Henry "Hank" Thompson

[cgjackson222]

Hank Thompson, Willie Mays and Monte Irvin form the first all African American outfield for the 1951 World Series.

[GeoPoto]

Great photograph, Charles. Thank you for showing it.

After he finished the 1951 season with a .235 batting mark and only eight homers in 87 games, there didn’t appear to be a regular role for Thompson with the Giants in 1952. Then left fielder Monte Irvin, the reigning National League RBI king, broke his leg before the start of the season. Thus, the Giants began their defense of the National League pennant with Thompson and newly acquired veteran Bob Elliott platooning in left field. Hank handled his assignment well enough that he was entrusted with the Giants center field job when Willie Mays was inducted into the Army in late May. Eventually Hank moved back to third base for the last third of the season, swapping positions with Bobby Thomson. For the season, Hank started 51 games in center field, 43 at third base, and 17 in left field, while also filling in at second base and right field. He finished with a .260 batting average, 17 homers, and 67 RBIs in 128 contests, while recording a solid .798 OPS. In the offseason, he signed on with Roy Campanella’s All-Stars, touring the South with an all-black team that featured Campanella, Irvin, Larry Doby, Joe Black, Harry Simpson, and George Crowe. Willie Mays even put in a couple of appearances with the All-Stars while on furlough from the service.

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[GeoPoto]

Thompson spent the first month of the 1953 campaign warming the Giants’ bench while highly touted rookie Daryl Spencer was tried at third base. Finally inserted back into the hot corner spot in mid-May, he responded with his finest big league season. He appeared in only 114 games, sitting out most of the first month of the season and missing most of the last month after suffering a concussion when a bad-hop grounder knocked him out. Yet he slammed 24 homers and drove in 74 runs while hitting .302. His .567 slugging average was the seventh highest in the National League that year, and his outstanding .967 OPS was the sixth highest mark.

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[GeoPoto]

In 1954 Hank shook off a painful chipped kneecap suffered early in the campaign to set a career high with 26 homers, while hitting .263 and driving in 86 runs in 136 games for the world champion Giants. He also walked 90 times, finishing ninth in the league in on-base percentage and tenth in OPS.

Thompson enjoyed his best day as a major leaguer on June 3 of that year. Playing in St. Louis, he homered in his first three times at bat before the Cardinals intentionally walked him in the top of the seventh inning with no outs and a man on second. Hank did get a chance for his fourth homer, but could only manage a single to drive in his eighth run of the game.

In the Giants’ four-game World Series sweep of the heavily favored Cleveland Indians, Hank posted an amazing .611 on-base percentage, hitting for a .364 average and breaking Lou Gehrig’s record by drawing seven bases on balls. He also earned accolades for his flawless defense and alert baserunning.

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[GeoPoto]

Still just 29 years old, with two fine seasons behind him going into the 1955 campaign, Thompson should have been at the peak of his career. But his average dropped to .245 and his home run output fell to 17. The next year he injured his shoulder in spring training and lost his regular job to light-hitting rookie Foster Castleman. For the season, he hit only .235 with eight homers in 83 games, although he excelled as a pinch-hitter, hitting .333 with a pair of homers in 24 pinch at-bats.

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[GeoPoto]

Before the 1957 season, Thompson was sent down to the minor leagues with a missed exhibition game in San Diego probably having some bearing on the demotion. Playing the outfield for Minneapolis, he endured nagging leg injuries and hit only .243 with a pair of homers in 78 games before leaving the team in late July. In subsequent interviews, he remembered ending his playing days on that note, but he did in fact try to resurrect his career with Ponce in the Puerto Rican Winter League after the season – an effort that lasted only three games before his career as a professional baseball player was truly over.

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[GeoPoto]

Thompson’s off-the-field behavior had been a problem throughout his baseball career. He began drinking as a teenage semipro player and admitted to being an alcoholic by the age of 17. In the service he went AWOL on one occasion and spent time in the stockade for fighting on another. He liked to carry a gun, which led to his killing a man before joining the Giants. In 1953 a violent altercation with a cab driver made headlines, prompting the black publication Our Sports to publish a profile of Thompson entitled “Problem Child?”

Stanley Glenn, a catcher with the Negro League Philadelphia Stars before entering Organized Baseball said, “Hank was a little bit off-center. He had a drinking problem and a woman problem. … But he was all baseball on the field.”

Former Monarchs teammate Sammy Haynes remembered, “He (Thompson) had a lot of little kid in him … but he had a temper and liked to play rough.”

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