Keep the Heritage Alive!

Wilbur Barton

"Discover Greatness"
 
Transcript of a portion of the video of "Discover Greatness" Program
(A reminiscence of local Black softball and baseball during the 1930s and 1940 in conjunction with the opening of an exhibit on the Negro Baseball Leagues)
Panelist: Wilbur Barton
Moderator: Willie Tripp
Place: McLean County Museum of History, Bloomington, Illinois
Date: October 9, 1999
WT Now let's introduce Mr. Barton.
WB (microphone rings) Anything to keep me from talking. (laughter) It's on. I'm ready to go. Okay. They didn't tell me exactly what I was going to talk about, but I wrote some stuff down. And it starts out with the exhibit on the Negro baseball players. I'm going to say what I know about it, and a few things that you might be interested in. My name is Wilbur "Barney" Barton, and they called me at other times "Deacon." The only person that called me Wilbur, which is my first name, was my mother. All the other people called me something else. And when I get into the Young Men's Fellowship Club, I will tell you the names that we all had. First I want to say that I knew Jackie Robinson, and I knew Larry Doby. In fact, I was in the navy with Larry Doby who went on to play for the Cleveland Indians, you know. And he was the second Negro to play in organized baseball after Robinson. And we had-I was in the navy, and we had a softball team over there, and Larry played with us as a fielder on the softball team. Larry was only about twenty years old then. He wasn't very good. The best guy on the team was a guy named Jim Brown. He's not the football player that you all are thinking about, but he was about thirty-two years old, and he had been drafted. I think Larry volunteered to come in. Maybe his parents had put him in the navy, or something like that. So when I think he joined-about two years after he got out of the navy, and they took him in the Cleveland Indians. And I often wondered why they didn't take Jim Brown because he was the best player. But Jim Brown was thirty-two, and Larry was only about twenty so you can see why they took Larry Doby instead of Jim Brown cause he had at least more years to play. Which makes sense when you go back over it, and I think that holds true of Jackie Robinson, too. Jackie Robinson came to Illinois State and played basketball. I graduated in [19]36, and I think he came in about [19]38, and he had come from UCLA. And after that he played Negro League [baseball], and then he came to Montreal what was a subsidiary of Brooklyn, New York. I want to digress just a little bit about going to see Jackie Robinson first. There was a bunch of teachers in Indianapolis that wanted to go and see him play, and he was playing for Montreal. And so we went down to Louisville to see him play. And they had sold 500 tickets-it seated about ten or twelve thousand. They had sold 500 tickets to the Negroes that were coming to the game, and they wouldn't let any of the rest of us in because they were coming from all different cities to see him play. But they only decided to let 500 people in to see Jackie Robinson play. Probably didn't want him playing anyway. Well anyway, we didn't know what to do. So a farmer was going to the game. He said, "Well, you see that barn over there? That's my barn and as many as want to can go over there and sit on the barn and look over the center field fence." Ringside seats. So that's what we did. And, of course, we wasn't happy about it, but we got to see Jackie Robinson play. And after that I went to see him in Cincinnati and places like that. I never did see Larry Doby play until he came to Chicago. But since Jackie was the first one I wanted to see him play and everyone else wanted to see him. Incidentally I had a big league player that played with the Indianapolis ABCs. His name was Ernest Duff. And Ernest is related to Reggie Whittaker; his half-brother [sic]. And I wanted to get that in, [but] I don't remember what league he was in. But I remember them coming and playing different teams and Satchel Paige would come and play in Victory Field which was the name of the field in Indianapolis. I also had an uncle, Sherman Barton, who was a baseball-hardball-player. And he was good enough that McGraw wanted to sign him up, but he couldn't sign him up because he was the wrong color. And so I throw that in. [The Federal Census of 1900 lists Sherman Barton's occupation as "baseballest"] That's all that I can think of now in terms of the Major Leagues or going into the Major Leagues, but I was also to speak on a club softball team here. We had a group here called - they first started out as Jackson's Furniture. And Jackson had a furniture store in Normal, and we had a team that played behind the Normal Sanitary Dairy. And we had a field there that was I think sponsored by Alexander Lumber Company. And we played there.And then it graduated on to more or less better players because one of the churches, a couple of the churches, got together and got started on the YMFC which stood for the Young Men's Fellowship Club. And [Harold Wood's] two brothers played-Albert and Harry Woods. And we enjoyed barnstorming around the Bloomington area. And so we had this team. I played third base. Let me digress a little bit. We had different names besides our own names. For instance, our catcher was Barksdale. I can remember. Do you remember Herschel-Herschel Barksdale? And you know what we called him? Sally. S-A-L-L-Y. Our pitcher was Bubby Hunter. Bubby. We called him Bubby. Albert was a guy about six-foot tall. There's a young-timer over here. (pointing to a relative in the audience) And Bubby was a good pitcher, a real good pitcher, and our first baseman was Albert Woods. One of his brothers. Albert stood about six-foot, four inches and weighted about 250 pounds if you could weigh him, and he wore a size fifteen shoe. And a lot of times, they'd throw a ball to him, and they'd say, "You missed the base." And then he'd put his foot out like that and say, "Look at the shoe-fifteen. How could I miss the base?" "Out." The second baseman was a guy named Eugene Covington, and his dad was a doctor here. One of the first Negro doctors here in Bloomington, and we called him "Mouse," and he played second base. And we had a guy named John Sullivan who played shortstop, and we called him "Silky." I played third base, and they called me "Barney." And a lot of the time they called me "Deacon" because there were two Deacon's that went to Illinois State-Deacon Barton and Deacon Gorens. And the left fielder was Duffy. Back then on a softball team we had ten people who played. So you had a roving shortstop. And that was a guy named Gonzalo Curtis, and we called him "Gondola."And we would go to the little towns around here like Ellsworth, LeRoy, Clinton and play basketball, play baseball. And the people in the towns would take up these names and call us by our nicknames. They liked Sally. They'd call, "Sally, Sally, Sally" because he was the catcher, and he was a loudmouth catcher, you know. Catchers are supposed to talk a lot, and so they took that up. Albert was "Footsy," Mouse, Silky Sullivan, Duffy-one of the Duffs-and so on. But the thing I want to tell you before I forget about it. We went to these small white towns and there were no Negroes there. We would kiddingly ask each other. We went in a state truck. And we had a seat along the back and down each side and the tools and stuff were in the middle, and the kids would see us coming and run along the side of us. And they'd say, "Here come the `Niggers.' Here come the `Niggers.'" And we would say, "Umm." But we didn't think anything about it because we knew they didn't know better. Because some of them were three, four years old who would come up and ask you why you don't wash your face. It wasn't their fault. And another joking thing we always did with each other-we would say, "What do you think they're going to feed us?" "I don't know. What do you think they are going to feed us?" And someone would say, "I don't know. Chicken and watermelon?" And that would happen every place we went. Some of you are too young to know about donkey baseball. How many of you have heard of donkey baseball? Donkey softball? Ellsworth, LeRoy, Downs, and those places ate up donkey baseball. With us on the donkeys. And those donkeys had a mind of their own. What we did is: Everybody, every fielder was on a donkey. Everybody that came to bat got on a donkey, bat the ball, and try to go to first base. The donkey may go to first base, and it may not. And it may go to first base and keep on going. And the fielders had the same trouble. They would hit the ball out there. The donkey would take you out to the ball, and walk off and leave you. These owners had them trained. And you didn't know who was going go win, and neither did the people in the stands know who was going to win. So, we found that very entertaining, and we used a softball and a regular mitt. And I finally graduated after sixteen years on the campus, and they went on and got me a job teaching school in Mount Vernon, Indiana in a two-room high school. We had about thirty-five kids, and what I didn't teach, the principal taught. And then I went on to-got a job in Indianapolis. I applied for a job-I cant' think of his name right now. Joe Louis was just coming up, and the guy who taught math at Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis went to join Joe Louis's camp to tutor Joe Louis. So I applied for his job and have been in Indianapolis ever since. Taught there for forty-one years and never came back home. Still have a home in Normal. And if you have any questions, I'll be open to questions. I don't want to dominate this thing. Thank you.
Ed Jelks Mr. Barton, how did you get your nickname of "Barney?"
WB I got that in the third grade-I don't really know-at Thomas Metcalf in about the third grade when they come out with the song "Barney Google." I don't know if any of you remember the song. (unintelligible) That's how they named me.
? That McGraw that wanted to sign one of the Negro ball players. Was that the McGraw who used to be police chief or mayor of Bloomington?
WB No. He [John McGraw] was with the Giants. One of the Eastern teams.
? When I was young, my dad and I would go to Chicago to the East-West games. (unintelligible)
WB I went too.
? Do you recall if Henry Aaron played while you were in Indianapolis?
WB I saw him play in the lower leagues. I'm trying to think of which place it was. See, Indianapolis is a farm team, too, you know.
? Now you were talking about you went to see Robinson play in Louisville. That would be Triple-A?
WB Triple-A. Right.
? Now at that time what team was Louisville with because I (unintelligible).
WB I'm not sure.
WT Okay. Another question over here.
? Did Oscar Robertson attend Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis? Did you have any contact with him? Were you teaching then?
WB I coached a team there called School 26. It was a big school. We had about 1400 kids. And he went to 17. Schools in Indianapolis go by numbers, and he went to 17. He learned his skills in a "dust bowl" we called it. It was a housing project. They had baskets up, and they'd get out and play basketball every day, seven days a week, twenty hours a day. And he was one of the dust bowl. Went to 17. We played him-School 26 played him for the final of the city tournament. And I was telling Woods here that I was the first non-believer of [Oscar Robertson] because I told my team there's nobody that good. I would say there's nobody as good as Bird. At that time there was nobody as good as Jordan. But I changed my mind on all of them. (laughter) Oscar was the first one that put us out of the tournament. We had won eight out of ten years, and when Oscar came along, he beat us by ten points. And I told my team that nobody was that good. Gary Roosevelt [High School] came down three years later to play in the state finals, and I told the coach, "Well, you got to give Oscar thirty points." "No. no." So he put his best man on him. His best man fouled out trying to guard Oscar.So I said, "I told you. You're the second non-believer in Oscar."
? How did you get the name "Deacon?"
WB Another fellow from Lincoln, his name was Herbert Gorens, and he played football. They called him Deacon Gorens. And we would buddy around together, and the kids on the football team and the basketball team would call us "Deacon One" and "Deacon Two" - "Deacon" Barton and "Deacon" Gorens.
WT Before we go any farther I'd like to introduce another baseball player. There's Floyd Bonds sitting back there. Do you want to stand up Floyd and tell what team you was on?
Floyd Bonds Well, my brothers all played with the YMFC team-(Inaudible) James, Sylvester James, and Arthur James. (Inaudible). I used to pitch out there with the team.
WB I'd like to say this. Growing up in Normal, Illinois I didn't run into any prejudice through grade school and over at the high school. I was out of a family of nine-seven girls and two boys. And my sisters-I was the youngest and my brother was the oldest-and my sisters did most of my fighting for me. (laughter) And if somebody called me a name, I'd go home and get my sister, and they were about three years apart. I'd get one seven, ten, thirteen, sixteen, twenty-one. (laughter) I went to Thomas Metcalf and U High. I didn't run into any prejudice until I got to Springfield, Illinois. We had won a basketball sectional or regional tournament-whatever they have here in Illinois. I don't know. It's different from Indiana. We decided-some of the boys who played the game that afternoon decided to go to a show. About ten of us went. About half didn't want to go to a show. So we went to the show in Springfield, Illinois-the capital of Illinois. We went up to the window and put the money down. I'm about the sixth guy in line. I put my money down, and the girl says, "We don't cater to colored trade." Well, I'm a sophomore in high school and "cater" means cooking. (laughter) And she repeated it. "We don't cater to colored trade." Then she spelled it out. "Colored people don't go to the show." Oh! I was kind of shocked.And so the boys gathered around me who were waiting to buy their tickets and said, "Get your ticket and get on out of the way." And then they come up to the window, and she repeated it to them-cause all these kids were white from Normal, and she was saying that "we don't cater to colored." And then she said, "Colored people don't go to the show." And so they were shocked too and somebody said, "Let's not go to the show."So we got back to the hotel. We're all staying in two rooms, and they said, "What happened? Thought you all were going to the show." And we said, "Well we decided not to go because Barney can't go." So we told the coach. It was T. J. Douglas and he was surprised himself. He said, "I wish I'd have know."And then, two or three hours later the other fellows come in who got into the show. "What the hell happened to you all? Thought you were going to the show." And everything got quiet. You could hear a mouse peeing on cotton because they had to tell the other ones. They said, Why didn't you just come in and get us. We'd have tore up the place." "That's why we didn't tell you."
WB That was 1934.
WT Are there any questions? (prolonged applause).
Note: There are undoubtedly errors in the spellings of names. As much as possible, I used city directories, college yearbooks, and Daily Pantagraph sports pages to check spellings. I wasn't able to find every name though. -Jack Muirhead.

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