinals to Houston.  Meanwhile, the Browns remained strapped for cash. Veeck sold Sportsman Park to the Cardinals, and attempted to move the team to Milwaukee. The American League owners would only give permission to move the franchise out of St. Louis if Veeck sold his interest in the team.  Veeck then sold his interest to an investment group that moved the Browns to Baltimore, and rebranded the team as the Baltimore Orioles.

 

Bill Veeck's Tenure with the Chicago White Sox

 

By 1959, Veeck returned as a Major League Baseball owner, this time heading a group that bought the Chicago White Sox from squabbling factions of the Comiskey family. That year, the team won its first pennant in forty years, and broke team attendance records.

In 1960, Veeck once against put his penchant for innovative promotions to use. He instituted the "exploding scorebaord," a scoreboard rigged with electronic sound effects and fireworks that would go off whenever  White Sox player hit a home run. Veeck also instituted the practice of placing the players' last names on the backs of their jerseys.

However, Veeck's health took a turn for the worse. Due to his health concerns, Veeck sold his interest in the White Sox in 1961, and concentrated on his medical condition. Fearing his imminent death, this is when Veeck took the steps to write his autobiography, which was published in 1962.

Most baseball insiders were not happy with the book, and his exposure of behind the scene baseball politics. Nonetheless, Veeck once again returned to the ranks of Major League owners, buying the full ownership of the White Sox in 1975. Once back in control of the White Sox, Veeck returned to his practice of unusual promotions and publicity stunts. Veeck and his General Manager conducted four trades in a hotel lobby, in full view of the public. Veeck instituted new uniforms for the White Sox players, softball-style clamdiggers and shorts. In the new free agency era, Veeck began the practice  "rentals" by trading for key players near the end of their option year. Veeck also encourage White Sox broadcaster Harry Caray to sing "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" during the seventh inning stretch, instituting a baseball tradition.

 

Disco Demolition Night

 

Embed from Getty ImagesPerhaps the most infamous promotion to occur during Veeck's tenure with the White Sox was Disco Demolition Night. Steve Dahl was a Chicago area disc jockey who had lost his job in 1978 when the station he worked for switched formats from Rock to Disco. It was a slight that Dahl would not let go of. Dahl was then hired by a Rock station in Chicago, WLUP.

Disco, of course, had become a popular musical genre, a development that sparked a backlash by traditional Rock N' Roll fans. Dahl rode that backlash, heading a so-called anti-disco army, and encouraged his fans to engage in acts of anti-disco highjinx.

Meanwhile, Mike Veeck, Bill Veeck's son, had become the head of promotions for the White Sox. Mike Veeck contacted WLUP about a possible promotion during the 1979 season. The White Sox had held a disco night in 1977, and the WLUP station manger, Jeff Schwartz, suggested that an anti-disco night might be in order. Dahl already had plans to blow up a crate of disco records as a shopping mall.  Schwartz suggested that he could do so at a White Sox game instead. The stunt was scheduled for a July 12th double header against the Tigers, and the idea of Disco Demolition Night was born.

The promotion included offering discounted tickets of 98 cents to anyone who brought a disco record to the stadium. The records would be collected and blown up between the games. The double header sold out, with the ballpark populated mostly by Dahl's listeners. The gather crowd actually began throwing the records onto the field during the first game. But the attendees also threw firecrackers, liquor bottle and lighters onto the field as well. This behavior of the crowd forced the first game to be delayed several times.

Embed from Getty ImagesWhen the first game ended, Dahl came out onto the field in a jeep and in military fatigues. He circled the field, enticing the crowd to yell "Disco Sucks," and proceeded to blow up a box of records that was in center field. Fans soon jumped onto the field and pandemonium ensued. Bill Veeck, who had checked himself out of the hospital due to his fear that this night would get out of hand, attempted to coax the fans back into the stands, along with Harry Caray, through the use of the stadium's public announcement system. When his efforts failed, the team was forced to forfeit the second game.

 

Is Bill Veeck a Reliable Story-Teller?

 

Embed from Getty ImagesWith Veeck's history as a maverick owner, we now return to his claim regarding the 1943 Phillies. There is no doubt that Veeck rankled many within the ranks of baseball insiders. His promotions were often viewed as calling attention to himself, at the expense of the dignity of baseball. Indeed, Veeck had certainly enhanced his role and importance in the retelling of many of his promotional efforts. Moreover, if his account were true, Veeck would have exposed some of the worst aspects of Commissioner Landis' personality. It is understandable why those connected to baseball would doubt his reliability as a narrator of baseball's past, or at least want to cast aspersions on his veracity. With that in mind, let's consider the credibility of Veeck's account.

 

The Phillies in 1942

 

By the 1940s, the Phillies were in dire financial straights. After winning the National League pennant in 1915, the Phillies spent much of the following two and a half decades at or near last place. In addition, the team had an outdated and deteriorating stadium, National League Park, colloquially called the Baker Bowl, that reigned rust and debris when a foul ball hit the roof. All of this combined to depress attendance at Phillies games. Indeed, the situation had gotten so bad that the Phillies had to borrow money from the National League just to send the team to Spring Training. Phillies President Gerald Nugent was under intense pressure to sell the team.

 

 

 

The Details of the Attempt to Buy the Phillies

 

According to Veeck, while he was on his way from Milwaukee to attend the World Series in 1942, he stopped in Philadelphia to meet with Nugent. Veeck claimed that it was during this meeting in October of 1942 that he discussed buying the Phillies from Nugent. It was only after Landis intervened that the National League bought the team. Veeck claims that the price paid was half of what he was willing to pay. Veeck also claimed to have heard rumors that Ford Frick, the National League President, was bragging around baseball inner circles about thwarting Veeck’s plan to “contaminate” the league.

The Case Against Veeck's Story

 

In their 1998 article, entitled, “A Baseball Myth Exploded: Bill Veeck and the 1943 Sale of the Phillies," Gerlach, Jordan and Rossi boldly claimed that Veeck’s story was not true, that Veeck had no deal to buy the Phillies, that he did not work with Abe Sapersten to staff the Phillies with negro league players, and that Landis and Frick never quashed the deal, because there was no deal to being with.

In support of their conclusion, the authors claimed that the National League’s purchase of the Phillies was not hastily put together, as Veeck’s version implies.  Rather, it was the result of months of meetings and deliberations among the National League’s owners, stretching from the end of the 1942 season to February of 1943.  This, according to the author,  belies the claim that Landis simply ordered Frick to have the league buy the team when he heard about Veeck’s alleged scheme.

The authors further noted that there were no sources that corroborated Veeck’s account.  In November of 1942, for example, Nugent was quoted in the press as saying that Veeck had stopped in to see him on his way to the World Series, but that Veeck did not mention that he was interested in buying the Phillies.  This directly contradicted Veeck’s version of events.  Nugent asserted that it was only later that he saw a press clipping in Milwaukee where Veeck claimed he had an interest in buying the club. And there was no mention of Veeck and his supposed interest in buying the Phillies in the press between October of 1942 and February of 1943, when the National League bought the club.  The authors found it significant that the Philadelphia Tribune, the city’s leading newspaper aimed at African-American audiences, never wrote about the sale of the Phillies during this time period.  The authors found this significant because of the pressure African-American sportswriters were trying to create to integrate baseball in the early 1940s.  Surely, the authors believed, if Veeck were working with Abe Saperstein as claimed, word would have circulated among African-American sportswriters, who would have championed the cause.

 

In fact, the only connection between the sale of the Phillies and the possibility of integrating baseball came from a Communist newspaper, “The Daily Worker.”  Nat Low, a white sportswriter for that newspaper praised the exit of Nugent as a baseball executive, and lamented the lost opportunity of being able to obtain negro league players for a small price, but did not mention Veeck in his article.

When Veeck purchased the Clevelant Indians, the authors claimed that Veeck shared in great detail with the press how he planned to improve the team.  But during that time, he made no mention of his supposed deal to buy the Phillies. When Veeck bought the contract of Larry Doby from the Newark Eagles, and negotiated a salary with Doby to have him break the color barrier in the American League, there was likewise no mention anywhere in the press of Veeck and his supposed plan to buy the Phillies and staff the team with negro league players.  Nor was there any mention of the supposed plan regarding the Phillies in the press when the Indians later obtained negro league legend Satchel Paige.  The authors claimed that it would just be natural for Veeck, a gifted self-promoter, to have mentioned his scheme in all of these opportunities.

 

It was true that noted African-American sportswriter, Wendell Smith, did write about Veeck’s supposed plan shortly before Veeck’s autobiography was published.  But the authors of the SABR article claimed that his account was inconsistent with Veeck’s, despite the fact that Veeck claimed that Smith was one of his confidants when the deal was being put together.  Plus, Veeck had first mentioned his supposed scheme publicly in 1960, in an article published in Ebony.  So, Veeck’s story had been out in the public for about two years before Smith wrote about it. It appeared suspicious that Smith had never mentioned the supposed scheme before 1960, if he were indeed so close to the deal.

This lack of evidence and contemporary corroborating accounts led the authors to conclude that Veeck’s claim in his 1962 autobiography was a lie. 

The Case Supporting Veeck's Story

 

While Veeck had a penchant for exaggeration, it is undeniable that he had legitimate credentials in helping to integrate the major leagues.  In the same year that Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in the National League with the Dodgers, 1947, Veeck hired future Hall of Famer Larry Doby to break the color barrier in the American League. Then, Veeck brought legendary pitcher Satchel Paige to Cleveland. This would lend credence to the conclusion that Veeck was willing to take the chance and force the issue four years earlier when the opportunity arose to buy the Phillies.

 

In his 2006 article, Jules Tygiel dismissed the claim that there were no contemporary accounts of Veeck’s plan in the press prior to 1960. Tygiel noted that as early as 1949, sportswriter Fay Young was quoted in the Chicago Press as saying he had spoken with Veeck about a plan to buy the Phillies in the context of discussing baseball’s integration. Then, in 1954, Abe Saperstein spoke about the plan in the Associated Negro Press. In an article published in the Philadelphia Independent, Saperstein laid out the details of Veeck's plan. Veeck was ready to buy the Phillies in 1943. He would publicly train a white team during spring training. In secret, he would train an African-American team at the same time.  Once Opening Day came around, Veeck would reveal the African-American team as the team the Philadelphia Phillies would field in 1943.

Tygiel also noted Doc Young’s 1953 book, “Great Negro Baseball Stars.”  In that book, Young claims that the story of how Landis put an end to Veeck's plans to staff the Phillies with Negro League stars had been circulating in the African-American community by at least 1946, when Veeck bought the Indians.  Young notes that because of this story, when Veeck bought the Indians, many African-American writers thought of Veeck as an ally in their quest to integrate major league baseball.

Tygiel’s point was that Veeck did not merely invent his story of his attempt to integrate the Philadelphia Philllies twenty years after the fact. This is what the authors of the 1998 articel insinuated. Rather, accounts of the supposed plan had been out there, at least since 1946.
 

Tygiel acknowledged that Abe Saperstein’s account, and Doc Young’s account differ from Veeck’s autobiography.  Indeed, the two didn’t seem to have the inside knowledge you would expect if Veeck had actually worked with them to see the plan come to fruition. Tygiel also acknowledged that throughout all of the mentions of the plan in the press, the ultimate source of information is still Veeck himself.  Given his penchant for exaggerations, we cannot discount his motive for self-promotion, particularly in his own autobiography.

Nonetheless, to make the sweeping conclusion that Veeck just invented the story whole cloth for his 1962 autobiography is just irresponsible.  It is clear that Veeck talked about it in the 1940s, and that the story was known among African-American sportswriters in the 1940s. 

Was Kenesaw Mountain Landis a Segregationist?

 

One unfortunate side effect of this debate is the presumption that Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis silently worked behind the scenes to preserve segregation in baseball. There is no evidence that Landis worked against the desegregation of baseball. In fact, to the contrary, all of the publicly available evidence shows the opposite.

 

Indeed, one source of the image of Landis as a strong segregationalist set against permitting African-Americans to play in the major leagues is the documentary by Ken Burns. Through the documentary, Burns charges that Branch Rickey only dared to hire Jackie Robinson after Landis died, insinuating that Landis did more than anyone else to perpetuate the color barrier.

However, Burns made similar allegations against Ty Cobb, namely that he was a stark racist. This is demonstrably false. Charles Leerhsen has done a remarkable job dispelling the various myths about Ty Cobb in his book, "Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty." Contrary to the popular misconception of Cobb, he was an enthusiastic supported of the integration of baseball.

Yet, it helped Burns' agenda by shaping Cobb as a die in the whool racist, to the extent of ignoring the evident to the contrary. If Burns were so willing to mislead his audience with respect to Cobb, then why should we trust his depiction of Landis?

Landis famously stated in 1942 that there was no rule preventing African-Americans from playing major league baseball.  That if any team wanted to sign an African-American to play, it was all right by him.  And that the issue of hiring African-American ballplayers was an issue for the club owners and managers, not the Commissioner. 

The perception that Landis actively prevented teams from hiring African-American players during his lifetime quite frankly presumes that the Office of the Commissioner had more power than it actually did. This is not to say that there wasn’t a conspiracy to keep the major league segregated. There was, absolutely. But the focus should be on people who kept that conspiracy in place, the major league owners.

Making such allegations without direct evidence, and based on nothing more than hearsay, is nothing short of irresponsible.

 

Did Veeck Have a Plan to Integrate the Phillies in 1943?

 

When all of the available evidence is examined, it does appear likely that Bill Veeck had an idea that could have led to the integration of the Philadelphia Phillies in 1943. He may have explored the feasibility of the idea, and communicated it to a number of people in a position to help bring the idea to fruition. The fact that many of the key players had some memory of the plan in the 1940s and 1950s certainly supports the conclusion that the plan existed.

But, how far did Veeck go in implementing that plan? That is a question that remains in doubt. A huge factor against the veracity of the entirety of Veeck's account is the fact that many of the people who were supposedly on board in implementing the plan, Abe Saperstein, Doc Young and Wendell Smith, all have different accounts on just how far Veeck got in his plan. They all acknowledge that he discussed the idea. But there is no support for the claim that Veeck had gotten so far as to make an offer to buy the Phillies, or even to start putting together the roster of Negro League All-Stars he would need to bring the plan to fruition. Furthermore, given the need to negotiate a price and secure financial backing, it is just not feasible to conclude that Commissioner Landis ordered Frick to buy the team and it happened practically overnight.

In the end, while portions of Veeck's story are plausible, other parts are not as credible. It is likely that Veeck merely exaggerated the extent to which he had brought his idea to completion.

By:  William J. Kovatch, Jr. 

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References

 

Dickson, Paul, Bill Veeck: Baseball’s Greatest Maverick (Walker Books 2012).

Gerlach, Larry, Jordan, David Jordan and Rossi, John, “A Baseball Myth Exploded: Bill Veeck and the 1943 Sale of the Phillies,” The National Pastime (1998).  https://sabr.org/research/article/a-baseball-myth-exploded-bill-veeck-and-the-1943-sale-of-the-phillies/

Kaiser, David, “A Troubling Myth About Jackie Robinson Endures,” Time (April 15, 2016).  https://time.com/4294175/jackie-robinson-burns-landis-myth/ 

Leerhsen, Charles, Ty Cobb: A Terrible Beauty (Simon & Schuster 2015). https://nypost.com/2015/05/31/how-ty-cobb-was-framed-as-a-racist/

Smith, Kyle, "How Ty Cobb was framed as a racist," New York Post (May 31, 2015)

Tygiel, Jules, “Revisiting Bill Veeck and the 1943 Phillies,” The National Pastime, 109 (2006).  http://research.sabr.org/journals/files/SABR-Baseball_Research_Journal-35.pdf

Veeck, Bill and Linn Ed, Veeck as in Wreck: The Autobiography of Bill Veeck (University of Chicago Press 1962).

Warrington, Robert D. and Macht, Norman, “The Veracity of Veeck,” Baseball Research Journal (Fall 2013).  https://sabr.org/journal/article/the-veracity-of-veeck/