In my July 19 column, I ran a photo of a local youth baseball team posing with BoBo Newsom, the journeyman pitcher who hosted the Orioles? pre-game show on Channel 13 in 1954. I was curious about where the photo was taken and who the kids were in the picture. Because Newsom was employed here for just 1954 ? the Orioles? first season ? I naturally assumed the photo was from that season.
It?s not. It?s from 1956. In fact, the photograph was taken 50 years agotoday: Aug. 11, 1956. The boys in the photograph are the 1956 Roland Park Baseball League All-Stars, and the photo was taken at Gilman School, right there on Northern Parkway.
The RPBL began in 1952, making it one of the oldest youth baseball leagues in the country. When the league began, roughly 70 to 90 boys participated. This year, 744 boys ? and girls ? played. Dutch Ruppersberger is a graduate of the league, though Jim Considine, the league?s historian, doubts any future big leaguers were ever RPBL players.
“Politicians and businessmen, yes,” he told me, “but a lot of these kids went from swinging a bat to carrying a lacrosse stick and stopped playing baseball.”
The All-Stars in the photo ? there are only eight of them, so someone must?ve missed the ceremonies that day ? are, standing, left to right, Carl Cummings, Joseph Coale III, Wendell Leimbach, Billy Decker, Gordon Hammann Jr. and Vernon Kelly Jr. Kneeling in front are John Nixdorff and Curtis Andrews. Newsom is standing behind them, resplendent in a plaid shirt and a checked jacket.
Considine provided a few additional photos from that day, including one showing BoBo with the league champion Lions, who are each holding a special championship patch. (Any of those still around?) They are all also holding an 8×10 photograph of BoBo wearing an Orioles? jacket and holding a package of Esskay hot dogs. Those were the photos that had been used as promotional giveaways in 1954 when Newsom hosted the TV show, and it?s safe to assume that BoBo kept those left over.
So, we?ve identified the kids in the photograph, but we have a new unsolved mystery: What was Newsom still doing in Baltimore two years after his TV show went off the air? Considine thinks he may have been looking for a job.
“He had contacts in Baltimore and Washington, so maybe he was looking for another media gig,” Considine said. “Or maybe he was doing someone a favor, since the Orioles were playing in New York that day.”
BoBo passed away six years later at the age of 55 in Orlando, Fla. I can?t find any evidence that he ever worked in baseball again after the 1954 season. But here he was, 50 years ago today, on hand to help celebrate another successful season of the Roland Park Midget Baseball League. He was one of the most colorful characters in the history of the game. Here?s hoping those kids ? now grown ? appreciate the gift it was.
Thanks also to David Mock for providing information used in this column. Listen to Phil every Saturday 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on ESPN Radio 1300. He can be reached at [email protected].
