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    The College of Wooster

    TITLE

    by

    Gregory James Van Horn

    Presented in Partial Fulfillment of theRequirements of Senior Independent Study

    Supervised byDr. David Gedalecia

    Department of History

    Spring 2012

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    INTRODUCTION

    Sports historians have long recognized the pivotal role that sport has played in

    creation a citys civic image. Whether this was a desire to be a champion or simply to be

    considered among Americas elite cities, the perception existed that professional sports

    conveyed the dreams and values of the community. Richard Grumau and David Whitson

    argued how sport could reinforce a communitys image and served as a vehicle for

    spreading a towns reputation. Further, the presence of a professional team for a larger

    metropolitan area helped to constitute a modern urban culture while also serving as an

    asset for attracting media attention and advertising the local economy. As Grumau and

    Whitson assert, A winning sports franchise could diminish the passing of the industrial

    age and turn a Cleveland into an oasis of pleasure. 1 This argument has been made over

    and over again for numerous cities by their politicians, the booster press, and

    entrepreneurs themselves in hopes of bringing in an expansion or relocated franchise, or

    pushing for public funding of new facilities. In Cleveland, athletic success in the postwar

    years drove the transformation in a city that was searching for identity to one that could

    proudly call itself the Best Location in the Nation during the postwar years.

    Sports in America had a significantly different place in American culture both before

    and after World War II. Prior to the war, people watched sports as a way to escape the

    troubles of their own lives and of those in American society- wars, unemployment, social

    conflict, political instability, and economic depression, among others. But the nature of

    sports spectatorship changed at the onset of the war, and sports in America and around

    2

    1 CITE- pdf 13, I-6

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    the world suffered for next several years primarily due to the stoppage of routine life

    during World War II. After the war, sports began to assume a largely different role in

    American culture and took on a whole new meaning in peoples lives. Sports historians

    Randy Roberts and James Olson wrote that in the postwar years, sports became not only a

    reflection of the changes occurring in the United States, but a lens through which millions

    of Americans interpreted the significance of their country, their communities, their

    families, and themselves. Consequently, they became a national obsession, a new

    cultural currency, [and] a kind of social cement binding a diverse society together. 2

    Of all the professional sports, baseball emerged as the most popular sport in America

    by the end of the 1940s. Baseball historian Jules Tygiel believed that postwar baseball,

    like America, seemed poised on the brink of change in many areas, largely reflected in

    the dramatically different relationship that unfolded between baseball and its fans after

    America emerged victorious from World War II. 3 During the postwar era, attendance at

    baseball games reached an all-time high, easily surpassing the previously established

    records from the popular 1920s. In 1945, as the war drew to a close, a record 10.8

    million fans attended baseball games. By 1946, as many of baseballs stars were

    returning to the game after serving duty, baseball attendance nearly doubled to 18.5

    million. The number rose to 19.8 million in 1947 and 20.8 million in 1948. Overall,

    average attendance between 1946 and 1949 jumped an unprecedented 16,027 people per

    game. 4

    3

    2 Randy Roberts and James Olsen, Winning Is the Only Thing: Sports in America Since 1945 (Baltimore:Johns Hopkins University Press, 1989), 9; hereafter cited as Winning.3 Jules Tygiel, Past Time: Baseball as History (Oxford [England]: Oxford University Press, 2000), 162;hereafter cited as Tygiel.4 Tygiel, 149.

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    No city exemplified baseballs growing role in postwar American society better than

    Cleveland, Ohio. Immediately after World War II, winning teams coincided with urban

    growth to produce what some people might consider the greatest period in the citys

    history. Cleveland had entered the war as a former industrial giant just beginning to

    shake off the effects of the Depression. Its population had dropped during the 1930s, and

    despite New Deal reforms, many of its factories were still not working to capacity. The

    war changed all of that as plants were reopened, work forces expanded, and people

    flooded to the city. By 1946 the value of goods produced in Cuyahoga County amounted

    to $2,673,300,000, more than 2.5 times the value of production in 1939. The labor force

    had increased by a factor of 1.6 during this time, and the industrial payroll had grown to

    2.8 times its 1939 level. In 1950, the city would achieve its highest-ever population

    figure, 914,808. 5

    When servicemen and women returned to Cleveland, they came back to a newly

    prosperous city as victors in the greatest conflict in history. The success of their

    professional sports teams would only serve to add to the general civic euphoria, and

    baseball provided the greatest thrill. In 1946, Bill Veeck, a thirty-two year old ex-Marine

    from Chicago, headed a syndicate that bought the Cleveland Indians franchise. Veeck

    was a showman who thought the game should be an entertaining experience for the fans.

    His unique promotional gimmicks provided a sideshow that certainly attracted fans, but

    more important, the strong Indians teams, led by player-manager Lou Boudreau and

    supported by a stellar pitching staff featuring Bob Feller, played exciting and winning

    4

    5 CITE- Sports in Cleveland , 84.

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    baseball. By 1947, the Indians were drawing so much attendance that all games had to be

    moved to Municipal Stadium, and the teams use of League Park ended. Attendance

    records continued to be shattered in 1948 as the Indians set major-league records for the

    largest crowds for a single game, doubleheader, night game, opening day game, and the

    season; a total of 2,620,627 saw them play that year, a record that would stand for the

    next thirteen years. 6 The team went on to beat the Boston Braves four games to two in

    the Worl d Series, and for the first time in more than a quarter century Cleveland had a

    world championship baseball team.

    From 1946 to 1954, Cleveland sports fans were in a state of euphoria, having never

    before experienced so much success in professional sports. By capturing this

    championship, Clevelands image rose above other elite cities, and professional sports in

    Cleveland grew into a special role for years to come. Through winning, the Indians

    signified the health and success of the community. The local press eagerly adopted The

    City of Champions as a proud, new claim on Clevelands place among other American

    cities, and proudly proclaimed the city of Cleveland to be The Best Location in the

    Nation. 7 Following the 1948 World Series, the Cleveland News Ed Bang wrote, Not

    only is Cleveland t he home of champions... but [it] is also the town that forces the five

    more heavily populated cities in general, and especially Greater New York, to bow low

    5

    6 CITE- Sports in Cleveland, 85. The single-season attendance record was broken in 1962 by the LosAngeles Dodgers7 CITE- The City of Champions also referred to the Cleveland Barons of the National Hockey Leagueand the Cleveland Browns of the National Football League, who also won their respective leaguechampionships in 1948.

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    when it comes to establishing attendance records. 8 Any chance a civic booster had to

    use numbers or slogans to positively measure Clevelands national value was taken. 9

    This study examines the creation of Clevelands civic image through the presence of

    the Cleveland Indians in the immediate postwar years. In his 1899 volume The Theory of

    the Leisure Class , Thorstein Veblen noted, The addiction to sports, therefore, in a

    peculiar degree marks an arrested development of mans moral nature. 10 Had Veblen

    visited Cleveland some ninety-one years later after writing these lines, he would have

    believed he had stumbled upon a completely amoral society. Sports seemed both a local

    and national addiction, and the leisure class had expanded b eyond any limits Veblen

    could have imagined in the 1890s. In Cleveland he would have found a daily newspaper

    devoting at least one-fifth of its column space to sports, new electronic media devoting

    equal if not greater amounts of time to sports, and a chamber of commerce that no longer

    viewed sports as a civically valuable consequence of normal business enterprise but

    considered it a main supportive member of the local economy.11

    More important, had he

    looked at the previous forty-five years of civic history in Cleveland, he would have noted

    a remarkable parallel between sports and civic progress. No longer an activity that

    seemed to take place independently of the citys development, sports be came linked to

    the social, political, and economic fortunes of post-World War II Cleveland.

    The first chapter examines Clevelands history from its beginning through the

    immediate postwar years. The chapter presents postwar Cleveland as a city determined

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    8 CITE- pdf 1229 CITE0 pdf 122, 4-2510 CITE- Sports in Cleveland, 83.11 CITE

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    to return to the national prominence it held prior to the Great Depression, and concludes

    by suggesting that the Cleveland Indians were helpful in that endeavor. Chapter Two

    provides a thorough history of baseball in Cleveland, but most importantly examines how

    the Cleveland Indians became important element in reviving a positive civic image after

    World War II. The third chapter analyzes Bill Veecks three and a half years as owner of

    the Cleveland Indians, from 1946 to 1949. While his time in charge of the club was brief,

    his impact was immeasurable. Through gutsy personnel decisions and whacky

    promotional gimmicks, Veeck created an environment at the ballpark that attracted fans

    in record numbers. At the same time, he put together the most successful teams in the

    history of the franchise, culminating in a World Series Championship in 1948. This

    chapter will examine the effect that Veeck had not only on his team, but on the entire city

    of Cleveland. Finally, Chapter Four discusses the role that the media played in

    galvanizing postwar Americas mass consumerism. More specifically, the chapter

    focuses on how sports media in postwar Cleveland helped attract attention to the

    Cleveland Indians.

    All in all, each chapter suggests that the Cleveland Indians played an important

    role in Clevelands transition to an era of postwar prosperity. The postwar years were a

    turning point in the history of both baseball and of the United States as a whole. The

    sport sought to revive its fortunes in conjunction with the relative stability of the citys

    economy and culture scene. The following chapters will show how the Cleveland Indians

    became a symbol of Clevelands perceived return to glory as it developed into a

    championship contender.

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    Cleveland looked to return to the national prominence it held prior to the Great

    Depression, and the Cleveland Indians were an important element in reviving a positive

    civic image.

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    CHAPTER 1

    A HISTORY OF CLEVELAND:EXAMINING CLEVELANDS PLACE IN POSTWAR AMERICA

    Cleveland was born on July 22, 1796, when General Moses Cleaveland arrived

    with a surveying party at the mouth of the Cuyahoga River. It remained a rather quiet

    canal town until a century later, when Cleveland had grown into the economic and

    cultural center of Ohio. The quiet canal town was a growing industrial and commercial

    power that epitomized the urban growth of the Industrial Revolution. Clevelands

    population had also grown dramatically by this time. Census figures showed that it

    doubled from 1850 to 1860, and then again in 1870. At that time Cleveland was the

    fifteenth largest city in the United States with 92,829 residents. 12

    Cleveland continued its growth into the twentieth century. The early decades

    showed a dramatically rising population that propelled the city to the fifth largest city in

    America with just under 800,000 residents in 1920, over double the 381,768 Clevelanders

    recorded in the 1900 census. Over one third of Clevelanders were foreign born, with

    large numbers of Italians, Poles, and Hungarians arriving in the city during this time and

    adding to the multi-ethnic flavor that included large populations of Czechs, Germans,

    Russians, and Jews. The search for employment and better living conditions in

    accordance with the ideals of the American Dream held by so many immigrants was

    realized instead in hard labor and the residential limitations of cramped apartments and

    tenements. Although some found a tremendous disassociation between the Old and New

    Worlds, many found hints of home in established or growing ethnic neighborhoods. Dirk

    9

    12 CITE- pdf 29, 2-2

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    Hoerder, in Identity, Conflict, and Cooperation: Central Europeans in Cleveland,

    1850-1930, surmises that immigrants found, th e old world existing in the new yet

    different, the new world to be understood with the emotions, values, and experiences of

    the old. 13

    Clevelands suburbs benefited to some extent from the central citys increasingly

    overcrowded living conditions. Bordering cities picked up some of the immigrant

    overflow, but more distant suburbs attracted established families looking to escape from

    the chaos of the industrial city. The aftermath of World War I revealed the first signs of

    rapid suburban growth and a decelerated rate for Cleveland. Advancements in

    transportation, namely the automobile, and communication in the twentieth century also

    encouraged the process along. Between 1910 and 193 0 Cuyahoga Countys population

    grew to 1,201,455, essentially doubling in the process. 14

    Clevelands black population also grew during this period. A large migration of

    blacks left the South to escape both poverty and prejudice, and made their way north to

    the industrial hotbeds of the Midwest. For much of the nineteenth century, Clevelands

    black population remained small; never exceeding two percent of the citys total

    population from 1850 to 1910, yet the actual number of residents grew from 224 to 8,488.

    The slow growth of the late-nineteenth/early-twentieth centuries exploded between 1910

    and 192 0, when the black population increased 308% to 34,451; the vast majority settled

    on Clevelands east side. By 1930 there were 71,889 blacks residing in Cleveland,

    making up eight percent of the total population. 15

    10

    13 CITE- pdf 29, 2-314 CITE- pdf 30, 2-415 CITE- pdf 31, 2-5

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    The twentieth century also saw the continued growth of Clevelands importance

    as a national power and Progressive urban model. Iron and steel continued to be the

    primary industries, followed by foundries and machine shops. Cleveland also moved to

    the forefront of national transportation technology with both aviation and the automobile

    industry. The diversified nature of the local economy was strong and increased the

    prospects of prosperity, despite keeping Cleveland from rising to the foreground of

    national attention in one field like Detroit (automobiles), Pittsburgh (steel), or even Akron

    (rubber). The wealth accrued through these industries enabled the city to give itself a

    needed facelift in various stages.

    The Group Plan of 1903 16 infused Progressive Era ideology into the

    redevelopment of Clevelands downtown. By the mid-1920s, construction in accordance

    with that plan had produced a new city hall, court house, board of education

    headquarters, public library, pos t office, and public hall. Additional construction projects

    produced the Union Terminal (better known as the Terminal Tower), which remains the

    most recognizable icon of Cleveland architecture, and the Ohio Bell Telephone Building.

    The transition from dilapidated buildings and slums in the heart of downtown to shiny,

    new skyscrapers symbolized and era of prosperity and vision, and gave Cleveland

    confidence that it was moving forward with no foreseeable end in sight. Yet one needed

    only look at Euclid Avenue, stretching east from Public Square in the heart of downtown

    to E. 105th Street, to be made aware of negative possibilities. Through the industrial

    boom of the late nineteenth century and into the twentieth, Euclid Avenue was considered

    11

    16 Explain what this plan is

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    to be one of the most beautiful streets in the world, let alone America. Mansions housing

    some of the wealthiest industrialists and entrepreneurs, including John D. Rockefeller,

    added to the picturesque visions of the tree-lined street. But following World War I many

    of these illustrious homes were abandoned as families moved to wealthy suburbs or to

    new cities altogether. Still, Cleveland was immersed in a new euphoria by the 1920s as it

    grew into a major American metropolis and saw no limit to its prospects. For many, the

    rising population and ever-present wealth were social givens that would pass from

    generation to generation. 17

    The Terminal Tower opened on October 23, 1929, and conveyed visions of a

    prosperous future for Cleveland. Six days later, the stock market crashed and with it fell

    Clevelands hopes. Former Plain Dealer editor Philip Porter argued that the Great

    Depression hit Cleveland harder than most cities. The bottom dropped out, he said,

    and there seemed to be no bottom to the bottom. Recalling bank failures, business

    closures, and lost jobs, he called the downward spin sickening and believed Cleveland,

    on a collective level, ente r ed into a state of depression that was as low as the highs had

    been high a decade earlier. Almost 100,000 Cleveland workers were unemployed by

    January 1931 and relief efforts only slowed the downward spiral. County work relief,

    amounting to nearly $200,000,000 between 1928 and 1937, was only one-sixth of the

    normal wages lost during that time. Cuyahoga County residents in need of aid or work

    relief escalated from 3,499 in 1928 to 77,565 in 1936.

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    17 CITE- pdf 32, 2-6

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    The economic hardships of the 1930s, while impacting those living throughout the

    county, were felt in different ways inside and outside of Cleveland. Those living in the

    suburbs tended to be affected much less than those in the central city, where poorer

    economic ar eas felt the worst hardships. Subsequently, the appeal of suburban life drew

    more residents from Cleveland into the surrounding communities. The 1930 census

    showed the population at 900,429, but also indicated that residents moved away from the

    center of the city to the outskirts, if not to a new city completely. By 1940 Cleveland

    would experience its first recorded loss in population, and the stage was being set for

    Clevelands apparent demise. 18 But civic leaders and city planners took note of these

    issues and knew they must be addressed in the postwar years. 19

    World War II provided a temporary relief from the hardships the industrial city

    first encountered during the Depression. Many in cities like Cleveland felt that postwar

    revival was inevitable. However, the conditions of local econ omies in respect to the

    modern needs of the nation le ft these cities in dire need of change. The age of heavy

    industry would no longer sustain the heart of a local economy, thus making it necessary

    that new industry was attracted to the city. Many city leaders recognized that dreams of

    growth needed to be replaced with plans for stability for the industrial city to survive.

    Put simply, in the aftermath of World War II, cities like Cleveland were looking for a new

    beginning. 20

    In the early 1940s, with America on the verge of entering the war, civic leaders in

    Cleveland began to ponder questions about the citys future. The Regional Association of

    13

    18 CITE- pdf 34, 2-719 CITE- pdf 34, 2-720 CITE- pdf 63, 3-2

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    Cleveland put together a report in 1941 addressing the next stage of city growth. The

    report, looking back upon the rapid growth of the 1920s, commented:

    One of the results [of the growth] was the setting up of scores of independent

    municipalities, each with its own complete government, complicating theadministration of governmental functions, duplicating services, and thus wastingtax money. This may have seemed expedient at the time, but in the long run it isan inefficient type of governmental organization for a community as much asocial and economic unit as Greater Cleveland. 21

    It considered Cleveland to be an unorganized city that wa s inconvenient for the people

    who lived and worked there. It especially noted that the city was in great need of better

    adapting its street systems to accommodate automobiles. The report concluded that by

    1960 Cleveland would no longer experience population growth, and therefore needed to

    concentrate on renewal of its land to meet the needs and the living conditions of its

    citizenry. 22

    As a result, attempts to plan Clevelands future accordingly began in 1943, when

    the Postwar Planning Commission laid out specific areas of need. Mayor Frank Lausche

    set up the commission ...not only to build the bridge from war to peacetime production

    but also to lay plans for making Clevelands industrial advantages so patent that we can

    keep all of the industries we have and attract new ones... 23 Politicians, business leaders,

    and other civic promoters realized that the days of rapid growth were over and had been

    replaced by a time of direct competition between all industrial cities. Lausches

    commission listed five areas that deserved individual panels for evaluation:

    transportation, public works, interracial relations, the needs of returning servicemen, and

    14

    21 CITe- pdf 6322 CITE- pdf 64, 3-323 CITE- pdf 64

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    public finance. These steps towards addressing Clevelands urban planning needs were a

    positive first step and coincided with the hopes of a Plain Dealer writer who in 1940

    proclaimed that Cleveland, if it could not be a bigger city, could become a far better

    one.24

    Postwar Cleveland did indeed act on the recommendations of the panels formed

    through Lausches commission. The urban renewal movement was laced with elements

    of social reform. New Mayor Thomas A. Burke addressed some of the citys

    transportation needs through the construction of a downtown airport and also pushed for

    the development of a rapid-transit system. Old transit lines were replaced by busses with

    routes that included some of the surrounding suburbs. The need to connect Clevelands

    residents to the central city went beyond the rapid-transit system and beyond the city

    limits. Major freeway development connected the outlying suburbs to the central city,

    although it consequently fragmented some existing communities.

    Clevelands neighborhoods remained an issue with the panels recommendations

    for interracial relations. The panel focused on key issues impacting the quality of life for

    Clevelands black residents and the interaction with the white population, which included

    housing, health, recreation, and working conditions (including hiring practices). This

    culminated in the 1954 formation of the Cleveland Community Relations Board.

    Clev elands overall racial acceptance, although perceived as being rather liberal, was not

    all-encompassing and was most evident in the citys housing patterns. Black residents

    were often limited to certain areas on Clevelands east side. Few new homes were being

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    24 CITE- pdf 64, 3-3

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    is a widespread fear of doing anything for the community on a big scale. If it isnot quickly dissipated, this fear is going to block the best efforts of those whohave faith in the future of Cleveland and who have been doing their part to helpCleveland realize that future. 26

    At the heart of this statement were concerns that Cleveland faced the immense challenge

    of not being lulled into a false sense of security and satisfaction through its prosperity and

    overall appearance. Signs of decay were present, and heroic action was needed by

    civic leaders if Cleveland was to avoid the doom of the city, with all of the economic

    loss and the human suffering involved in the virtual abandonment of institutions which

    men have labored for years to build. Cleveland needed positive actions to replace

    booster rhetoric and boasts if the perception of the citys bright future was to become a

    reality. 27 The next chapter will show how such positive actions came from the

    unprecedented level of success achieved by the Cleveland Indians during these postwar

    years.

    Overall, postwar industrial city faced multiple challenges as the nation braced for

    a return to a peaceful existence. The threat of fascism that had unified Americans

    through the overall war effort was symbolically replaced, to some extent, in aging central

    cities such as Cleveland by threats regionally from growing suburbs and nationally from

    other emerging markets. In the face of these challenges, Cleveland looked towards urban

    revival as it transitioned to a peacetime economy and a new America. The transition for

    the postwar city faced decisions regarding not only shifts in the economy, but also those

    on issues of the suburbs and race relations.

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    26 CITE- pdf 27 CITE- pdf 68, 3-5

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    Professional baseball in 1945 was faced with a similar transition into a new era in

    American history. In Cleveland, the Indians welcomed back Bob Feller from his naval

    service, and also welcomed a new owner, Bill Veeck, who would elevate the franchise

    and the sport to never before seen heights. Both city and sport embraced the postwar

    period with anticipated prosperity, and indeed the early years offered hope for the future.

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