Cooperstown Confidential: a tribute to Big Daddy Crowe

Some players are just destined to be overlooked. Consider the case of George Crowe. The former Negro Leagues and National League first baseman died on Jan. 18, at the age of 89, yet there was nary a mention from most Internet baseball sources. I first learned about his passing while reading Bill Madden’s Sunday column in the New York Daily News. A few other newspapers covered the story, including the Los Angeles Times and the San Jose Mercury News, but for the most part the coverage seemed so shallow and incomplete. Though hardly a household name, George Crowe deserved better, even if the lack of attention probably wouldn’t have bothered him in the slightest.

Who exactly was George Crowe, you might ask? A left-handed hitting first baseman with power, he was baseball’s original “Big Daddy,” given the nickname long before Rick Reuschel, Cecil Fielder and (among today’s players) Cardinals star Matt Holliday. Crowe was also known as “Big George.” Either nickname described him well. He was 6-foot-2 l and weighed 215 pounds during his career, dimensions that might not sound overly large today, in the modern era of weight lifting, steroids and HGH, but were certainly well above average for ballplayers in the 1950s and ’60s.

As a ballplayer, Crowe was not a star, not a dominant player in either the Negro Leagues or the big leagues, but a solid ballplayer who enjoyed one season of glory with the Reds in the mid-1950s. As an amateur, he was actually a better performer at basketball. In fact, he was such a standout that he was named the first “Mr. Basketball” in Indiana state history.

Crowe eventually turned his hardwood skills into a professional basketball career, but only after a tour of duty with the Army during World War II. Upon his discharge in 1946, Crowe joined an integrated basketball team known as the Los Angeles Red Devils, where he became a teammate of Jackie Robinson. Crowe played so well for the Red Devils that he drew the interest of the famed barnstorming team, the Harlem Renaissance, also known as the Rens. Crowe remained with the Rens for two seasons, with one of his career highlights coming courtesy of a 19-point game in front of a large throng at Madison Square Garden.

Although he was a talented guard who could score, Crowe would find more long-term success in baseball. In 1948, Crowe signed with the New York Black Yankees of the Negro Leagues. Like most African-American standouts of the era, he longed for a shot at the major leagues. That opportunity finally came calling in 1952 with the Boston Braves. The following year, Crowe moved with the franchise to Milwaukee, where he played most of the time as a backup and a powerful pinch-hitting threat.

In 1956, the Braves traded him to the Reds, where he played sparingly before getting his first fulltime playing opportunity the following summer. Replacing the injured Ted Kluszewski at first base, the 36-year-old Crowe emerged as an All-Star, erupting for a career-high 31 home runs and slugging a solid .504. Those were numbers that were close to Big Klu’s level of production in 1956.

His career year in the books, the aging Crowe fell off significantly in 1958, losing his first base job and convincing the Reds to trade him. He finished his career as a backup with the Cardinals, where he added to his impressive pinch-hitting totals and ended up as the career leader in pinch home runs with 14. The record was letter broken by Jerry Lynch, Cliff Johnson, and most recently, Matt Stairs.

I find Crowe fascinating for reasons that go well beyond his rather pedestrian playing career. More significantly than his raw pinch-hitting numbers, Crowe became a quiet pioneer on the civil rights front, both in and out of the game. Shortly after his return from the war, Crowe took his wife to a local movie theater. As they watched the film from the lower level, a theater attendant approached the couple, informing them that they would have to vacate their seats and move to the blacks-only section of the balcony. Quietly but firmly, Crowe refused. He and his wife remained in their seats. One week later, the owners of the theater decided to integrate the building fully.

Crowe also did his best to improve race relations in baseball. Although he was a fading veteran by the time he joined the Cardinals in 1959, he did not hesitate to push the organization on the issue of segregation in spring training. The Cardinals, who trained in St. Petersburg, Fla., traditionally kept their white players and black players in separate hotels. Seeing the injustice in such an arrangement, and how it was angering some of the younger black players on the team, Crowe made a behind-the-scenes effort to change the situation. Crowe lobbied Cardinals management to stop the segregation and find a hotel willing to take all of the players, regardless of their skin color.

The change was especially important to a Cardinals club that would become one of the most racially diverse teams of the 1960s. Some of the team’s younger African-American standouts, like Bill White, Curt Flood and Bob Gibson, began to look to Crowe as a mentor and father figure. He fulfilled those roles into the early stages of the 1961 season, his career coming to an end after seven games as a pinch-hitter. Now 40, Crowe opted for retirement. Although he clearly would have brought value to a team as a coach, he decided to leave baseball entirely.

He also decided to leave mainstream civilization. Dissatisfied with the ways of life in the city, Crowe eventually moved into a small log cabin in the deepest woods of Delaware County, N.Y., not too far from us here in Cooperstown. Crowe lived off the land, while having to make do without artificial heat, electricity, or running water. Crowe enjoyed the solitude for more than 10 years before deciding to move later in his life to be closer to his daughters.

I began to learn about Crowe in 1998. That’s when several employees at the Hall of Fame, including this author, received a memo from Hall public relations director Jeff Idelson that Crowe would be visiting Cooperstown. He would accompany Arlene Howard, the widow of his good friend, Elston Howard, along with sportswriter Ralph Wimbish, who had just authored a biography of the former Yankee catcher. Jeff told us that Crowe, who had rarely been interviewed during or after his playing days, would be available for a question-and-answer session.

I remember meeting Crowe that day in 1998. He was polite and reserved, a true gentleman. I looked forward to interviewing him on camera for the Hall of Fame’s archive. It seemed like a rare opportunity, a chance to talk to a former player about life in the always-intriguing Negro Leagues. Then the interview began. I asked questions, but Crowe gave mostly one-line or one-sentence responses. He didn’t expound on any of the points he made. The interview quickly devolved into a teeth-pulling session, which ranks at about the low point of interviewing success. As much as I tried, I couldn’t extract many interesting answers from Crowe. He was just too reserved, too soft-spoken, and too uncomfortable in front of a microphone and camera.

The interview was a disappointment, but in retrospect, I learned something that day. Being a bad interview subject doesn’t make you a bad guy. Crowe was nice and polite, and meant absolutely no harm or malice. He was just naturally shy, unable to give colorful answers in the manner of a Buck O’Neil, and not one who seemed to enjoy talking about himself. Perhaps he was ill at ease speaking with a perfect stranger. And really, that’s perfectly understandable. Some people are just not comfortable speaking on camera, especially when they’re being peppered with questions from someone they’ve just met. They’re not losers or killjoys; they’re just human beings with different strengths and weaknesses than those who are naturals in front of a live microphone.

Even though the interview provided little tangible value, it didn’t detract from my first impression of Crowe: that he was a good and caring man who had taken some time to spend time with people who shared his affinity for his late friend, Elston Howard.

Perhaps it was Crowe’s inherent shyness that contributed to the lack of media coverage of his death. I still think the media dropped the ball on this one—specifically the baseball media that should be paying better attention to the game’s history. But I have a feeling that the lack of media stories about his death would have suited Crowe just fine. He never liked bringing attention to himself. Crowe, the man known as Big Daddy, just didn’t see the need for people to make a fuss. The man just didn’t have much of an ego.

A Hardball Times Update
Goodbye for now.

And that’s just another attribute, along with those unpublicized civil rights efforts on behalf of his fellow citizens and his Cardinals teammates, that made George Crowe a pretty cool guy.


Bruce Markusen has authored seven baseball books, including biographies of Roberto Clemente, Orlando Cepeda and Ted Williams, and A Baseball Dynasty: Charlie Finley’s Swingin’ A’s, which was awarded SABR's Seymour Medal.
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BlftBucco
13 years ago

I agree with you that the mainstream media misses out on covering deaths of players.  I found that the link listed below gives daily updates on all passings in the baseball community.  It’s a daily read for me.  More often than not, there is a link to an obituary or another interesting write up on the player.

There are quite a few links for George Crowe.

http://sports.dir.groups.yahoo.com/group/BaseballNecrology/messages

Bruce Markusen
13 years ago

Bucco, thanks for posting that link. It’s good to know about such a resource.

Claude
13 years ago

Crowe had a much more important role in basketball:

http://www.blackfives.com/tag/george-crowe+series/

Basketball writers were the first to know of his death, starting with BlackFives.com and followed by the Indy Star, The Johnson Country Franklin, IN News-Journal, the Sacramento Bee … because he was the first Indiana Mr. Basketball and because he was the last surviving New York Renaissance player.

In my series of conversations with Mr. Crowe, I didn’t sense any “shyness.”  What I picked up instead was that he appreciated being recognized for who he was and the effort to connect with him on his terms.

Thanks for the thoughtful piece. Especially thanks for sharing your personal encounter. Yes, “the media” mostly only cares about today’s news cycle.

BlftBucco
13 years ago

Claude,

Thank you for your writings on George Crowe.

Yours were the additional links that I was referring.

You have my sympathies on his passing, as it seems you had a personal relationship with Mr. Crowe.

Thank you for sharing your relationship and insight with those of us who may not have known Mr. Crowe.

Claude
13 years ago

“… it seems you had a personal relationship with Mr. Crowe.”

Thank you, but I didn’t really.  I guess I just treated it as if I did.  And then all of a sudden, I did. That’s the problem when you decide to care about something.  The deep loss here, in addition to Mr. Crowe, is the end of the Rens chapter, which is the loss above the loss, for which Mr. Crowe is also now the poignant symbol.

But as always, when one chapter ends another begins. (-:

Anna McDonald
13 years ago

I really enjoyed this. Thanks. This is interesting because right now I happen to be reading “The Way It Is” about Curt Flood. Talk about a candid interview.  This article fit nicely with that. Thanks.

Steve Treder
13 years ago

Great article, Bruce.  Crowe was obviously a remarkable fellow in many ways.

Bruce Markusen
13 years ago

Claude, did not know about Crowe being the last surviving member of the Rens. Were most of the Rens players of NBA quality? I’d love to hear more about Crowe’s abilities as a basketball player.

Claude
13 years ago

Graham, thanks.  I’ll check it out.

Bruce, yes. The Rens dominated the 1930s and 40s by whooping all-white teams like the New York Original Celtics, Philadelphia Sphas, Oshkosh All Stars, etc.

Every player on the team, certainly in the 30s and 40s, could have played in the white pro leagues. Except they were barred as individuals and as a team from joining the racially segregated Basketball Association of America and the National Basketball League, both predecessors to the NBA.  The emergence of the NBA effectively caused the Rens to dissolve, in so many words. 

There are parallels to the Negro Leagues, with a few big differences, one being that the African American basketball teams were playing against Caucasian teams routinely since prior to 1910.  Also, there was no basketball equivalent of Major League Baseball until 1950.

Of course there’s more to it than that but this is the summary.

Grandpa Boog
13 years ago

That is a great article. I well remember Big Daddy.

During what would have been his prime years, George Crowe was a backup to Joe Adcock in Milwaukee and then to Ted Kluszewski in Cincinnati. If he had played regularly, he’d have been a consistent 25-30 HR, 90-110 RBI man.

By the time the Cardinals obtained him, he was pretty much done, but as I recall, he hit 4-5 pinch-hit homers for StL, probably in 1958 or 1959.

—Stay tuned.

Graham Womack
13 years ago

If you’re into these kinds of stories, I strongly suggest you make my blog daily reading. One of my writers, Joe Guzzardi, does an excellent job noting the passing of old players. He wrote a tribute to Crowe earlier this week:

http://baseballpastandpresent.com/2011/01/26/remembering-big-george-crowe/

Red Nichols
13 years ago

Outstanding story, Bruce.  Thanks for bringing to life the face of a dimly-remembered baseball card.

I’d like to know more about the ‘fringe’ black players of the fifties, guys like Bob Thurman. Fascinating stuff.  .  .all I remember about George Crowe is that he was considered a threat to crush the ball at all times

gloria
9 years ago

George Crowe was my neighbor while I was growing up. He didn’t live in the woods or in a cabin as the media stated. He lived a simple life in a plain home with his partner, Tish. They were wonderful neighbors. George was a quiet man with a love for the simple life. He made a huge impact on my life regarding the civil rights movement. I had the honor to speak with him when President Obama was elected. It made my heart proud to know that he lived to see a black person become President of the United States.