Thomas Turner, a former Negro League baseball player, will celebrate his 90th birthday Tuesday.
‘High Pockets’ to celebrate 90th birthday
Negro Leaguer played during segregated times
By Katie Chadwell
Before the Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 60s, America was a land of separation between blacks and whites. All things, from movie theaters to bus stops to restaurants to restrooms, were segregated. Baseball was no exception. Blacks were not allowed to participate in the white-dominated Major League, but they were determined to play and therefore formed their own professional black teams and played against each other. On of these players was Thomas "High Pockets" Turner. The story of Turner tells of playing baseball in the Negro Leagues is not unlike what many black baseball players were forced to endure. The character of these players encompassed kindness to each other, dedication to their sport, and desire to change an American tradition. While the players of the Negro Leagues lacked equal treatment, they lacked nothing in talent.
Turner's childhood
Turner was born June 22, 1915 in Olive Branch, Tenn. He grew up loving sports. His first experience of baseball was as a child playing with his siblings. His mother would make a ball out of rock covered in rags and the sew it closed and they used a tree limb or broomstick for a bat.
The Negro Leagues were organized in 1920 under the direction of Rube Foster. Turner grew up watching the leagues. He first played organized baseball at the age of 11 for a team his father managed. His father bought him the best glove made and told him if he lost it he would not get a new one. Turner slept with the glove and would not take it off.
After high school, Turner attended Tuskegee Institute, an economic program to integrate African Americans through education, for two years before being drafted into the army and sent to Fort Huachuca, Ariz. While in the service, he participated in intramural sports and started playing first base for the infantry's baseball team.
Turner begins Negro League baseball
Jack Adkins, the coach of the army's football team, contacted Dr. John Martin, who owned the Chicago American Giants, and recommended Turner play Negro League baseball. And so, in 1947, Turner entered professional baseball playing for the Chicago American Giants. However, Negro League baseball was not like white Major League Baseball. They played a faster game and, since there were no coaches and instructors, everyone followed his own form.
The style of play was not the only difference between black and white baseball. Negro Leaguers had an exceptional level of class. There were no fights, the players could socialize with the crowds without a need for security, and the men were all like brothers. The manager of the Chicago American Giants, Jim "Candy" Taylor, made all the players shave and have a haircut.
Blacks vs. Whites social differences
The most significant difference in black and white baseball was the way the players were treated. Black baseball players were not given the same opportunity as whites.
Jeffrey Sammons, history professor at New York University, said, "Blacks built their own subculture in America because they were excluded from the white mainstream. This meant...black baseball."
Black baseball players had separate ball parks, separate hotels, separate stores and separate restaurants. The ball parks were not as nice as those that the white Major League players used. There were no bleachers and fans stood to watch, but it was still a big event. When the teams were allowed into a hotel, they were poorly kept and sometimes water was not even hooked up. For Turner, sanitation was the worst part because many times the black players were forced to stay at another black person's home, with one wash tub for all 15 or 16 men. The stores were also bad. "Jessup," one of Turner's friends in the league, wanted to buy a hat from a local store. He tried on three and was forced to buy all three.
Restaurants were the worst. Many would not serve the players and others would not let them eat in the dining room. Sometimes the team would have to go around the back and ask through a small window if they could be served. On one occasion, the team sent their chauffeur into the restaurant to ask if they could eat inside. They were allowed in, but not before the restaurant management tied a large rope down the center of the dining room to separate the white side from the black side. This was Turner's worst confrontation with segregation. The team always liked music and liked to play the jukebox, but this night the jukebox was on the other side of the rope. When one of the team members asked a white waitress to play the jukebox, she would not touch his hand to take his money.
All black players felt the anguish of segregation. Buck O'Neil, who eventually became the first black coach of the Major League, commented in an interview that segregation was the toughest part of playing in the Negro Leagues. But, it was something that the players had to deal with. Turner said, "You can stand a lot of things when you have to, just realize you have to and move on."
Occasionally the black teams got the chance to play the white Major League teams in exhibition match-ups. Chicago was a highly segregated city and so an intense rivalry grew between the black and white teams. Games between the two leagues were dramatic events, but the blacks were competitive. In one specific game, the Negro Leaguers wore the white team out and ended with a victory. After the game a white fan said, "You all's the ball-playin'-est darkies I ever laid eyes on." While the racist undertone of the remark could have caused a fight, the calm manner of the Negro Leaguers allowed them to take it as a compliment.
There were many good times playing in the Negro Leagues. Turner reflects on his favorite game he played with the Chicago American Giants as a home game in Chicago. Two officers who served with him in the military had come to watch and take pictures of him. There were 44,000 people in attendance for the game and Turner hit his only professional baseball home run on that day. While the white press did not cover the Negro Leagues well, Turner got several personal write-ups in the black papers. He remembers that the Negro Leagues were "Just good."
Robinson integrates baseball
Things began to change in black baseball in 1947. This, the year that Turner joined the Negro Leagues, was the year that Jackie Robinson became the first black to play in the Major League. Turner watched Robinson's career in the majors. It was always controversial – it wasn't until many years later when it was ok. Many thought that blacks would not be able to compete in the Major League, but by midsummer, Robinson was hitting about .300 and becoming the most exciting player in the game. Not many Negro Leaguers got the opportunity to play in the Major League, but they were not resentful. Buck O'Neil said, "Every black ball player who played baseball before Jackie Robinson was important. We paved the way."
Though there was great satisfaction in knowing that baseball was becoming integrated, it was also sadly meant the end of the Negro Leagues. Now the black superstars could play in the majors and did not have to form their own all-black teams. Turner was sad when the leagues broke up, but he understood that they were hurting for talent and money. He only played for one season because he would have had to take a salary cut to continue into the next season in 1948 and he was not willing to do so.
It was a triumph for the Negro League players to integrate baseball, but baseball was not the only thing in the country that was changing. Integration of baseball was the first in a chain of integration events in America. One year later, in 1948, President Harry S. Truman integrated the army. Seven years later, in 1954, the Supreme Court integrated public schools. Ten years after that, in 1964, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act and ensured all blacks the right to vote. The Negro Leagues, while it unfortunately meant their end, accomplished their one main goal – to earn respect for the black race.
Turner after Negro Leagues
Following his career in the Negro Leagues, Turner moved to Cincinnati and started a semi-pro team called the Valley Tigers. He managed them four years, until 1951. He continued to coach other baseball and fast-pitch softball teams and eventually went to three Major League tryouts. In Hamilton, Ohio he was invited back for all three days of tryouts and on the last day he hit 5-for-5 and made no errors. However, Turner never played in the Major League. But the Negro League stars did not play for fame. Turner stated, "We played baseball because we loved to play baseball. I love to play baseball."
Negro Leaguers today
Many of the players from the Negro Leagues who are still alive today have focused their efforts on improving athletics and the lives of young people today. Retired players who now live in the Cincinnati area, including Turner, started a group called Seniors With a Purpose, or SWAP, to reach the lives of young people who may be on the edge of trouble. Chuck Harmon, who became the first black man to play for the Cincinnati Reds, thinks that kids today need to learn about respect. Turner agrees that the focus of sports has become too hostile and all about winning and should be turned back to the kids.
About 200 Negro League veterans attended the 75th Anniversary Reunion of the League, Oct. 28, 1995. The players of the Negro Leagues have seen many changes in their lives. Dealing with segregation was hard, but black baseball players agree that the Negro Leagues were good. Quoting author Mark Ribowsky, "Forces they couldn't understand could take away their rights, but no one could take away their ability to play. And man, could they play."
