Photo: Montreal Royals star Jackie Robinson meets Honus Wagner

April 4, 2024

By Kevin Glew

Cooperstowners in Canada

For someone who runs a blog called Cooperstowners in Canada, it’s a dream photo.

It features a lean, young Jackie Robinson, in his Montreal Royals uniform, shaking hands with Pittsburgh Pirates legend Honus Wagner, who many consider the greatest shortstop in major league history.

I had never seen this photo before yesterday when LeBreton AJ posted it on the Montreal Royals Baseball Memories Facebook page.

LeBreton AJ also included a newspaper article with the photo to explain that it was taken at Forbes Field in 1946 when Robinson was heading a barnstorming team called the “Robinson All-Stars” who were playing “Honus Wagner’s Major League All-Stars,” managed by a 72-year-old Wagner.

But I needed to know more.

What date did this game take place?

Who won?

Who played for the Robinson All-Stars?

Upon further research, I discovered the game was played at Forbes Field in Pittsburgh on October 8, 1946, just four days after Robinson had led the International League’s Montreal Royals to a Junior World Series title.

Robinson had made history that year, becoming the first Black player in the modern era to compete in an integrated professional league. While with the Royals, Robinson faced racism in International League cities like Syracuse and Baltimore and the taunts intensified in Louisville, the city Montreal opposed in the Junior World Series. It was a struggle for the courageous trailblazer, but on the field with the Royals, Robinson excelled, leading the International League in batting average (.349), walks (92) and runs (113).

According to SABR’s Alan Cohen, it was Dodgers’ director of promotions Mickey McConnell who organized the Robinson All-Stars barnstorming tour. Robinson’s team, who played six exhibition games in the Midwest and several more in California, was comprised primarily of Dodgers’ minor leaguers and Negro League players.

Despite McConnell’s and Robinson’s best efforts, and a roster that featured four eventual Hall of Famers, the “Robinson All-Stars” were not a big draw on the barnstorming circuit. Only 3,000 fans showed up at Forbes Field for the showdown against Wagner’s All-Stars.

Coming off losses to Wagner’s club in the two previous games in Cincinnati and Youngstown, Ohio, Robinson was hungry for a win. The game in Pittsburgh was initially scheduled to be a night contest but it was switched to 4 p.m. due to a power strike in the city.

Prior to the game, Robinson learned that shortstop Al Campanis was injured and would not be available, so Robinson took over at short. The athletic 26-year-old would field his position cleanly and almost single-handedly lead his club to victory, recording a single, a double and a triple, while scoring two runs and stealing a base, in a 6-4 win.

Larry Doby, who would break the American League’s colour barrier with Cleveland the following season, was Robinson’s double play partner at second base. Doby had a triple in the contest.

Behind the dish was 24-year-old Roy Campanella, who had spent the 1946 campaign with the Dodgers’ class-B affiliate in Nashua and would suit up for the Royals in 1947, before becoming a Hall of Fame catcher with the Dodgers.

And Monte Irvin was one of the outfielders for Robinson’s squad. Still three years away from his major league debut with the New York Giants, the 27-year-old Irvin walked and scored a run in the game.

The starting pitcher for the Robinson All-Stars was Willie Pope, a 6-foot-3 right-hander from the Pittsburgh Crawdads of the Negro Leagues. Pope had a rough fifth inning in which he allowed four runs on two hits, three walks and a hit by pitch but was otherwise strong.

Wagner’s team was comprised largely of veteran big leaguers. Outfielder Al Gionfriddo, second baseman Frank Gustine and third baseman Lee Handley were three of the Pirates players on the club. Cincinnati Reds right-hander Joe Beggs tossed a complete game for Wagner. He was joined on the team by two of his Reds teammates: right-hander Bob Malloy and shortstop Eddie Miller.

A report about the game in the Pittsburgh Press said Robinson “drew praise from his major league opponents on his fine play.”

This was game three of a six-game trek through the Midwest for the Robinson All-Stars. They would defeat Wagner’s teams twice more, in Chicago on October 13 and in Cleveland the following day.