Advertisement Curator uncovers lost history of African-American baseball team in Louisville Share Shares Copy Link Copy

When the Louisville Slugger Museum became the owner of some old baseball photos in 2018, curators thought they had pictures of the Louisville White Sox, a Negro Leagues baseball team from 1931.But more research recently uncovered the photos had a much deeper, less documented history.It appears the photos actually date back decades earlier and show a team called the Louisville Unions in action.Museum curators said this team dominated the Southern baseball circuit in 1908, before the organization of the Negro League and way before the integration of baseball.That made the photos a rare find and an important addition to the documented history of black baseball.“There’s still more I’d like to learn about these photos and this team, but it’s so gratifying to know the Louisville Unions have been rediscovered as a part of baseball’s story, where they belong," Bailey Mazik, the museum’s curatorial specialist, said in a news release.Mazik is the one who dove deep into the photos to unearth the truth.She suspected the photos told a different story when she noticed the letters on the players’ uniforms were not consistent with the Louisville White Sox. But perhaps the biggest clue to tip her off was none other than Kentucky's favorite beverage: Bourbon. In one of the photos, she noticed a bourbon distillery beyond the outfield fence. The Sunny Brook Distillery Co. was located at 28th and Broadway from 1897 to 1909, which didn't match up with the White Sox time frame, she said. The discovery eventually helped place the team at what turned out to be a historically-significant ball field. That ball field stood where Elliot Park now stands in the Parkland neighborhood. Mazik said the deal was sealed when she found articles in the Louisville Courier-Journal from 1908. According to the articles, the Unions played other semi-professional and amateur teams from Louisville and beyond. Local opponents included the Louisville Giants, Reccius Club and City League Stars. They also apparently played teams from Ohio, Tennessee, Indiana, Pennsylvania and New York.Some of those articles referred to the Unions as “the best colored team in the South,” often beating out their white opponents.“I commend Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory on finding the images and conducting the great detective work in piecing together a partial history of the Louisville Unions. Early 20th-century black baseball history, before the start of the formal Negro Leagues in 1920, is still an underappreciated area of baseball research,” said Dr. Raymond Doswell, vice-president/curator of the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City. Want to see the photos for yourself? A display featuring the Louisville Unions is on view at the Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory through Sept. 7.Information provided by Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory and Bailey Mazik's blog.