Toledo Mud Hens - Team History

Team History

The Mud Hens have played in the International League since 1965, when the New York Yankees' AAA club, the Richmond Virginians, transferred there. Although the Tigers have been the predominant MLB parent of the IL Mud Hens (1967–73 and since 1987), the team has also been affiliated with the Philadelphia Phillies (1974–75), Cleveland Indians (1976–77), Minnesota Twins (1978–86) and the Yankees (1965–66).

Toledo was without organized baseball for nine seasons (1956–64). That was the city's longest stretch without professional ball since the 1880s. Toledo is a special place to baseball historians due to its early (failed) attempt to break the color/race barrier in the game. The Toledo Blue Stockings operated during 1883–1885, including an entry in 1884 with the then-major American Association. In the 1880s, before the major leagues stabilized, it was not unusual for a minor league team to be "promoted" to major league level for awhile. The 1884 club was the only major league team with black players (Moses Fleetwood Walker and his brother, Welday Walker) prior to Jackie Robinson's appearance with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. The refusal of prominent baseball figure Cap Anson to play the Toledo team, in an exhibition game with his Chicago White Stockings, accelerated the drawing of the color line.

Several minor league teams in Toledo lasted for short durations late in the 1880s and during the 1890s. The team also returned to the AA in 1890, as the Toledo Maumees (some sources say their nickname was the Black Pirates). That was one of several short-lived nicknames, including, the White Stockings. It was in 1896 that the team acquired the nicknames "Swamp Angels" and "Mud Hens" due to the ballpark's proximity to marshlands and waterfowl. "Mud Hens" gained popularity and has stuck with most of the Toledo teams ever since.

When the American Association revived as a minor league in 1902, the Mud Hens joined as a charter member. The team had been playing at Armory Park since 1897. With the success and stability of the Association, a better ballpark was built. Swayne Field opened in June 1909, and would be the Mud Hens primary home through the 1955 season. Swayne Field remains the longest-lasting venue of any of the Toledo teams.

The Mud Hens temporarily relocated to Cleveland during 1914 through 1915, to help the Cleveland Indians counter any territorial threat by the Federal League by ensuring that League Park would have a game every day. Another team was placed in Toledo in 1914 for the South-Michigan League. The "Soumichers" or "Little Mud Hens" drew poorly and took to the road for the second half of 1914. There was no team in 1915. The Fed disbanded after that year, and when the team returned from Cleveland to Toledo in 1916, they had acquired a new nickname, the "Iron Men". The name "Mud Hens" was restored in 1919.

This incarnation of the Mud Hens usually resided deep in the second division of the circuit, winning the AA pennant only once, in 1927 when the manager was Casey Stengel. After the farm system era began in the 1930s, the Mud Hens were usually affiliated with the St. Louis Browns, who by then were also a perpetual second division team in the American League.

By the early 1950s, Toledo annually trailed the other seven Association clubs in attendance, reaching a desperation point in mid-season of 1952. On June 23, 1952, the team moved to Charleston, West Virginia, that state's capital city, and became the Senators. However, the city gained another American Association franchise the next year, when the Boston Braves transferred to Milwaukee in March 1953, displacing their farm club, the Milwaukee Brewers, which then shifted to Toledo as the "Sox". The relocated Brewers were loaded with talent, and the 1953 T-Sox won the second Association pennant in their history and drew over 343,000 fans, a 244% increase compared to 1951.

But the Braves stayed only three seasons (1953–55) before moving the team to Wichita, Kansas, as the Wichita Braves. Swayne Field was demolished soon afterward. By the 1960s there was revived interest in minor league baseball for Toledo, and public official Ned Skeldon led the effort to remodel the Lucas County Fairgrounds stadium into a suitable minor league ballpark. The Yankees' transfer of the Richmond club to Toledo in 1965 restored professional baseball to Toledo (or to be technical, Maumee - the Hens played their home games in the Toledo suburb until the 2002 opening of Toledo's downtown ballpark, Fifth Third Field).

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