minor league photo help

[darwinbulldog]

Hmm, promising that the one Mississippi team on the list is 1921-1923. Thank you very much. I'm also told he played for one of the Cardinals' farm teams. Maybe that's the Foundation team. The Greenwood Indians don't have any listed affiliation. My understanding of it, and this is just based on what I recall from Ken Burns, is that the Cardinals were the only major league team that really had an extensive farm system in those days, but I don't think the family member who told me about the St. Louis affiliation would have had any knowledge of that. Alright, I'm off-topic enough for now. I'll continue the investigation on my own.

[RUKen]

Originally Posted by darwinbulldog

I'm also told he played for one of the Cardinals' farm teams.

"Herbert A. “Hooks” Dessauer, Shirley’s husband, was a semi-pro baseball pitcher who went to Spring Training with the Cleveland Indians and was offered in the 1920s a professional contract with the St. Louis Cardinals, but turned it down because of family obligations."

Source: http://iagenweb.org/clinton/people/patin/PTPatin.htm

(This source also includes the photo that was posted above.)

[darwinbulldog]

Originally Posted by RUKen

"Herbert A. “Hooks” Dessauer, Shirley’s husband, was a semi-pro baseball pitcher who went to Spring Training with the Cleveland Indians and was offered in the 1920s a professional contract with the St. Louis Cardinals, but turned it down because of family obligations."

Source: http://iagenweb.org/clinton/people/patin/PTPatin.htm

(This source also includes the photo that was posted above.)

And that would seem to solve the mystery, but I am in a position to be able to consider the source. The guy who wrote all of that is my grandfather's cousin, and I suspect he just made up the whole thing about the Cleveland Indians because it seems consistent with the picture. "Oh, the Indians. Guess he was with Cleveland. I'll write that." I don't believe Cleveland ever had uniforms with "Indians" on them until the 1940s. Does anyone else know otherwise or know that this is true?

Also, my grandfather, that is Herbert's own son and a baseball enthusiast in his own right, never said anything to me about Cleveland. And he talked about baseball pretty much every day of his life. The Cardinals were always his favorite team, and that was because his father had been in their farm system for a time. It's possible they offered him a big league contract, but I doubt that part of the story as well, as it just seems like something that members of his immediate family would have known about and mentioned to me at some point. Also it seems unlikely that he would have been offered the opportunity to play in St. Louis without having accomplished enough in the minors to show up in the baseball-reference database, but maybe it's less thorough than I give it credit for. It also seems to me if he had been that good that soon he would have been something of a local legend as opposed to just the great-grandfather who played a little minor league ball once.

[thecatspajamas]

FWIW, the minor league info in baseball-reference is far from perfect when you get back into the 1920's and earlier. Some are better than others, but seems to be largely dependent on the availability of source material. Lots of question marks next to player names for many teams indicating uncertainty.

[RUKen]

Originally Posted by darwinbulldog

And that would seem to solve the mystery, but I am in a position to be able to consider the source. The guy who wrote all of that is my grandfather's cousin, and I suspect he just made up the whole thing about the Cleveland Indians because it seems consistent with the picture. "Oh, the Indians. Guess he was with Cleveland. I'll write that." I don't believe Cleveland ever had uniforms with "Indians" on them until the 1940s. Does anyone else know otherwise or know that this is true?

You're right; according to the Hall-of-Fame uniform website, Cleveland didn't have "Indians" on the uniforms until 1946.

The Baseball-Reference roster for the 1923 Greenwood Indians is particularly incomplete, probably because the league disbanded in mid-season. I came across another website that included a roster for this team, but Herb Dessauer wasn't included.