He also attempted to create leagues for Black players, though none were successful.
Use Next and Previous buttons to navigate Fowler knew firsthand how hard segregation made it for Black players to sleep and eat on the road. When Fowler founded the Page Fence Giants in 1894, he secured a railroad car for the team, fitted with sleeping quarters and a cook. His New York Gorhams, formed in 1887, were the first successful Black barnstorming team. When Fowler reported to Denver, the Rocky Mountain News noted in surprise, and with the casual racism of the time, that “Fowler, the Pastimes’ new player, turns out to be an African gentleman, black as the ace of spades, but a crack baseball player.”įowler found equal success organizing and managing Black teams. One team, the Pueblo Pastimes of Denver, signed him on reputation alone, according to a biography of Fowler by Brian McKenna written for the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR). But Fowler was such a skilled player that he always found another team willing to take him on. “There’s no name that you find in the 19th century, at least to date, that was a better promoter of Black baseball and Black baseball players, teams, himself.”įowler, who was best known as a second baseman, played before Black players were banned, though he was frequently kicked off teams because of his skin color. “When you’re talking about Bud Fowler, what we’re talking about is somebody who was a pioneer,” said Leslie Heaphy, a member of the Early Baseball Era Committee, which voted Fowler into the Hall.
For that distinction, earned when he took the field for the Lynn, Mass., Oaks of the International Association in 1878, his stellar career as a player and his work as an organizer and promoter of Black baseball teams, Fowler will be inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame on Sunday.
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