Boston Bloomers Women's Baseball Team PC

[slidekellyslide]

Originally Posted by jthorn

I believe the male ballplayer seated in the front is Smoky Joe Wood, who signed with the Boston Bloomer Girls in 1905 or 1906 (at age 91 he said he was 15 when he signed with the Bloomer Girls, which would make the year 1905). He did not sign with the Red Sox until 1908.

john thorn

I had this conversation a few years ago with Joann Kline when this same postcard showed up on ebay. I believed it to be Wood also, Joann did not...the price the card sold for indicated that I was not alone in my belief as it sold well above what most Boston Bloomer cards sell for. I believe that Wood started his career with a Western Bloomer club located in Kansas City at age 15 and later played for the Boston Bloomers for a short while in 08 just before he got called up to Red Sox in late 1908. There is a famous photo with Wood and the Boston Bloomers in front of a trolley car that I believe is in the Ken Burns Baseball book. I can't say for 100% that it's him in this postcard, but I think it just might be.

[aelefson]

Hi-
Thanks Dan and John! I had heard Wood played for a few women's teams but I had no idea he might be on this postcard. In fact, I bought it and a Western Bloomers postcard showing Maude Nelson from an antique dealer and he made no mention of a potential major leaguer or of Maude. I am hoping Mark might be able to help with this. If needed, I can provide a higher resolution scan of the postcard.
Thanks again,
Alan

[Brian Campf]

Deleted

[jthorn]

Wood himself stated to interviewer Joan Whaley, for an article published in Baseball Digest in May 1981, that he signed with the Boston Bloomer Girls at age 15. That he started playing with the Bloomer Girls in KC is likely. On page 157 of Glory of Their Times, the basis I suspect for later claims that he joined the Kansas City Bloomer Girls, Wood tells Ritter that he joined a TOURING Bloomer Girls club at the end of 1906.

john thorn

[slidekellyslide]

I checked my Ken Burns book and the photo is of Wood with the Western Bloomer Girls. I think in the Red Sox encyclopedia they mention Wood playing with the Boston Bloomers in 1908.

[jthorn]

Specifically to the point about the Western Bloomer Girls portrayed on page 19 of Ken Burns's Baseball, note that the Western Bloomer Girls were formed by Maud Nelson, not Galbreath ... in 1911. The man at the far right in the image is NOT Joe Wood. The caption identifies him as a "future pitching star" but by 1911 he was entering his fourth year in the majors and certainly did not moonlight with the girls... I think Walter Johnson, however, may be posed at the middle!

john thorn

[jmk59]

Hi guys,

Dan and I did discuss whether the guy in the front row was Wood. I don't remember the details of the quick search I did on it, but for some reason I think the timing was wrong for him to be in this particular photo. But Dan is definitely correct in that the price for this card was a clear indication that other bidders thought it was Wood. It was the most I've paid, by far, for any Bloomer Girls team PC.

I don't know that there are any published or easily available lists of players on any of the Bloomer teams. Someday when I retire, I think I will go to all of these towns and really try to do a newspaper deep dive and try to figure it out. I have a lot of images of Bloomer teams. I haven't sat down and studied them closely, but offhand it looks like some of the people are in the photos for different teams (although it's a little hard to tell b/c hairstyles are all similar - that's why I'd need to really sit down and look at it).

The confusion on the teams and league as a whole is increased by the fact that people use some of the terms generically. Some people use "Western Bloomers" to describe any Bloomer team, when in fact Western Bloomers were a specific team that was from SW Michigan. Also, some people use the phrase "Bloomer" to describe any female team image, when in fact the true Bloomer teams were loosely organized in a league at times, and at minimum specifically named themselves "Bloomer" teams. There were many, many female teams at that time that were not associated with any Bloomer teams.

So any research or even thinking I do is tied closely to the identification of the team on the image. (Meaning, I don't try to find info on a "Bloomer team" unless the image specifically says that it's a Bloomer team, etc.)

Any image with one or all of the players identified are quite tough, and I go after those in particular because some day it may make it easier to match names with faces. Maud Nelson (some think her last name was Olson) is probably the easiest to find identified, but there are a few others here and there.

Maud's husband founded the All-Nation's team (something like that) near Chicago at about that time. Maud played for a Chicago team and then started the Western Bloomers after she was either done playing or late in her career. I'm a bit rusty and doing this from memory, but I think some of the loosely organized Bloomer teams either pre-1900 or immediately after were generically Star Bloomer teams, but that was probably the last generic name?

And finally, john thorn, I LOVE that Bloomer Girl cartoon. Last year I rented ... what was it? Pollyanna, maybe? But it had a Mickey Mouse short at the front of the DVD, and the short had Mickey in the Gay 90's - all dressed in knickers, etc. It starts out with him walking through a park to meet a girl while "Merry Merry Month of May" is playing. At the side of the path is this HUGE billboard that I swear has that exact same cartoon image of the Bloomer Girls on it! Not the whole cartoon - just the part of the poster they are looking at. The players were facing left, so it would be mirror image, and it is in color and advertising a game. I don't know if it is an exact mirror match, but it is 100% the exact same style. That's one of the coolest things I've ever seen - Thanks so much for posting it.

A few things posted before, but not in awhile. I'm limited to five so I'll try to pick. You can see that there is some variation in how teams are named and what the uniform says.

Joann

[jthorn]

Whoops I meant write "That he started playing with the Bloomer Girls in KC is UNlikely." My reason for thinking this is that the owner of the Bloomer Girls club for which he played was, according to the "well-researched SABR biography," Logan Galbreath (not "Galbraith"), pictured in the postcard! He owned/managed the Boston Bloomer Girls baseball team from 1905-1925 and toured the midwest, southwest, and California. Babe Pinelli and Rogers Hornsby are among the future major leaguers to play with the Boston National Bloomer Girls Base Ball Club, who appear to have been confused in recent books with a perhaps nonexistent entity called the "National Bloomer Girls Base Ball Club."

I believe this error has been propagated on the net and in other scholarly titles beyond Robert Elias's 2006 book, which I believe is the first to make the claim. To prove me wrong--which would be perfectly fine with me--find a contemporaneous source (even pre-1960 would be OK) stating, as Elias does, without sourcing, that Wood started with a Bloomer Girls club based in Kansas City, Kansas.

john thorn