Really Need Help with PCL Players Reunion Photo

[OLDBILL]

I've had this photo for some time of what I think is a PCL Reunion. It was passed on to me from the daughter of a friend of Bill Tozer, a pitcher for the PCL League from 1903-1914, with the exception of pitching briefly for the Cincinnati Reds (NL) in 1908.
I'm hoping maybe someone out there who might be related to, or knows friends related to any of these players, - might be able to id somebody...I know it's a long shot...

I know for sure that #11 is Bill Tozer. As a reference, he was born in St Louis, MO 1882 and died 1955 in Belmont, San Mateo Co., CA. So, I'm just wildly guessing maybe the photo was taken between 1945-1955?

I've also attached a photo with names of the Buffalo Bisons PCL Team players whom he pitched for from 1906-1908.

A long shot, but this forum seems to be my last hope...

Any thoughts, leads or help would be really appreciated!

[Butch7999]

Just to alleviate any possible confusion, the team composite is of the 1906 Bisons of the Eastern League, not the PCL.
McManus (died 1923) is the only other member of that team besides Tozer to have played any part of his career in the PCL
(a single game for Seattle that same year). Only four other guys who played for Buffalo from 1906 through 1908
played any part of their careers in the PCL -- Bill Clancy (died 1948), Bill Malarkey (died 1956), Joe Raidy, and
Bill Thomas (died 1906).
Trying to save any wild-goose-chase efforts to match those Bisons to the guys at the PCL reunion, although if Clancy
and/or Malarkey can be identified at the reunion, that'd provide some window as to the date of the event.
Some of the reunion attendees look to be in their 80s, others barely 40, so depending on when the reunion
actually took place, you've got guys there who could've played any time from probably 1898 to the 1930s or '40s.
Good luck with the research!

[OLDBILL]

Butch,

Thank you so much for your kindness and taking time to reply...

The Buffalo photo seemed to be the only one out there that I could find so far showing team players together and your suggestion not to try and compare any of those players with Buffalo to the reunion photo I have is a wise one.

I know I can, and have already searched down single images of PCL Players from PCL cards and the like to try and compare to the reunion photos, but was hoping my best bet was that maybe someone might have been connected to one of the players in the reunion photo.

Trying to compare PCL player images when they were in their early years to photos of when they were older is certainly a challenge, - at least for me...I'm in my 70's now and I have trouble imagining it is the same person when I compare photos of myself now to when I was in my 20's! Ha!

Thanks for the facts and insight as I continue with my search for facts for my distant relative, William Louis Tozer.

Bill Tozer

[Butch7999]

Hi Bill, you're spot on about comparing young faces to old -- sometimes a strong similarity remains,
often there's little resemblance after many years (or even after not that many years -- oh for the head of hair
we all had just ten years ago!).

Glad to save you some time looking for Eastern League guys in the PCL, but really we've eliminated only
guys who played for Buffalo from 1906 to '08. Other players from other seasons, other teams, may be
among the reunion crowd. It's hit-and-miss, but Baseball-reference.com does feature photos of many career
minor-leaguers that could be useful for comparison. It'll be an arduous, time-consuming task no matter how
you go about it, but if you open up the page there that lists PCL seasons, you'll see links to each team,
and each team has a roster list for that season with links to each individual player and often a photo of the guy.

Those rosters are sortable by any statistical heading, so reunion guys with some identifiable physical trait
can be zeroed in on or eliminated. Ferinstance, player #4 in your photo looks about 5'5" and 130 pounds --
and younger than most of the other guys -- so if you see somebody with a face resembling his but that guy
was 6'3", 220, and born in 1875, that's probably not attendee #4. We'd also bet a day's wages that #16 is a redhead.

[oaks1912]

I do not believe that this is a reunion of players from the same team, PCL or other for a few reasons. #1) Individuals are a range of ages #2) PCL PLayer reunions, for the most part did not start taking place until the late 1980's / early 1990's well after Bill Tozer passed away....

It could be a baseball player "Dinner", of which there were hundreds hosted over the years just in Northern California. Several cities had 'oldtimers' organizations for retired players including San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose and Stockton. Most of these organizations held monthly meetings , as far back as 1941, plus many hosted special dinners. These organizations welcomed players that were former major leaguers, Pacific Coast League, California League, as well as other minor leagues as well as those who played "semi-pro" ball. There was usually a requirement that the player was born, lived in, or played in the city that he was being recognized as an 'oldtimer'. Since Tozer played for the Seals in 1914, he could have been a member of the San Francisco Oldtimers.

Although many players ended their 'professional' careers by their late 30's, many played at the semi-professional level for many decades. One catcher that I knew played until his early 80's.

You may want to check John Ward's site on semi-pro baseball in California (http://goodoldsandlotdays.com/). There are literally hundreds of team's listed with thousands of articles and group shots. You're unlikely to find a perfect match, but you might be able to pick out a few faces.

I do agree with your guess on the photo's age. Mid 40's-early 50's is a good start

[OLDBILL]

Mark,

I was only guessing that it was a PCL Reunion. Both Butch and you saw the age differences that I never noticed. The fact that he pitched last for SF and died in that area makes sense for this photo's origin to be as Mark describes. I will follow-up on your suggestions, especially the link and see what I can find and share back. In the meantime, I'm attaching a brief summary of Bill's career I've compiled so far to share with whomever might be interested.

Once again, thank both of you so much for your time and patience...

Bill

[Butch7999]

Holy crap!
Bill, you've presumably seen these accounts of the shooting incident:
http://library.la84.org/SportsLibrary/SportingLife/1911/VOL_57_NO_03/SL5703001.PDF
https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn88085187/1911-03-15/ed-1/seq-2/

Mark's insights are excellent and his advice wise. We had taken at face value your information that the photo
was from some sort of PCL reunion.

[OLDBILL]

Butch,

Sorry for the delay getting back with you...lots going on right now.

Thanks so much for the links to those 2 articles. Mine were from the SF Call newspaper and LA Herald. Correction, the shooting was actually on Sunday, March 12, 1911.

Searching a bit more, turns out this Flo Israel, the shooter of Bill Tozer and a reporter was not only an umpire for the day, but a bookmaker at the local race track.

Shooting happened outdoors after he and a group of friends had a party at the hotel everyone was staying. And somehow, he got a .22 caliber rifle from one of these party friends and his story goes that it was an accident because he was just joking because of comments made by some of the players earlier for "kidding him." The police arrested Israel,, but released him after booking him. Bill Tozer disagreed with the reason and hired a lawyer. Can't find how that turned out.

Regardless, the bullets stayed in Bill Tozer and he recovered, pitching a shutout to Oakland in Sep, 1911 (sot in March 1911). He stayed with LA until 1914, then went to Spokane and SF Seals in that same year.

Interesting enough, one of the answers to what do old BB Players do...Well, looks like at least in 1916, he became an ice skating teacher in LA! Ha!

The first link below is a great Calif Digital Newspaper Collection home page link (it's free); need to register (free) if you want to save articles as pdf's, jpgs, etc.

https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=p&p=home&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN-TOZER+shot-------1

The second link is that to the Bill Tozer skating article.

https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/cdnc?a=d&d=LAH19161222.2.602&srpos=1&e=-------en--20--1--txt-txIN-ball+players+turn+skating+teachers-------1

Bill Tozer