From : It's A Black Thing, published by Kids in Control,
Clarksville, TN.
The following publication --
part of an oral history series by students in Clarksville --
provided by Eleanor Williams, Historian, Montgomery County,
Clarksville, Tennessee.
"THE EYE OF AN ERA!"
An Oral History solicited from STEVE ENLOE WYLIE
Professional Baseball Player
BORN: May 7, 1911 (Black Male)
BIRTH PLACE: North 2nd Street, Clarksville
FATHER: Charlie Wylie
MOTHER: Diane (Moore) Wylie
WIFE: Anna Love (Elliott) Wylie
Steve states that at the time of his birth he was living on top
of the hill behind the now present Shoney's restaurant stand, he
says that there used to be an old fort there.
His father, who was born right at the end of slavery, worked on
the railroad and in the mills of Montgomery County and Evansville,
Indiana.
Steve recalls that in the 1920's his grandparents, who were
ex-slaves, lived in what was known as a "shot-gun"
house. It had a bedroom, kitchen and 2 rooms upstairs for the kids
to sleep in.
Steve is the last remaining member of his family, he had three
sisters and two brothers all older than him, but they have all
passed on.
As a child he went to Burt School, an all colored school during
segregated times, on Franklin Street. There he completed both
grade school and high school. This remarkable man still remembers
many of his teachers including : Mrs. Bessie Cross, Mrs. Margie
Stamps, Mrs. Clara McReynolds, and Mrs. Hattie Barksdale all grade
school teachers and Mr. Robert Trice, Mrs. McKinney, Mrs. Collins,
Mrs. Sims, Mr. Blackburn, Mr. Allison all high school teachers. He
was graduated in the class of 1933.
He says that when he was a child, black people went to high
school sporting events for entertainment, or sometimes they went
to a dance hall for colored called Buck's Hall on 6th
Street.
Also, the City of Clarksville had a black baseball team that
would play other teams from Louisville, Indianapolis, and
Milwaukee, and this was a very big event to go to after church on
Sunday.
Steve says that Clarksville was not as bad as other places in
the South, because the local blacks would fight back even though
they would be put in jail. Judge Cunningham was also more lenient
than other judges. Still when blacks fought back they would always
end up on the wrong end, but they refused to cower down.
Steve's grandfather used to tell Steve that if he had his way,
he'd put all whites in jail.
Steve reflected that black ministers in times past, were not as
fast and after money as they are now.
Steve stated that when he was a child, Clarksville was just a
farm town, and that all of his ancestors originally came from
places in Montgomery County like "Round Pond",
"Hematite", and "Blaton".
When he was a young man, the only government work that blacks
were allowed to do in Clarksville was street cleaning or driving
mule teams. Later they were allowed to concrete curbs and
gutters.
He recalls that black grocery stores in Clarksville included:
Jessie Darden's on Cedar Street, Albert Roberts on Dodd Street,
Les Thomason on Poston Street, a store operated by Thomason's
nephew in Lincoln Homes, Warfield Grocery on Ford Street, and
Landers Grocery on Ninth Street, Additionally, Pope Garrett
operated a dry cleaners.
Steve also recalls some black "fortune tellers": Mary
Blakley, who was blind, and lived on Eleventh Street, Mrs. Fry
also residing on Eleventh Street Jenny Daniels -Franklin
Street
When asked about (Black Bottom), Steve advised that it was a
rough place and that he never did go there,
Steve says that in 1923 or 1926 when Indian Mound was all
Cherokee Indians the Negro's started intermarrying with them and
the whites couldn't tell the Indian children from the Negro
children. So to keep the blacks from going to the white schools
like the Indians did, the whites burned down the schools in Indian
Mount and in 1926 a lot of blacks left Indian Mound and settled in
Woodlawn and Clarksville.
He remembers that a lot of black men worked at the mill and the
snuff factory, but most of them were farmers or railroad workers.
Still he says that quite a few of the blacks drove trucks and
wagon teams for Brollin & Harris and Richardson & Pettus
stores delivering coal and stuff to stores and homes.
In 1930 only nine to eleven thousand people lived in Montgomery
County and Franklin Street (because of bootlegging) was the
roughest part of Clarksville.
He says that Chief of Police Roberson was a good fellow but
that all of the police would collect money from the gamblers and
guys who sold whiskey. Whiskey then was 25 cents a half pint and
$2.50 a gallon and according to how much you sold, would be how
much you paid the police.
He personally witnessed that a particular Pool room which had
sold six or seven gallons of whiskey on a Friday or Saturday
night, had to give the police their cut, when they showed up to
collect on Monday morning.
Steve started playing baseball in 1923 for the Clarksville
colored team as a pitcher, they played against Hopkinsville,
Bowling Green, then when times got bad he went to Crofton, KY, and
Ft. Wayne, Indiana where he worked.
There he was scouted and picked to play for the Kansas City
Monarch's colored baseball club. While there he became a relief
pitcher for Satchel Page and later Jackie Robinson joined the
team.
He recalls that one time he drove 500 miles from Minnesota to
Minor North Dakota to relieve Satchel Page in 1946, Page only
pitched three innings.
He says there were times that they would draw a bigger crowd
than even the New York Yankees when Satchel would pitch and that
Satchel would receive as much as two and three thousand dollars a
game.
He also played with Josh Gibson, a man he praises as the
greatest baseball catcher there ever was.
Steve says that there were 50 Negro baseball pro teams, and
that he himself pitched four no hitters in his life.
He says that when he played for the Kansas City Monarch's, they
came to play Nashville two or three times a year.
When baseball became integrated in 1947, he let the Kansas City
Monarchs and so did Jackie Robinson.
Steve says he left because the team was sold to Tom Barrett
from Dale Williams and that Mr. Barrett got rid of all the older
players and kept the younger ones. Mr. Barrett felt he could make
more money by sending them to the big leagues.
So Steve went to Canada and played ball from 1947 to 1956. He
played for the North Battleford Beavers and the Winnipeg Bucs of
Sasquatchan. Then he played for the Gualt All Stars out of Galt,
Ontario. He also played with teams from Iowa and Minnesota.
Once he had been scouted to play for the Chicago Cubs but
Horace Lisenbee (a famous white ball player from Clarksville) had
him turned down by saying that Steve could not pitch well
enough.
Steve began playing black professional baseball in 1934 and in
1956 he played his last game in Gualt Ontario close to
Detroit.
Recently in June of 1989, the Atlanta Braves Baseball Club and
the Southern Bell decided to honor these forgotten black baseball
greats. Steve was brought there for three days, where he was
presented with a commemorative baseball bat, a $300 watch, and
they tried to pay him past wages to equal the pay he should have
received justly when playing ball.
Steve was invited to attend the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooper
Town but could not afford the funds it will take. This was to be
on June 12-13 of 1990.
Steve says that in the 1930's he went into the Navy and the
blacks could only be mess attendants, cooks or stewards, and it
took a black man 18 months to attain his first rate of $36.00 a
month. While his white counterpart received his first rate
automatically after his 3 months of training.
In fact he says if a blackman did not have a white officer who
would give him a break you could be there 20 years without
receiving a rating and you were always referred to as Nigger or
Shine.
Steve says you were given a ratings test every year, but you
could not see the results and you always failed so you didn't get
rated.
Steve says there were no black Navy officers or sergeants then,
but he does recall seeing Army black officers and sergeants, but
they were always stationed overseas in Guam, Honolulu, or
China.
Other Recollections of Steve Wylie:
Steve says that in someways prejudice is worse in Clarksville
today than it was yesterday in the 1920's. Because then you could
only be what the white man let you be. You didn't have jobs like
clerk, opened up to you, so you never looked forward to it because
you knew you'd never get the job.
He remembers that the black voters helped to get the Trane
Company here. But when they got here they would only hire blacks
as janitors until the 60's.
Steve later worked as a welder in Trane Company for nine
years.
Steve recalls a black man named Mr. Dickson in the 1940's who
was executed by the state for the crime of rape of a white woman.
Steve says everyone used to see this man riding the bus to Round
Pond where would go meet this white woman. Steve says it was
common knowledge that this woman had already given birth to two
children fathered by Mr. Dickson. But somehow he was charged with
rape and executed.
Steve recalls with fondness the famous Dr. Burt, Steve went to
school with Dr. Burt's daughter and with his own later to be wife
Anna Elliott.
Steve used to swim in a swimming pool behind Dr. Burt's
infirmary, and Dr. Burt once operated on his foot.
The first black police officers that Steve remembers in
Clarksville is Henrey Newell, Elias Pettus, and Otis Martin in the
late 1950's he says they were Auxiliary Policemen and not allowed
to arrest white people.
Steve says he has two daughters and so many grandchildren and
great-grand- children, that he would have to throw a rock on top
of the house to see how many ran out so he could count them
all.
All previous information on Steve Enloe Wylie was obtained by
the author, Ronn Evans, in an interview at his home on June 05,
1990. I found this man Mr. Steve Enloe Wylie to be a man of
unreproachable demeanor and a past that demands the respect he is
due. Not only was he a pioneer in the field of black baseball, but
truly the Eye of the Era of Baseball integration.
|
Steve
Enloe Wylie
In
mid-August, the Tennessee-native allowed just three hits and
fanned thirteen to lead Brandon to a 5-3 win in the opening game
of the Manitoba Senior Baseball League final. A week later Wylie
scattered eight hits and struck out twelve in pitching Brandon to
the league championship. He finished the season with a record of
12-1.
