50 Years Ago, Lookouts Finally Broke Through Color Barrier

The day was a long time in coming. Truth be told, it seems absurdly late when posted on the calendar of civil rights breakthroughs, but it probably could not have happened any sooner than April 19, 1963 – when the Chattanooga Lookouts finally became an integrated baseball team 50 years ago this week.

April 19, 1963, was long after baseball had enjoyed its finest hour in the civil rights movement. In fact, it wasn't even the biggest civil rights news in Macon, Ga., that day where the Lookouts played. Local university Mercer announced a new open door policy to all races effective that day, so to the locals, it was little more than Opening Day.

But two years after the demise of the Southern Association and the Jim Crow attitude that helped kill it, two of the minor league franchises left in that rubble -- the Nashville Vols and Joe Engel's Chattanooga Lookouts -- re-emerged with a new league (the South Atlantic, soon to become the Southern League), a new opportunity and a large new pool of talent to draw from.

After sitting out 1962 with no league and no professional games at Engel Stadium, the Lookouts and Philadelphia Phillies -- who provided the players for the franchise's final Southern Association championship in '61 -- reaffirmed their arrangement, but with the clear understanding that the Phillies needed to develop its growing pool of talented black athletes. This was, after all 1963, seven years after the Phillies broke their own color line with a short-timer named Johnny Kennedy.

Jackie Robinson had come along and changed much of baseball 16 years earlier. Robinson was already eight years retired. The South Atlantic League, whose growth spurt brought the Lookouts aboard, began integrating its teams all the way back in 1953, when Hank Aaron (Jacksonville) was one of the four players who were chosen as pioneers among its Deep South cities, and other future MVPs like Frank Robinson had come along since.

But for Chattanooga and Nashivlle, this was something new. The Vols' problem was different from the Lookouts, as in 1963 they were a co-op team with six different major league providers. The players chosen to break the Nashville color line were a pair of outfielders from the Los Angeles Angels farm system named Eddie Crawford and a Panamanian named Hank Mitchell. They, too, officially broke through their city's color barrier on April 19.

The Phillies, meanwhile, had put together a pool of “can't miss” prospects, not including their volatile but excessively talented infielder, Richie Allen, who was breaking similar ground with their Triple-A club in Little Rock.

Ultimately, the Phillies selected a half-dozen prospects “on merit of playing ability” and soon settled on four players who spent most of March understanding that they would be the first black Chattanooga Lookouts.

The Candidates

Chattanooga fans were drooling over the numbers that Hank Allen -- Richie's older brother by two years but still only 23 -- had put up in Idaho in 1962. A versatile player who could handle first, third or the outfield, he could by all indications handle the bat. He drove in 140 runs for manager Jack Phillips at Magic Valley, hitting .346 with 37 homers and 118 runs scored in 130 games.

But Phillips, named by the Lookouts skipper at the same time that the franchise deal was sealed, made his first request of a player for the '63 Lookouts a non-related namesake of his -- Panamanian outfielder Adolfo Phillips. Also in Magic Valley for the '62 season, the five-tool player hit 33 homers, stole 46 bases, led the league in outfield assists and averaged scoring a run per game.

The third dark-skinned player that made the cut was second baseman Bobby Gene Sanders. A native of Centre, Ala., and a bit older and more experienced than the others, the Phillies signed Sanders away from the Birmingham Black Barons. A skilled second baseman with a knack for making contact, he was coming off a .310 season for Magic Valley with a career best 20 homers as part of a team that hit 169 homers in 130 games.

The fourth candidate, more a long-shot than the others, was Charlie Fields. He hit .300 for the Phillies' Williamsport club in 1961, but was out of baseball during the '62 season for military service. His spring training was a disaster; his 17-month-old daughter was ill much of the time with a treatment-resistant bug, and he missed days of training -- first, to drive his family all the way back to California, then to bring his family back to Chattanooga after camp broke.

Others Phillies black prospects were chosen to break the same Southern Association-caused barrier with the (Little Rock) Arkansas Travelers in 1963, including Richie Allen (who later reached the majors that year at the age of 21) and pitcher Marcelino Lopez.

Two Historic Days

The actual debuts of the black Lookouts came April 19 in Macon against a Cincinnati Reds farm club that had already taken that step. Because of manager Jack Phillips' batting order, Bobby Gene Sanders technically became the first player to play. But while Sanders batted second, Phillips hit third and Allen batted cleanup.

In the game, a 5-1 Macon win, only Allen got a hit and scored the only run. It would be Allen's only hit with Chattanooga in 1962, as the 22-year-old was overmatched by veteran pitching at every turn. He was soon sent to Miami, but would return to be a fixture on the 1964 Lookouts.

Fields, out of shape, was placed on the disabled list by the Phillies and would soon draw his release, hitting only one homer in 13 games with the Lookouts.

Old school fans were given a chance to get used to the new-look Lookouts in a practice held on the 21st. During the day, it was notable than fans quickly latched on to the nifty defense displayed by Sanders and the cannon of a throwing arm by Phillips.

The home debut of the integrated Lookouts was April 22nd, and was much more the historical day in the history of the franchise. The Knoxville Smokies were in town and over 8,200 people showed up for the first Opening Night (as opposed to day game) in club history – the concession stands all sold out and were closed long before the game ended. Another change whose time had long since come was that owner-operator Joe Engel was able to integrate the grandstand for the first time ever, rendering instantly obsolete the black fans entrance gate at Third and O'Neil. Traffic was backed up well past game time, but those in attendance got their money's worth.

Indeed, the 1963 opener might well have been the last great night enjoyed by Joe Engel at his park, as attendance declined sharply and was next to nothing by the end of the 1966 season, But this was a good one -- a walkoff 5-4 win in 10 innings. Trailing 4-0 going to the bottom of the eighth, Adolfo Phillips' pinch-hit single began the comeback. Jerry Griffin drove him in.

In the ninth, catcher Pat Corrales drove in a run, but the big hit was a two-run game-tying hit from Bill Sorrell. In the 10th, a pair of throwing errors were sandwiched around Costen Shockey's bunt.

Sanders went 0-for-5. Allen, already mired in the slump that would lead to his demotion, was 0-for-4. Fields' debut was still some days away.

Moving forward, Phillips was the breakout star of the season, as he tied for the league lead in runs scored and was second in hitting with a .306 mark. He tied a club record with five runs scored in a game and soon would be on his way to a seven-year major league career -- a length of service matched by Allen, mostly with the Senators. Sanders was a crowd favorite and the league's best defensive second baseman, but his bat did not made the grade and he was out of baseball by 1965.

Sanders, last known to be living in the Cleveland, Ohio, area, was unable to be reached by Chattanoogan.com despite repeated efforts. Phillips was last thought to be living back in Panama, Allen is still active in baseball, scouting for the Astros as late as in 2011. Fields lives in California. None of them have ever been back to Chattanooga to be honored as the pioneers that fate selected them to be.

David Jenkins

carty43@netzero.net