By Karen Zautyk
Did you know that Cleveland once had a pro-baseball team called the Spiders?
Do you care?
As someone who bleeds Yankee blue, my answer to that would have been “no.”
But that’s before I started reading an absolutely fascinating tome, “That’s Not in My American History Book.” Author Thomas Ayres is an investigative reporter, whose skills in that field are obvious from the amount of investigation that went into his book.
It is described as “a compilation of little-known events and forgotten heroes” and ranges from the Vikings to Richard Nixon (not a hero) and between and beyond. Open it at random and find yourself immersed in some fascinating account. Such as that of the Spiders and their forgotten hero, Louis Sockalexis, whose more-than-a-century-old story prompted this column. As did a 2018 decision by Cleveland’s team.
As just about everything in history — American and otherwise — there is debate about this, but the expert consensus is that Sockalexis was the first Native American to play major-league baseball.
A member of the Penobscot nation, he was born in 1871 on a reservation in Maine, where, Ayres writes, his “amazing athletic ability” was first evidenced.
In his teens, he attended a Catholic high school, where he was the star player on its baseball team —a star so bright he came to the attention of college coaches. In an era when a Native American college student was virtually unheard of, Sockalexis first enrolled, in 1893, at Holy Cross College in Massachusetts, then transferred to Notre Dame in 1895.
At Holy Cross, Ayres notes, Sockalexis’ batting average was .444 — and he also played football and competed in track. But before he could complete even one season at Notre Dame, he was scouted and signed by the Spiders.
However, the outfielder played pro ball for only three seasons: 1897-1899.
Celebrated by promoters and sportswriters as a superstar before he even took the field, he more often than not rose to the fans’ expectations. But they expected perfection. Anything less was unacceptable. Add to that the bigotry Sockalexis had to endure, including racial slurs and spectators imitating war whoops and war dances.
Ayres notes that the player eventually “became a daily target for critical stories by cynical sportswriters.”
Under the constant pressure, Sockalexis began drinking. Heavily. Which, of course, affected his game. And then, his Wikipedia bio says, “when sports journalists attributed his rapid decline to alcoholism, they identified the disease as the inherent ‘Indian weakness.’”
The man whom one pro coach said “should have been the greatest player of all time” found his major-league career too soon over. He reportedly played awhile in the minors then returned to Maine to coach kids’ teams, but gave up baseball altogether in 1903.
Sockalexis, who battled not only alcoholism but also tuberculosis and heart problems, died in 1913.
He was just 42.
Two years later, Cleveland changed the name of its American League team (then called the Naps) to the Indians, reportedly to honor him.
What hasn’t honored him, or any other Native American, is the Cleveland team’s logo, the hideously offensive “Chief Wahoo.” In February, Cleveland announced the grotesque caricature finally would be removed from uniforms and stadium signs — but not until the 2019 season. And it is likely to remain on souvenir items.
Wahoo.
(Note: We couldn’t figure out how the Spiders got their name, so we asked our colleague and Central Park League pitcher/right-fielder Ron Leir, who, within minutes, had researched the answer: “The team was named for their skinny and spindly players.”)
