Scott Joplin, Ragtime, and Baseball in Sedalia, Missouri in 1900

Scott Joplin first achieved recognition as a composer with the publication of his Maple Leaf Rag in Sedalia, Missouri in 1899. A few months later, a Sedalia newspaper reported that Joplin and fellow musician Henry Jackson organized the Shortridge-Robb baseball club. The club planned to host a team from Kansas City at Liberty Park in Sedalia on 4 August 1900. Nothing else was published about the team in surviving Sedalia newspapers. This monograph examines the circumstances surrounding the organization of the Shortridge-Robb baseball club in an attempt to ascertain why it was organized and whether it played any games.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1022/thumbnail.jp

Integrated Baseball in Kansas during the Sport’s Era of Segregation, 1865–1945

Black athletes were barred from playing baseball in the major and minor leagues prior to 1946 with few exceptions. The implementation of the color line in organized baseball during the nineteenth century has been the focus of thorough research. Less studied is integrated baseball among independent town teams, and this research has focused on particular players or circumstances rather than an entire state or region across a broad span of baseball history. Integrated teams in Kansas provide a unique opportunity to examine their history at these larger scales. Prior to 1946, major league baseball was essentially concentrated east of the Mississippi River, which placed Kansas on the sport’s broad western frontier. Also, the role of Kansas in the prelude to the Civil War placed the state on the boundary separating North from South. In addition to the geographical context, most newspapers published in the state prior to 1923 and several published after that year have been digitized. Collectively, these circumstances make Kansas well suited to serve as a case study of the broader history of integrated baseball from 1865 to 1945. This book begins with biographies of more than 80 Black baseballists who played or umpired games with white or predominantly white town teams and minor league clubs, as well as predominantly Black teams that had white players. With the foundation provided by these experiences, the questions of why, when, and where integrated town teams took the field are examined and placed within the context of segregation and exclusion across the broader community.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1032/thumbnail.jp

Freshwater Mussels of Kansas: Register of Taxa, Synonyms, and Assumed Misidentifications

The literature on freshwater mussels (Mollusca: Margaritiferidae and Unionidae) of Kansas includes a collection of names of species and subspecies that makes it difficult for even experienced malacologists to decipher which taxa actually were collected. Compounding this problem is the absence of voucher specimens for some of the studies conducted in the state. This list was compiled to aid those who are conducting research and want to assess their results with reference to the earlier accounts. The alphabetical list of valid taxa, synonyms, and assumed misidentifications of freshwater mussels of Kansas is drawn from the literature and not an examination of specimens. In addition to the list of taxa, published references and selected reports that include each species or synonym are provided

Annotated List of Diatoms Reported From Kansas

This annotated list has been prepared to organize all of the available information in the literature on the diatoms of Kansas. The literature also has been reviewed to briefly summerize the history of research on diatoms in the state.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/fort_hays_studies_series/1063/thumbnail.jp

Deaf Baseball Players in Kansas and Kansas City, 1878–1911

During the late 1800s and early 1900s, William Hoy and Luther Taylor were well-known baseball players in the major leagues. Hoy and Taylor were also deaf. Consequently, they were given the same inappropriate nickname—Dummy. Several other deaf ballplayers enjoyed careers in the major and minor leagues, as well as on other professional teams. This narrative focuses on the lesser-known aspects of the early history of deaf baseball players and teams, with an emphasis on Kansas. It opens with the experiences of students at the Kansas State School for the Deaf at the end of the nineteenth century, where Luther Taylor was a student. The successes of players on school teams led to the organization of independent teams composed primarily of deaf players, such as the Kansas City Silents. This narrative closes with the minor league career of Joseph Laughlin, a well-liked third baseman with good defensive skills, who was nevertheless stereotyped for being both deaf and American Indian, neither of which affected his ability to play baseball. A preliminary list of deaf ballplayers in the major and minor leagues prior to 1920 is also included.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1010/thumbnail.jp

Baseball Career of Andy Cooper in Kansas

Andrew Lewis Cooper was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006. He was a lefthanded pitcher, who played and managed in the Negro Leagues from 1920 until his death in 1941, mostly for the Detroit Stars and Kansas City Monarchs. Cooper also played baseball in California, Cuba, and the Far East. However, his life before 1920 has been little studied. Andy Cooper was born in Texas, probably in 1897. Although he was a resident of Waco and began playing baseball in northern Texas, contemporary newspaper reports document an African American pitcher from Texas named Andrew “Lefty” Cooper playing for baseball teams in Wichita, Kansas during the summers of 1917 and 1919. In addition, Andy Cooper lived in Wichita during parts of the offseason while he played in the Negro Leagues during the 1920s and 1930s. He also wrote about baseball and his extensive travels in a series of columns for a Wichita newspaper, the Negro Star. This monograph recounts Cooper’s experiences in Wichita and frames some of the questions about his early life still in need of thorough research.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1027/thumbnail.jp

Promoting Good Roads: Basketball and Baseball on the Red Line Road in 1915

The first good road associations in Kansas with an interest in interstate travel were organized in 1910–1914. Construction of roads in rural Kansas was seen as a benefit to farmers and ranchers and to towns trying to attract visitors as automobiles and cross-country trips became more common. Initially, most of these efforts were implemented by counties and other local entities, with volunteers making substantial contributions. Most of these early routes were marked by colored bands painted on telegraph and telephone poles. Thus, they were sometimes known by names such as the Red Line Road or Golden Belt Road. These two roads ran from Kansas City to Denver but followed different routes across most of Kansas. To promote the Red Line Road, boosters in Glasco and Plainville organized sports teams to barnstorm across Kansas and eastern Colorado, painting bands on poles as they went. The teams scheduled games in towns along the route to earn money to pay their expenses. This monograph presents an overview of early road construction in Kansas and the efforts of the Glasco basketball team and Plainville baseball team in promoting the Red Line Road in 1915.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1021/thumbnail.jp

Who’s on First? Kansas City’s Female Baseball Stars, 1899–1929

Although female players were typically excluded from formal baseball teams, teams consisting entirely or partly of female players were organized across the country as early as the mid-1800s. The first female baseball club in Kansas and adjacent states was organized in Wichita in 1873. These early teams predated the arrival of the barnstorming teams with female players and usually one or more male players, who were sometimes disguised as women. Female players on most of these early traveling teams wore bloomers, and the teams were referred to as “bloomer girls.” Women on later teams wore traditional baseball uniforms and objected to the name. Some of these professional female ballplayers of the late 1800s and early 1900s, such as Maud Nelson of Chicago and Lizzie Murphy of New England, became well known. Two of the prominent players lived in Kansas City. This is the story of the professional careers in baseball—not softball—of Mae Arbaugh from Kansas City, Kansas and Ruth Egan from Kansas City, Missouri, both of whom played first base from 1899 to 1929, earning the respect of fans and male players.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1009/thumbnail.jp

“What’s in a name? Baseball Goes to Town in 1886

In 1886, the St. Louis Browns of the American Association defeated the Chicago White Stockings (now the Chicago Cubs) of the National League in a postseason series, the only time an American Association club won the series played from 1884 to 1890. Also in 1886, the Missouri Pacific railroad organized the construction of a rail line in Kansas from Council Grove through Osage City to Ottawa. To commemorate the Browns’ season, the Missouri Pacific named two new stations after Browns’ players: Bushong in Lyon County and Comiskey in Morris County. Albert “Doc” Bushong was a catcher for the Browns, and Charles Comiskey was the club’s first baseman and captain (player-manager). Early reports of the towns named after baseball players contained incorrect information, but more recent publications have correctly described the events. This monograph provides additional details of the events and documents contemporary sources. The town of Comiskey no longer exists, but the small community of Bushong recently became a trailhead on the extensive Flint Hills Trail State Park, which follows the final alignment of the Missouri Pacific railroad bed.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1029/thumbnail.jp

Early Baseball Career of Carl Mays in Oklahoma, Kansas, and Utah

Carl Mays was a successful submarine (underhand) pitcher in the major leagues from 1915 through 1929 with the Boston Red Sox, New York Yankees, Cincinnati Reds, and New York Giants. He pitched in four World Series. He had 207 wins and 126 losses, with an earned run average of 2.92. His on-field credentials place him among the best pitchers of the time, yet Mays has not been enshrined with his peers in the National Baseball Hall of Fame. Mays had a reputation for pitching inside when batters crowded the plate, and he consequently hit 89 men during his 15-year major league career. Sadly, one of the batters he hit remains the focus of his professional baseball legacy. In 1920, a pitch thrown by Mays hit Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray Chapman in the head. Chapman died at the hospital the following morning, the only major league player to die from an injury received during a game. Other authors have described this tragedy in detail, along with other events in the major league career of Carl Mays. What has been missing is a fuller account of his early days in baseball, when Mays was a dominant overhand pitcher as a teenager for semiprofessional town teams in Oklahoma, Kansas, and Utah. This study focuses on his experiences during this formative period, including his participation in the “flat bat game” in Kansas and his stint as a pitcher in Utah after he was caught riding freight trains west to pursue his baseball career.https://scholars.fhsu.edu/all_monographs/1004/thumbnail.jp