Montreal Royals

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Montreal Royals (disambiguation).

The Montreal Royals were a professional baseball team located in Montreal, Quebec, that existed from 1897-1917 and from 1928-60 as a member of the International League and its progenitor, the original Eastern League. The Royals are most famous as the top farm club (Class AAA beginning in 1946) of the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1939 to 1960.

In 1928, George Stallings, a former Major League Baseball executive and Southern United States plantation owner, formed a partnership with Montreal lawyer and politician Athanase David and businessman Ernest Savard to resurrect the Montreal Royals. Among the teams other partners was Charles Trudeau who also served on the Board of Directors until his death in 1935. [1]They built Delorimier Stadium at Delorimier Avenue and Ontario Street in downtown Montreal to serve as the team's home field. This version of the Montreal Royals enjoyed great success and launched the baseball careers of Sparky Anderson, Gene Mauch, Roberto Clemente and the man who broke Major League Baseball's color barrier with the Royals in 1946, Jackie Robinson. Others Royals' players of note include Duke Snider, Don Drysdale, Chuck Connors, Walter Alston, Roy Campanella and the winningest pitcher in the history of the team, Tommy Lasorda. [2]

The team holds a unique place in baseball history as being the first major-league affiliate to break the so-called "baseball color barrier", when the Brooklyn general manager and part-owner, Branch Rickey, signed Jackie Robinson, an African-American, on October 23, 1945. Robinson played with the Royals during the 1946 season.

During that season, Robinson faced the racist resistance of his manager, Mississippian Clay Hopper, and teammates to his entrance, but soon won them over with his masterful playing (beginning with spectacular play in the opening game against the Jersey City Giants and courage facing against hostile crowds and opponents. As for his home city, he was welcomed immediately by the public, who followed his performance in that season with intense adoration. For rest of his life, Robinson remained grateful to the people of Montreal for making the city a welcome oasis for his wife and himself during the difficult 1946 season.

Statue at Montreal's Olympic Stadium of the Royals' most famous player, Jackie Robinson.

Robinson then left to play for the Dodgers the following year, but not before winning the Little World series and being chased by exultant Montreal fans right to the train as he left. In Ken Burns documentary film Baseball the narrator quotes Sam Maltin, a stringer for the Pittsburgh Courier: "It was probably the only day in history that a black man ran from a white mob with love instead of lynching on its mind."