In the summer of '50:

Wyczawski recalls historic summer of 1950

By JIM BASTIAN

Journal Sports Writer

NEW ULM -- Carl "Red" Wyczawski has seen a lot of sports history in his time here in New Ulm which ranges all the way back to 1956.

While Wyczawski is New Ulm's unofficial sports historian, 54 years ago Wyczawski became a part of history in the Northern League as he was the first sports writer to cover a black baseball player in the Northern League.

Now in a book titled "A Summer Up North" by Jerry Poling, regarding the Northern League back in the 1950 season, Wyczawski recalls that summer.

It was a summer in which Wyczawski, 22-years old and fresh out of Superior State in 1949 with a degree in journalism, took a job at the Eau Claire (Wisc.) Leader and Telegram.

"I had worked at the Duluth News Tribune and the Superior Evening Telegram while going to college," Wyczawski said. He is featured in Poling's book about the first black players admitted to the Northern League. "But my first real job came at the Eau Claire Leader."

Normally, a new reporter is gradually brought into the system with some easy assignments to get his feet wet. But that was not the case with Wyczawski.

"I covered spring training in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for the Boston Braves (who later moved to Milwaukee in 1953)," Wyczawski said. "Myrtle Beach was a converted air force base. There were nine minor league teams there. That time was the advent of colored players -- there were seven or eight colored players out of 150 that were there."

Eau Claire was a Northern League team where major league teams sent their minor league players to go. Duluth, St. Cloud, Eau Claire, Aberdeen, Sioux Falls, Superior, Fargo and Grand Forks were all in the league.

"The Eau Claire paper sent me down to cover spring training and while I was there, I got the call from the Eau Claire president and was told that my writing skills were going to be tested," Wyczawski said. "They were going to introduce blacks into minor league baseball that spring. I got a call from Herman White, who was the president of the Northern League and was told that I would be given the task of introducing the first colored player into the Northern League. The two players that were assigned to the Eau Claire team that I would be covering were Billy Bruton and Roy White."

Wyczawski said that at the time Eau Claire had a population of about 45,000 people.

"But there were not many colored people in that town," he said. "The Braves told me that this was going to be a pilot project in that Eau Claire would have the first colored players in the Norhern League. I was assigned the task of introducing these two players."

Bruton had success his first year in Eau Claire. He led the league as a rookie in stolen bases with 66 and three years later he was in the major leagues. He hit a home run in his first major league game in St. Louis for Milwaukee.

Wyczawski said that he did not feel awkward having to cover the first black baseball player in the Northern League.

"I felt that they were equal to the whites. But we had one (white) player from Alabama who did not accept it well," Wyczawski said. "But all of the other players accepted Billy Bruton. My feeling was to treat [Bruton] as any other player."

In Bruton's first game at Eau Claire covered by Wyczawski, Bruton got a nice ovation.

"He got a warm reception," Wyczawski said. However, Wyczawski himself got some angry letters calling him a "n-lover. But that did not bother me at all."

Wyczawski said that one of his memories of Bruton was that Bruton "he never did anything to embarrass himself. When he came to Milwaukee (with the major league team) we hit it off again. We got along great," he said.

Wyczawski said that after he moved to New Ulm and Bruton was traded to Detroit the two still kept in contact.

Wyczawski also recalls covering the Northern League All-Star game in Fargo in 1953.

"I met a player named Roger Maris (then spelled Roger Maras) there and made a prediction in the paper that he would make the major leagues," Wyczawski said. "I got to know Maris well."