Philadelphia Teams

Today when you think Philadelphia baseball the Philadelphia Phillies automatically come to mind. But did you know that Philadelphia was once considered to be a baseball mecca with dozens of amateur and professionals teams dotting its landscape during the late 1800s into the mid 1900s?

The Philadelphia Phillies

The hometown Phillies played their inaugural season in 1883 and are the longest tenured team in sports history to have played in the same city and with the same name since inception.

Phillies History

Today, the Phillies play in Citizens Bank Park. Over the last two decades the Phillies have been instrumental in honoring the legacy of African-American baseball players who played in the city and over the years developed a strong bond with members of the Philadelphia Stars. Sadly the last of the surviving Stars, Mahlon Duckett, passed away in 2015 but the Phillies continue to honor the legacy of Duckett and the men who fought adversity to play the game they loved.

The Philadelphia Athletics

When discussing professional baseball in Philadelphia, one may call to mind the Philadelphia Athletics, now the Oakland Athletics, who played in Philadelphia from 1901-1954 as part of the new American Baseball League.

Athletics History

During the majority of their time in Philadelphia, the Athletics were the city's most popular Major League team. They won the American League title six times. However, by the beginning of the 1950s the Athletics popularity began to dwindle. This was due in part to poor play and in part due to a growing interest in the Phillies whose on field performance was on the rise.

On September 19, 1954 the Philadelphia Athletics played their last game in Philadelphia losing to the New York Yankees at Connie Mack Stadium. After the season, the team finished 60 games out of first place, was sold and moved to Kansas City. The team would stay in Kansas City until the 1968 season when they moved to Oakland, California.

In addition to being the home to the Phillies and the Athletics, Philadelphia was also home to a multitude of African-American baseball teams. Players, managers and owners all had an impact on the fabric of baseball not just in the city of Philadelphia but countrywide. During the course of the last two decades, the Phillies have helped to celebrate the storied history of teams such as the Philadelphia Stars of the second Negro National League and the Hillsdale Athletic Club (also known as the Dasies) of Darby, Pennsylvania located just a few miles from Philadelphia in Delaware County. Here is a look at some of the teams that contributed to Philadelphia's baseball history.

Excelsior Base Ball Club

In 1866 the Excelsior Base Ball Club was founded in Philadelphia. Often credited as the first all African-American team in Philadelphia, the Excelsiors played in the self-proclaimed First Colored Base Ball Championship against the Brooklyn Uniques. The game ended after seven innings when the Excelsiors forced the game to be called due to darkness. The score had the Excelsiors in the lead 42-37.

Philadelphia Pythians

The Philadelphia Pythians helped to establish Philadelphia as an African-American baseball city while at the same time inadvertently beginning the case for the unofficial segregation in the baseball that would plague the sport until 1947.

Founded in 1866 as the Pythian Baseball Club, but more widely known as the Philadelphia Pythians, the team was championed by civil rights activists Octavius Catto and Jacob White, Jr. The all African-American baseball team made history when they played in the first documented interracial baseball game against the Olympics in 1869. While this is monumental, it punctuates the separation between the teams by race.

Two years prior, on October 16, 1867, the Catto led Pythians applied for entrance into the Pennsylvania State Convention of Baseball in Harrisburg. The application for admission was denied due to their race with Convention members pointing out that more than two African-Americans were playing on the team, something that was not widely accepted at the time. The Convention also shared the sentiment that white teams would not accept the Pythians admittance.

While the Pythians operated primarily as an independent team, in 1887 they joined the newly founded National Colored Base Ball League as an original member. The Pythians and the league both folded within two weeks of the opening season.

Philadelphia Giants

The Philadelphia Giants were founded in 1902 and continued to play until 1911. The Giants owner Henry Walter Schlichter, manager Sol White and Harry A. Smith were the founders of the National Association of Colored Baseball Clubs of the United States and Cuba (NACBC). The NACBC, founded in 1907, was one of the first attempts to organize a formal Negro League and the Giants dominated play winning the championship five out of the six years they played in the league. After the 1909 season the Giants left the NACBC to return to independent play before disbanding in 1909.

Hilldale Athletic Club

In the spring of 1910, 19-year old Austin Thompson organized the Hilldale Amateur Baseball Club in Darby, Pennsylvania. Situated just a few miles outside of Southwest Philadelphia, Darby was a strong African-American community. The team, known as the Hilldale Athletic Club or Hilldale Daises, caught the attention of businessman and baseball enthusiast Ed Bolden. By the end of the 1910 season, Bolden was able to gain control of the team from Thompson and promptly began work to elevate the status of the team.

The team had success under Bolden's watch. He tirelessly promoted the team as black-owned and operated leading to the recruitment of top talent as well as increased interest and support. By 1914 Bolden had managed what may have seemed impossible, the construction of Darby Field, better known as Hilldale Park. Hilldale Park was in the community and was easily accessible on game days thanks to Bolden's deal to have the local trolley company run trolleys to the field.

When the Negro National League was formed in 1920, the Hilldale club was accepted as an associate member. Despite the alliance, Bolden refused to follow the rule not to pillage players from other teams within the Negro National League. This led to feuds between Bolden and NNL founder Rube Foster. Adding fuel to the feud was that Bolden also resented the clause stating that NNL teams could not play teams outlawed by the NNL. By 1923, Hilldale pulled out of the NNL relationship and Bolden joined forces with Nat Strong, a white promoter from New York, to form the Eastern Colored League with Hilldale as an original team.

By the end of the 1924 season, Bolden and Foster forged a frosty truce that paved the way for the inaugural Colored World Series that pitted the NNL Kansas City Monarchs against Hilldale. The Monarchs emerged victorious in the nine-game series but the following season Hilldale would claim the title five games to one. But the following season Hilldale did not perform well. By 1930, with the team not living up to its winning legacy, Bolden was pushed out by the Hilldale board who purchased his shares of the team. Hilldale would continue under the leadership of John Drew until 1932 when the team folded.

Nearly 64 years after the Hilldale team folded, the Phillies helped to recognize the Hilldale Athletic Club and its contribution to baseball. On October 14, 2006 a marker was erected at the corner of Chester and Cedar streets and reads:

The Hilldale Athletic Club (The Darby Daisies)

This baseball team, whose home was here at Hilldale Park, won the Eastern Colored League championship three times and the 1925 Negro League World Series. Darby fielded Negro League teams from 1910 to 1932. Notable players included baseball hall of fame members Pop Lloyd, Judy Johnson, Martin Dihigo, Joe Williams, Oscar Charleston, Ben Taylor, Biz Mackey, and Louis Santop. Owner Ed Bolden helped form the Eastern Colored League.

Harry Passon, a white businessman, became a great promoter of sports in Philadelphia. He was a member of the South Philadelphia Hebrew Association Basketball team who went on to found, along with fellow teammates Ed Gottlieb and Hughie Black, the PGB Sporting Goods Store in 1920. The endeavor began as a way to provide quality uniforms for their basketball team. Passon would soon buy out his partners and operate the store on his own as Passon's Sporting Goods.

It was during this time that he began to extend his reach beyond basketball and his store. He worked to found, support and promote sport area sport teams. He took a particular interest in baseball and founded both the white Passon Athletic Club and the African-American Bacharach Giants. As part of his plan to promote the game he took over a field at 48th and Spruce, dubbed Passon Field, and installed lights and seating. The field would be home to the Philadelphia Stars during the 1933 baseball season.

In 1931 Harry Passon, a white sporting good storeowner and promoter of semi-professional sports throughout the Philadelphia area, formed the Bacharach Giants. The Bacharach Giants were not an original team but rather the resurrection of the Atlantic City Bacharach Giants that was first founded in 1916 and folded in 1929. The talent that Passon pulled for his team sparked interest and a following in the African-American community and Passon hoped to further grow interest by joining the newly formed National Negro League.

However, Philadelphia Stars owner Ed Bolden whose Philadelphia Stars were being courted to play in the NNL, quashed Passon's membership attempt stating that Philadelphia could not support two NNL teams. Passon's application was denied and he opted not to fight the ruling. Despite this, he continued to field the Bacharachs and due to their strong play in the first half of the 1934 season, they were offered NNL membership for the second half of the season. The affiliation did not last long as the team, and the field at which they played (Passon Field at 48th & Spruce Streets, Philadelphia), was plagued by violence which led to Passon's withdraw of his team in 1935. The team continued as a semi-professional team, playing at Passon Field for a number of years.