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Historic Game Program Discovery: July 7, 1942 Service All-Stars
By the summer of 1942, the transformation of professional baseball was well underway. Starting with a trickle of personnel hanging up their flannels and spikes to volunteer for wartime service in the armed forces in December, 1941, the exodus of players from major and minor league baseball picked up a head of steam through the Selective Service draft and volunteer enlistments.
“Immediately after Pearl Harbor, baseball executives began devising scenarios in which the professional game could contribute to the war, even as some were questioning the need for the game’s very existence,” author Steven R. Bullock wrote in his 2004 book, Playing for Their Nation: Baseball and the American Military during World War II.
Thirty-nine days after the December 7, 1941 Japanese sneak attack at Pearl Harbor, baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis was prompted to dispatch a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt regarding the 1942 season:
January 14 1942
Dear Mr. President:The time is approaching when, in ordinary conditions, our teams would be heading for spring training camps. However, inasmuch as these are not ordinary times, I venture to ask what you have in mind as to whether professional baseball should continue to operate. Of course my inquiry does not relate at all to individual members of this organization whose status in this emergency is fixed by law operating upon all citizens.
Health and strength to you – and whatever else it takes to do this job.
With great respect,
Very truly yoursKenesaw M. Landis
January 14, 1942 Letter from Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw Landis to FDR
Those interested in baseball history know very well President Roosevelt’s famous “green light letter” response. The President detailed the importance of the game – 300 teams employing 5-6,000 players being a recreational outlet to 20,000,000 of their fellow citizens during the tough times the nation was facing. Despite his call for the continuance of the game for the sake of the citizens, the President did not levy any measure of exclusion of players from wartime service, “As to the players themselves, I know you agree with me that individual players who are of active military or naval age should go, without question, into the services. Even if the actual quality of the teams is lowered by the greater use of older players, this will not dampen the popularity of the sport. Of course, if any individual has some particular aptitude in a trade or profession, he ought to serve the Government. That, however, is a matter which I know you can handle with complete justice.”
By the spring of 1942, with players such as Hank Greenberg, Bob Feller, Sam Chapman, Hugh Mulcahy, Fred Hutchinson, Morrie Arnovich, Cecil Travis and Mickey Harris already serving in the armed forces, baseball owners sought out means to support the war effort by elevating the national morale. St. Louis Cardinals executive Branch Rickey, according to Steven R. Bullock, “expressed the opinion that baseball had an obligation to do everything within its power to bolster the Allied cause, even operating at a break-even level if necessary.” As baseball was deeply ingrained into the fabric of American life, it was more than just a sport or a pastime to the people, players and owners. Bullock continued, “For Rickey, professional baseball’s fate paralleled the fate of the nation as a whole, and thus the national pastime should not hesitate to drain its resources to support the war effort.”
Major League Baseball as a whole did operate at a loss during the war. Not only did clubs fail to cover costs due to reduced ticket sales, but each club donated money, equipment and other resources. With baseball’s players now serving, the issues and concerns of the troops were brought to the forefront. The Pearl Harbor attack and subsequent losses suffered by the armed forces early in the war illuminated the need to provide financial support to the surviving spouses of troops who lost their lives in service. Beginning with the May 8, 1942 Giants versus Dodgers game at Ebbets Field, Major League Baseball began a wartime campaign to raise funds to address the needs of troops and their families, with monies collected directly supporting Army and Navy Relief organizations, recreational equipment for troops and War Bond drives. Not only did baseball play regular season games to raise funds but professional teams played countless exhibitions against service teams throughout the war in support of troops and their families.
Perhaps the most notable fund-raising exhibition game was the one that was played early in the war at Cleveland’s Municipal Stadium, home of the American League’s Indians franchise. The game was slated to feature the winner of the Major League All-Star game playing host to an assemblage of players serving in the armed forces on the last of the three-day All-Star break, July 7, 1942. The Brooklyn Dodgers were originally slated to host the July 6 mid-summer classic at 35,000-seat Ebbets Field. With more than 50,000 seats available at the neighboring New York Giants’ ballpark, the Polo Grounds, Dodgers president Larry McPhail shifted the game. Inclement weather negated the move as thousands of fans did not attend the game. The National League All-Stars, headlined by Arky Vaughn, Johnny Mize, Mel Ott and Johnny Vander Meer, were favored over the American League led by Lou Boudreau, Ted Williams, Joe DiMaggio, Joe Gordon and Spud Chandler.
| National League | Pos | Batting Order | American League | Pos |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jimmy Brown | 2B | 1 | Lou Boudreau | SS |
| Arky Vaughan | 3B | 2 | Tommy Henrich | RF |
| Pete Reiser | CF | 3 | Ted Williams | LF |
| Johnny Mize | 1B | 4 | Joe DiMaggio | CF |
| Mel Ott | RF | 5 | Rudy York | 1B |
| Joe Medwick | LF | 6 | Joe Gordon | 2B |
| Walker Cooper | C | 7 | Ken Keltner | 3B |
| Eddie Miller | SS | 8 | Birdie Tebbetts | C |
| Mort Cooper | P | 9 | Spud Chandler | P |
| Leo Durocher | Mgr | Joe McCarthy | Mgr | |
| Frank McCormick | Rsrv | George McQuinn | Rsrv | |
| Billy Herman | Rsrv | Bobby Doerr | Rsrv | |
| Bob Elliott | Rsrv | Bill Dickey | Rsrv | |
| Ernie Lombardi | Rsrv | Buddy Rosar | Rsrv | |
| Mickey Owen | Rsrv | Hal Wagner | Rsrv | |
| Danny Litwhiler | Rsrv | Stan Spence | Rsrv | |
| Willard Marshall | Rsrv | Dom DiMaggio | Rsrv | |
| Terry Moore | Rsrv | Bob Johnson | Rsrv | |
| Enos Slaughter | Rsrv | Phil Rizzuto | Rsrv | |
| Pee Wee Reese | Rsrv | Jim Bagby | Rsrv | |
| Paul Derringer | Rsrv | Al Benton | Rsrv | |
| Carl Hubbell | Rsrv | Tiny Bonham | Rsrv | |
| Cliff Melton | Rsrv | Sid Hudson | Rsrv | |
| Claude Passeau | Rsrv | Tex Hughson | Rsrv | |
| Ray Starr | Rsrv | Hal Newhouser | Rsrv | |
| Johnny Vander Meer | Rsrv | Red Ruffing | Rsrv | |
| Bucky Walters | Rsrv | Eddie Smith | Rsrv | |
| Whit Wyatt | Rsrv |
Despite the heavy lumber on both rosters, the game was a pitching duel with the American League hurlers Chandler and Al Benton holding the Nationals to six hits and a run, a leadoff home run by catcher Mickey Owen in the bottom of the eighth inning. With the infield playing at normal depth, Owen had tried to catch the defense flat-footed with a bunt attempt that rolled foul. With a planned citywide blackout fast approaching, fans shouted at the Dodgers catcher to hurry back to the plate, to which he responded by trotting back to the dish from first base.
All the American League’s tallies came in the top of the first at the expense of starting pitcher Mort Cooper. Lou Boudreau led off the game with a home run. Tommy Henrich followed with a double to right field. Ted Williams hit a fly ball to Joe Medwick in left field and Joe DiMaggio grounded out to Arky Vaughn at third. With Henrich sitting at third base, Rudy York drove a ball over the right field wall for the second and third runs in the 3-1 victory. The game ended at 9:28 p.m. and the victorious American League squad was whisked away to board a train for Cleveland.
| Player | Pos | Order | Branch | Duty Station |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Pat Mullin | CF | 1 | Army | New Cumberland Army Reception Center |
| Benny McCoy | 2B | 2 | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Don Padgett | LF | 3 | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Cecil Travis | SS | 4 | Army | Camp Wheeler |
| Joe Grace | RF | 5 | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Johnny Sturm | 1B | 6 | Army | Jefferson Barracks |
| Ernie Andres | 3B | 7 | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Vinnie Smith | C | 8 | Navy | Norfolk Naval Training Station |
| Bob Feller | P | 9 | Navy | Norfolk Naval Training Station |
| Morrie Arnovich | LF | Rsrv | Army | Fort Lewis |
| Frank Baumholtz | OF | Rsrv | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Sam Chapman | RF | Rsrv | Navy | Norfolk Naval Training Station |
| Johnny Grodzicki | P | Rsrv | Army | Fort Knox |
| Chet Hajduk | 2B | Rsrv | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Mickey Harris | P | Rsrv | Army | 83rd Coast Artillery/Fort Kobbe |
| Fred Hutchinson | P | Rsrv | Navy | Norfolk Naval Training Station |
| Johnny Lucadello | SS | Rsrv | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Emmett “Heinie” Mueller | 2B | Rsrv | Army | Jefferson Barracks |
| Frankie Pytlak | C | Rsrv | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Johnny Rigney | P | Rsrv | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station |
| Ken Silvestri | C | Rsrv | Army | Fort Custer |
| Mickey Cochrane | Mgr | Navy | Great Lakes Naval Training Station | |
| George Earnshaw | Coach | Navy | Jacksonville Naval Air Station | |
| Hank Gowdy | Coach | Army | Fort Benning |
As the Major League All-Star festivities were taking place in New York, Navy Lieutenant Gordon “Mickey” Cochrane was leading practices for his new assemblage of Army and Navy ballplayers. By Saturday, July 4, Cochrane had assembled a squad of 16 players that included 14 with previous major league experience. “I won’t be able to pick any sort of starting lineup for the Cleveland game until we know whom we are playing,” the current Great Lakes Naval Training Station (GLNTS) Bluejackets manager told the Associated Press. “The major leaguers may beat us Tuesday night, but we’ll put up a helluva argument over the outcome,” LT Cochrane stated, following a Great Lakes 5-0 victory over the Fort Custer Reception Center (Battle Creek, Michigan) team at Detroit’s Briggs Stadium. Both service teams used players that would be among the Service All-Stars for the July 7 game. The Great Lakes squad saw Norfolk Naval Training Station’s (NTS) Fred Hutchinson start the game, with George Earnshaw completing the shutout. Mickey Harris, who had arrived fresh from the Panama Canal Zone, started on the mound for Fort Custer, with Ken Silvestri serving as his battery mate. With nearly 7,000 paid attendees, $10,000 was raised in support of service athletic funds.
The following day, the enhanced Great Lakes squad defeated an All-Star squad from the Flint, Michigan Amateur Baseball Federation in Flint. The Bluejackets featured Norfolk NTS outfielder Sam Chapman, the New Cumberland Army Reception Center’s Pat Mullin and Camp Wheeler’s Cecil Travis, who accounted for most the GLNTS firepower in the 8-2 victory.
After traveling from Detroit to Cleveland, the Service All-Stars held a workout at Municipal Stadium on July 6 as the American and National League squads squared off in New York. Newspapers were predicting as many as 75,000 spectators for the highly anticipated 9:00 p.m. game. Speaking to reporters a few days before his probable start against the eventual winner of the Major League All-Star game, Bob Feller was candid with his self-assessment. After spending the entire spring pitching for the Norfolk Naval Training Station club, Feller speculated that consistently facing inferior batters led to a dulling of his skills. “You throw to a lot of ham-and-eggers in some of these exhibition games,” he told Blosser. “You can’t keep an edge that way.” Cleveland Fans Cheer Bullet Bob Feller Even in Defeat; Fireballer Wasn’t Sharp for Battle – July 8, 1942
The Chevrons and Diamonds collection holds numerous scorecards and programs from service and fund-raising exhibition games from 1942 into 1946. With so many artifacts continuing to surface, we have been able to assemble a broad range that encompasses significant games in all war theaters as well as domestic games. One piece that was on our wish list was the program from the July 7, 1942 Service All-Star game in Cleveland. Over the holiday season, we were able to source and acquire a beautiful example in near-mint condition.
Sixteen pages cover-to-cover and printed on cardstock, the entire program (view a full PDF version), save for the scorecard inserted at the center, is the same as was used by the Cleveland Indians for their 1942 season home games. The internal pages are printed in blue monochrome with the covers being both blue and red, two-color printing. In addition to the scorecard with printed lineups and rosters, the program also includes two pages that spotlight the Service All-Stars.
Pre-game festivities included service marching bands and parading ranks of Army and Navy uniformed personnel. The “Clown Prince of Baseball,” Al Schacht, entertained fans while the Service All-Star starting pitcher, Chief Athletic Specialist Bob Feller, warmed up. Soon, Schacht began humorously mimicking Feller and the two began playing off each other for the crowd’s amusement. When the game finally got underway, the home team, the American League All-Stars, took the field with Jim Bagby, Jr. on the mound.
Bagby’s first pitch resulted in an easy infield ground ball from the leadoff hitter, Detroit Tigers outfielder Pat Mullin, for the first out of the inning. Second baseman and former Tiger and Athletic Benny McCoy watched four Bagby pitches pass by to earn a free pass. Left fielder Don Padgett strode to the plate and drove one of Bagby’s offerings to deep right center, splitting Tommy Henrich and Joe DiMaggio and dropping for a single. McCoy, with a slight lead off first, waited to see the ball drop before tagging and sprinting to second base. With two runners on base and just one out, former Senator star Cecil Travis worked another four-pitch walk from Bagby.
With the bases loaded, former St. Louis Browns outfielder Joe Grace stood on the right side of the plate. Having hit .309 with St. Louis in 426 plate appearances in 1941, Grace was a rising star in the American League before entering the Navy. Grace walked nearly twice as much as he struck out, showing that he was decidedly a threat at the plate. Bagby’s first two pitches were off the plate, placing the count decidedly in Grace’s favor and prompting the AL manager, Joe McCarthy, to get Red Ruffing up and warming in the bullpen. Bagby seemed to rebound against the Navy hitter as he pitched the count full before Grace watched strike three land in AL All-Star catcher Buddy Rosar’s mitt. American League umpire Ernie Stewart made the call.
Now with two outs and the bases still jammed, Johnny Sturm represented the Service All-Stars’ last hope to score. After fouling off the first pitch, the former Yankee grounded to Ken Keltner at third. Keltner easily tagged the bag to retire the side.
In the bottom of the inning the hometown crowd cheered the match-up of Indians teammates Lou Boudreau and Bob Feller. “Rapid Robert” coaxed the Cleveland shortstop to hit a routine fly ball to Mullin in shallow center field. As easy as the first out came to Feller, the rest of the inning didn’t go his way. Tommy Henrich drove a 1-2 count pitch back to the box, deflecting off Feller’s foot and allowing the Yankees right fielder to safely reach first. With one on and one out, Ted Williams came to the plate to face Feller. Williams worked Feller to a full count before coaxing a walk.
Centerfielder Joe DiMaggio faced Feller with a runner in scoring position and drove a pitch up the middle into center field, allowing Henrich to score and Williams to reach third. Rudy York stood at the plate with runners at the corners and one out and drove a ball to Joe Grace in right center. Williams tagged and crossed the plate to tally the American League’s second run. Feller coaxed Red Sox second baseman Bobby Doerr to foul out to third base and at least temporarily stop the scoring.
In the bottom of the second, Cleveland’s Ken Keltner legged out a triple to lead off the inning. Catcher Buddy Rosar followed Keltner with a single just out of reach of third baseman Ernie Andres, scoring Keltner. This led manager Mickey Cochrane to walk to the mound to hook his starting pitcher in favor of Johnny Rigney, a former Chicago White Sox hurler, who proceeded to shut down the American League stars. Rigney kept the AL score at three until he was spelled by Mickey Harris in the bottom of the seventh. Harris was dogged by a leadoff double by Phil Rizzuto, who then swiped third base. Williams, a recipient of three free passes in earlier innings, pounded a triple, scoring Rizzuto from third. Harris got DiMaggio to pop out to Travis at third base before George McQuinn tripled, driving in the fifth and final tally for the Americans as Williams crossed the plate. American League pitching held the servicemen to six hits in the 5-0 shutout.
The Service All-Stars had a total of six safeties, with singles by Padgett, Travis, and Sturm and two by Ernie Andres. Cecil Travis had the only extra-base hit, a double.
“We lost in the first inning,” Mickey Cochrane told Associated Press reporter Charles Dunkley after the game. “We had the bases loaded and a single would have changed the whole story. We just muffed a big opportunity. That’s all. You don’t get a chance to beat a team like those American Leaguers every day in the week. Poor Feller didn’t have a thing. I’ve never seen him get belted like that. It proves that he wasn’t there – his duties in the navy robbed him of his timing, his control,” Cochrane concluded. – The Muscatine Journal and News-Tribune (Muscatine, Iowa), July 8, 1942.
“I just couldn’t seem to get loosened up,” Feller told Ray Blosser of the Associated Press after the game.
When the game’s program-scorecard became available and we were able to secure a deal, it was a boon for our collection, which also includes photographs related to the game. The piece was a target of our search for more than a decade and the only drawback is that our example is unscored.
See Related Chevrons and Diamonds stories:
- Morrie Arnovich – Breaking Ground for Branch Rickey’s Bold Move
- Sam Chapman – A Lifetime Collection of Images: Star Baseball Player, Sam Chapman, the Tiburon Terror and Wartime Naval Aviator Part 1 | Part 2
- Mickey Harris – Visual Traces of a Wartime Service Career
- Hugh Mulcahy – Visual Traces of a Wartime Service Career
- Mickey Owen – Vintage Leather: Catching a Rawlings Mickey Owen Signature Mitt
Four New Flannels Added to the Chevrons and Diamonds Archive
Judging by the traffic flow through this site, one of Chevrons and Diamonds most popular features for readers is the Archive of Military Baseball Uniforms. Since it was established with a dozen jerseys and uniforms (including those in our own collection), it has grown tremendously as we add pieces that surface (and, hopefully, we catch them when they are listed), capturing photos and researching their designs, features and the associated assertions or provenance regarding their history. As of publication of this article, there are currently 19 items, with at least one queued up to add to the line-up. It should be prefaced that the critical commentaries regarding the pricing employ a measure of supposition and assumption (coupled with a small dose of sarcasm) while not taking anything away from the sellers’ rights to ask what they deem necessary.
In the last two weeks, we have observed three noteworthy jerseys listed at (online) auctions and there is a noticeable, if not just a negative trend with the sellers’ valuations. In September of this years, that upward trend of listing prices with the spate of wartime and mid-century Marines jerseys was noted with our article, Marines Baseball: The Many. The Pricey. – all of those jerseys remain unsold and relisted week after week. In the past decade, jerseys used by the Marines are the overwhelmingly market-dominant artifacts within this arena which causes anything different to stand out.
This humble Navy jersey, though lacking provenance or attribution (to a named player) garnered respectable interest from collectors, achieving a final bid price at just over $200 (source: eBay image).
Aside from the scarcity of baseball uniforms from the U.S. Army Air Forces (or its predecessor, the U.S. Army Air Corps), U.S. Navy pieces are a rare breed among wartime flannels. Two weeks ago, as an auction for a WWII Navy jersey was nearing its closing, the bidding drove the price higher from its $9.99 opening bid amount. After a ten-day run, the 21st and winning bid of $204.02 was a reasonable and sensible, considering the infrequency that any vintage Navy jerseys come to market. Among collectors in genre, the Navy jerseys that are on their wish lists are those that were used in the Pre-flight schools, used by the Norfolk area teams in 1942 to early 1943 and those that were on the Hawaiian and Pacific Island diamonds in late 1943 to late 1945. The Navy flannel in the recent listing was clearly not from any of these teams or games. Granted, the chances that one of those jerseys of having been game worn and used by a major leaguer are very good, but only one of them has surfaced in the last decade.
Reminiscent of the ridiculous asking prices of the aforementioned Marine Corps jerseys, not wanting them to be uniquely or alone in that sphere of insanity, the next two additions to the Chevrons and Diamonds archive, while they are quite fantastic pieces that would be fantastic additions to a military baseball collection, they are priced in a sphere well above reality. Both pieces were used by army personnel. one domestically and the other overseas, the sellers are either gouging and seeking to wait countless months, renewing their auctions repeatedly after the passage of each six-day segment without a bite – or – they simply do not understand the value of these items. Bear in mind that in recent months, there have been two 1940s (WWII-era) major league jerseys sold at auction, both worn by unknown players and have sold in the neighborhood of $200-$250. It is appropriate that these two jerseys, one from WWII and the other from the early 1950s and both from unknown players (most likely just average “Joes”) should be valued in the $75-100 range, when correctly compared with historic major league pieces.
Though this 1950s U.S. Army jersey from Wiesbaden, Germany is truly a beautiful piece, the asking price ($300) is about $220 above reality (source: eBay image).
Of the two Army jersey listings, one from the joint Army and USAF bases at Wiesbaden, Germany, is incorrectly listed as a World War II era piece. Since the War ended in 1945 and the base, a captured and converted Third Reich military facility, effectively began functioning as a U.S. base in 1946. While one might consider this fact a mere technicality, if the jersey was used in that or the immediately subsequent years, the features of the jersey itself give away the actual era (the 1950s). Listing the jersey as a buy-it-now with the price, $2 shy of $300, the seller is trolling for an ill-informed buyer (a sucker) who will bite on the fantastic design and excellent condition of the flannel. However, the seller left the door cracked for more astute buyers, indicating that a best offer will be accepted. Doubts remain as to the reasonable nature of an offer that would be deemed acceptable by the seller. Despite all of the pricing discussion, the jersey itself is a fantastic example of post-war design and the influence of the major leagues cascading down to the trenches of the military game. By the start of the 1955 season, the Dodgers was established as the dominant National League franchise, appearing in (and losing) five World Series since the end of WWII. The Wiesbaden Flyers jersey borrows many elements of Brooklyn’s uniform styling from this era, making it quite aesthetically appealing, though not for $298.00. As of publishing this article, the overpriced Wiesbaden jersey remains available.
The signs of usage (stains, wear marks) don’t take anything away from what is a great piece of military baseball history. However, what makes this jersey wholly unappealing is the insane asking price ($600) that is $500 too high (source: eBay image).
Not to be outdone by mere pretenders, another seller recently listed a vintage, WWII-era jersey that, aside from the unrealistic market expectations, is an otherwise fantastic piece. Listed with a single purchase option, the $599.99 (at least one needn’t spend a full $600 on sale price! The buyer gets to keep that $0.01 in his or her bank accounts…save for the $12.90 shipping charge) is beyond ridiculous and has edged to the realm of insanity. The road gray flannel clearly dates from the 1940s and, based upon the design, its age places it more from the World War II-period. The two-color block lettering that presents the base-name (Fort Lewis) in an arc across the chest is stylistically representative of what can be seen in most World War II uniforms. Other features of the jersey includes the vintage U.S. Army logo patch on the sleeve and the chain stitching across the back which might be the basis for the seller’s exorbitant selling price. Rather than having a game-worn jersey from a player, for a penny under $600, one can acquire a jersey worn by the most legendary figure from the Fort Lewis baseball team; its mascot. The short window of time that this jersey was available has expired and the seller has not yet re-listed the piece.
It is almost a shame to show this jersey in the same company as the two previous Army flannels. This piece is the nothing short of being genuinely historic as it is connected to a legendary team that was one win away from winning the ETO World Series title (image source: Goldin Auctions).
The last of the new entries for the Chevrons and Diamonds uniform archive truly is a piece of history that, for obvious (to military baseball fans) reasons, garnered the interest and the considerable final bid amount. Aside from the articles published to this site, the 71st Infantry Division’s Red Circlers ball club was one of the legendary teams that reached the pinnacle of the European Theater of Operations (ETO) 100,000 players strong baseball league. Despite losing to the Overseas Invasion Service Expedition (OISE) All Stars in the championships, the squad from the 71st was noteworthy having a roster filled with talent from both the major and minor leagues. Adding to the collector interest is that both pieces in this uniform group are named (to two separate team members) along with rock-solid provenance. Rather than see this group lurking in the shadows of the often-times seedy breeding grounds of nefarious activities (known by the simpler name – eBay), this group was listed with a reputable auction house.
Chevrons and Diamonds 