Words and Illustration by B.E. Sabin | December 12, 2024
The Hat
I have a hat. It is made of black wool broadcloth, white felt, green satin, buckram, hair cloth, cotton, leather, and brass.
The meat and potatoes of the hat are the wool broadcloth, the felt, and the satin. The black wool broadcloth makes up the crown and the upper brim. While the under brim is made of green satin. The white felt is cut into the letters S, O, X. The letters are each an inch tall and ¾ of an inch wide. When put together without commas, they become the word SOX, which is a clever way of spelling the plural of sock. They are sewn onto the front of the crown, just above the short visor.
The seasoning of the cap is buckram, haircloth, cotton, leather, and brass. The buckram and haircloth are sewn onto the back of the front of the crown. They give support to the front of the crown. The sweatband is made of cotton. Cotton is a much nicer fabric against one’s skin, much nicer than wool, and much less itchy. On the back of the hat is a leather strap and a brass closure. The leather strap is adjustable so the hat better fits whoever is wearing it. The brass closure holds the leather in place so the wearer of the hat doesn’t have to constantly keep fiddling with it.
When put together the meat and potatoes and seasoning look like this:
The Baltimore Black Sox
The cap that all of these ingredients have created was worn by the 1926 Baltimore Black Sox of the Eastern Colored League (ECL). However, technically, the original hat wouldn’t have had an adjustable leather strap with a brass closure, and the sweatband would most likely have been made of leather.
“But wait,” you say, “weren’t the Black Sox that dirty team from Chicago that threw the 1919 World Series? You know, the team with Shoeless Joe Jackson?”
Well, yes, that is a nickname for the 1919 Chicago White Sox, but they wore white socks. The Baltimore Black Sox wore black socks. The press dubbed the White Sox the Black Sox after the scandal of the 1919 World Series broke. But, it’s also possible that the nickname originated earlier. The story goes that Charles Comiskey, the owner of the White Sox, refused to pay the laundry bill for the team’s uniforms, saying that the burden lay with the players. Well, the players weren’t too happy about that and refused to launder their uniforms. Following several games of this cleanliness strike, their uniforms became increasingly dirty, and, among other articles of clothing, the White Sox white socks turned black. But enough about dirty socks/Sox.
Back to the Black Sox, the real Black Sox that is. The Baltimore Black Sox were a professional baseball team from 1913 through 1936. They played in various Negro leagues, starting initially as an independent team before joining the Eastern Colored League for its 1923 inaugural season. The Sox remained in the league for its duration, from 1923 through 1928.
Following the demise of the ECL, the Black Sox jumped to the American Negro League (ANL) for the 1929 season, winning the ANL Championship. After the ‘29 season, the Black Sox went independent again for the ‘30 and ‘31 seasons before joining the East-West League for the 1932 season. Continuing their nomadic lifestyle they jumped to the second incantation of the Negro National League (NNL) for the 1933 season, disbanded before the ‘34 season, and then returned as a different team using the same name for the ‘34 NNL season. The newly minted Black Sox saw little success and fell apart after the ‘34 season. They returned for the last time in the 1939 Negro American Association but disbanded when the league collapsed.
1926 Baltimore Black Sox
As I mentioned earlier, I have a hat. A 1926 Baltimore Black Sox hat. But who were the 1926 Baltimore Black Sox?
The long and short of it is that they weren’t a very good team. They finished in last place in the ECL with a 22-38-2 record. A whole 18 games back of the championship-winning Hilldale Club.
The 1926 Black Sox were in a transitional year. They had a new manager, Ben Taylor, who was the former manager of the Washington Potomacs (1923 and 1924) and had previously played first base for the Harrisburg Giants in 1925 under manager Oscar Charleston. He was a player(first base)/manager for the Sox and was well-known as the premier defensive first baseman of his time. Taylor would finish his career with a lifetime .337 average and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 2006.
Another Hall of Famer on the club was Jud “Babe Ruth” Wilson. Wilson, who held down right field, led the ‘26 Sox with 24 stolen bases and a .487 on-base percentage. He finished his career as a three-time All-Star, a two-time batting champ, a two-time World Series champ, and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 2006 along with his teammate, Taylor.
The ace of the club was Joe Strong who finished the season with a 3-5 record and a 4.18 ERA. Another banger for the Sox was Heavy Johnson. In 1926, Johnson played left field and had a .350 batting average over 163 plate appearances. Johnson had an illustrious career, winning the Negro National League Triple Crown with the Kansas City Monarchs in 1923. He also won two batting titles and was a World Series winner with the Monarchs in 1924.
One would think that with such a solid lineup, the ‘26 Sox might have fared a bit better, but, sometimes bats aren’t everything. It doesn’t matter how solid the wood is on a boat, if there’s a hole, water is going to get in and the boat will sink. In the case of the '26 Black Sox, the pitching staff was their leak and no matter how many runs they scored, they could not stop the boat from sinking.
So yes, I have a hat. It’s a hat of the last place Baltimore Black Sox and I love it.
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