The 1920's: A Decade of Winning

Fargo Forum, June 9, 1928

For more than a decade the Union Giants were known as one of the best barnstorming teams in the country.  In 1928, Robert Gilkerson was interviewed by the North Dakota newspaper, The Fargo Forum, where he defended his team's reputation, "We do not claim to be the best traveling team in the business, but if there are any teams claiming that honor, we'd like to meet them in a three game series, and we'll bet our end of the gate receipts on the outcome."

Gilkerson added, "There are plenty of strong traveling teams this season but any team that can win 95 percent of their games, playing the best aggregations in the middlewest, and barring none, is certainly worthy of consideration."

The idea that the Union Giants won 95% of their games was a bit of a stretch.  It may have been true when considering a short run of games, the Union Giants were known for long win streaks, but it simply wasn't sustainable over the course of a whole season and certainly not long term.  So, it's fair to ask, how good were the Union Giants really?  

Unfortunately, when it comes to independent traveling teams like Gilkerson's there were no official records or stats.  They did not belong to any league or conference and did not report to any governing body.  Instead, year-end totals were compiled and occasionally sent off to various newspapers by team owner Robert Gilkerson, mostly to promote the team the following year.

A century later, these records remain buried and forgotten in old sports columns, spread out over a decade and isolated in different parts of the country.   To my knowledge, no one had ever tracked them all down, compiled and publicly shared them until now. 

With this in mind, during the 1920's, the Union Giants are reported to have won 1,017 games out of 1,301 played.  This would put Gilkerson's combined winning percentage for the decade at over 79%.  The team's best overall year, according to the totals, was 1927, when they won nearly 84% of their contests.   Both are elite numbers and demonstrate clearly how the majority of their opponents were simply outmatched by the Union Giants.  Even on their worst year, the team won over 72% of their games.

Here are the totals broken down by year (sources below):

YEAR	W	L	T	PCT
1920	91	20	4	.809
1921	97	23	1	.806
1922	89	29	2	.750
1923	88	22	4	.789
1924	101	38	1	.725
1925	91	30	4	.744
1926	117	22	4	.832
1927	118	22	2	.838
1928	103	23	3	.810
1929	122	26	4	.816
TOTALS	1017	255	29	.793

The question remains, are these numbers accurate?  The totals seem almost too good to be true and there would have been nothing preventing Gilkerson from simply embellishing his wins and losses to help promote his team.  

On this point, I can offer this amateur analysis.   I've positively identified the outcome of approximately 60% of the 1,301 games the Union Giants are said to have played during this 10-year period.  I used box scores, line scores and accounts of games from a variety of newspapers that had no real interest in making the Union Giants appear better than they really were.  Of the more than 780 games I've verified for this period, the Union Giants won roughly 74% of them.  For 1927, the Union Giants' best year according to Gilkerson's numbers, I show them winning over 78% of their games.

While these winning percentages fall below what Gilkerson provided, they are still quite impressive.  With 40% of the games still unaccounted for, it is within reason to expect the gap between the two set of numbers to narrow.  I would even say, for most years, Gilkerson's totals are still plausible.  Based on my preliminary numbers alone, the 1925 team was likely a little worse than Gilkerson said.  At the same time, the 1926 Union Giants might prove to be better than reported.  

In the end, if it turns out that Gilkerson did in fact boost his numbers, it wasn't really necessary.  His team clearly lived up to their reputation as one of the great independent barnstorming teams of the decade. 

Here are the newspaper sources for each of the above totals along with some additional information.  As you will see, most years had multiple sources.  Any discrepancies or conflicting reports are also noted.

1920 (Record: 91-20-4):  The Chicago Whip, March 5, 1921.  The Dubuque Times-Journal and The Dubuque Telegraph-Herald, April 10, 1921.  Both Dubuque, Iowa papers also reported their run differential and number of shutouts for 1920.

1921 (Record: 97-23-1):  The Capital Times (Madison, WI), May 26, 1922.  Grant County Herald (Lancaster, WI), May 31, 1922.  The Vernon County Censor (Viroqua, WI), June 7, 1922.  June 14, 1922.

Nearing the end of the season, The Chicago Whip on October 22, 1921 reported their record as 91-23-1.

1922 (Record: 89-29-2):  Montreal River Miner (Hurley, WI), August 10, 1923.  

The Ironwood Daily Globe (Ironwood, MI) also published the Union Giants' 1922 record on August 7, 1923.  They however listed 89 games played instead of 89 wins.

1923 (Record 88-22-4):  The Capital Times (Madison, WI), May 27, 1924.  The Bricelyn Sentinel (Bricelyn, MN), June 13, 1924.  Reedsburg Free Press (Reedsburg, WI), September 11, 1924.  The Omaha Monitor, September 26, 1924.  The Grand Island Independent (Grand Island, NE), October 2, 1924.

                           

1924 (Record 101-38-1):  The Chicago Defender, October 18, 1924.

The August 7, 1925 editions of the Daily Times (Davenport, IA) and the Davenport Democrat and Leader both listed the Union Giants' 1924 record this way:  "Last year the colored boys copped 101 of their 139 contests."  This fails to acknowledge either one of their losses or more likely, their one tie.

1925 (Record 91-30-4):  Moline Daily Dispatch (Moline, IL), October 14, 1925.  Bureau County Tribune (Princeton, IL), October 23, 1925.

The Sioux City Journal reported on April 17, 1926 one less win and one more loss: 90-31-4.

1926 (Record 117-22-4):  Winside Herald (Winside, NE), June 30, 1927.   

The Brainerd Daily Dispatch (Brainerd, MN), August 10, 1927 listed their record with two less ties, 117-22-2.  Several other newspapers that year published their record as 117 wins and 22 losses, with no mention of ties.  The real outlier however was the Daily Times (Davenport, IA), May 3, 1927 which listed the Union Giants' record for 1926 as 134-32-4.

1927 (Record 118-22-2):  The Winnipeg Tribune, June 7, 1928.

The Daily Times (St. Cloud, MN), August 24, 1928:  "The Gilkerson Union Giants copped 118 games this season and lost but 22."  No mention of ties.

Immediately following the season (October 6, 1927), The Daily Post-Tribune (LaSalle, IL) recorded four fewer losses:  "Gilkerson's outfit played 138 games.  Of these 138 they won 118, lost 18 and ended two in ties.  For those who must have statistitics [sic] and accurated figures and percentages with their baseball, it can be pointed out that Gil's team had a winning percentage of .855 of total number of games played."

1928 (Record 103-23-3):  The Albert Lea Tribune (Albert Lea, MN), June 26, 1929.

The Fargo Forum (Fargo, ND), August 8, 1929 listed the Union Giants with 105 wins and 23 losses in 1928.   During the 1928 season, the Brainerd Dispatch reported on July 9th, that the Union Giants had already played 147 games that year, winning 101 of them.  This seems to be pure fabrication.

1929 (Record 122-26-4):  The Daily Pantagraph (Bloomington, Illinois), Apr 19, 1930 and April 20, 1930.  The Bismark Tribune (Bismark, ND), June 4, 1930.

The Daily Times (Davenport, IA) and the Quad-City Times (Davenport, IA) on April 25, 1930 listed their 1929 record with four fewer losses:  122-22-4.  The Daily Pantagraph initially provided their record this way on April 16, 1930:  "won 92, lost 24 and played four tie games out of 122 contests waged in 1929."  (The math is clearly wrong here.)  Another early provided record that was later updated came from the Bismark Tribune.  On May 27, 1930 they wrote, "last year, the Giants played 105 games, 23 of which they lost.  Three of their games ended in ties."

The 1920 Season

The Reach Official American League Base Ball Guide 1920

The winter of 1920 brought great changes to Black baseball in the Midwest.   Under the leadership of Rube Foster, owner and manager of the Chicago American Giants, the first Negro National League was formed in Kansas City after a three-day meeting of team owners at the Paseo YMCA.

Robert Gilkerson did not attend in person, however according to a February 21st article in the Freeman, he and his team were represented at the meeting by Attorney Elisha Scott of Topeka, Kansas.  When it was all said and done, the new league consisted of eight clubs but Gilkerson’s was not one of them.  Instead, it would mean that some of Gilkerson’s best players would be leaving for a chance to play in the new league.

In an article in the Chicago Defender on May 1st, Gilkerson addressed the issue saying, “After losing Boyd, Jack Marshall, Rube Currie, Cunningham, Harris and McNear in the new circuit, we still will be able to put out a team that will not suffer in comparison with the teams in the new circuit, who are as yet only great on paper.”

New additions to the Union Giants included William "Happy" Evans (cf), William "Peewee" Lowe (3b), H. Williams (ss), ? Poole (2b), John Fields (of), and ? Ellison (rf).  New pitchers for 1920 included H. Smith, ? Harris, and ? Hoskins.  Returning from the previous season was catcher and team captain Clarence "Pops" Coleman,  Edgar Burch (p), George Harney (p), Jess Turner (1b), and B.R. Jones (2b, of).  

Gilkerson’s team spent two weeks “spring training” in Spring Valley at Hicks Park before getting on the road.  This ritual would be repeated nearly every year of the team’s existence.  

An early game scheduled for May 16th in Dixon, Illinois promoted Gilkerson’s team, once again, as the Chicago Union Giants.   Before the game could happen, W.S. Peters wrote a letter to the Dixon Telegraph objecting to the use of the name, just as he had done in Omaha the year before.  

“Manager W.S. Peters of the Chicago Union Giants states that his team will play in Chicago Sunday and the organization coming to Dixon is made up of players from Spring Valley, who are traveling under the same name as the Windy City organization which has been playing baseball for 36 years.”

By June, Gilkerson's club would fully embrace the use of the name Gilkerson’s Union Giants.  Although, “of Chicago” or "from Chicago" was often added erroneously by newspapers when mentioning the team.

For the 1920 season the club was based in Lake View, Iowa with regular games scheduled there on Sundays.  During the week, like the year before, they would travel around the state playing local town and company teams.  On a few occasions they played other African American barnstorming teams such as the Tennessee Rats and Swift's Colored Giants from St. Joseph, Missouri.  On at least one occasion they crossed the state line and into Omaha, NE for a series against their recent rivals, the Armours.   The Union Giants swept them in a three game series.

In fact, the Union Giants dominated most teams in the Hawkeye state.  Based on a letter that Gilkerson had written to the Dubuque team at the close of the season, Gilkerson’s Union Giants finished the year with 91 wins, 20 loses and 4 ties.    According to an article in the Dubuque Times Journal in April 1921, Gilkerson’s team outscored their opponents 846-398 in 1920 with 14 shutouts.

This would be the last year that the Union Giants would spend the majority of their season in Iowa however.   By 1921 and with each subsequent year, Gilkerson would push farther north and west eventually reaching Canada and the West Coast by the end of the decade.

__________

After the team had returned from their tour of Iowa, Gilkerson booked one final game in nearby Dixon, Illinois on October 10, 1920.  Several of his players however had already split off from the team and were headed home.  As a result, Gilkerson recruited three white players from his hometown of Spring Valley, two of which had played for him on the Spring Valley Giants in 1918.

The Ternetti brothers (listed as Ternetter in the box score), John and Pete, along with ? Quinn intergrated the Union Giants for one afternoon.  Gilkerson's team defeated the Dixon Browns by a score of 6-1 in front of more than 1,100 fans, reportedly the biggest crowd for a baseball game in Dixon that year.  Peter Ternetti would eventually become the mayor of Spring Valley, Illinois.