Today Major League Baseball is a coast to coast game with teams from Boston to San Diego, or from Miami to Toronto. In the 1930’s the look of Major League baseball was different. The Major League only went from Boston to St. Louis. Yet baseball was the nation’s pastime.
People in Siouxland kept up on the game, via the newspapers, and radio. The Chicago Cubs, the Chicago White Sox, the St. Louis Cardinals, and the St. Louis Browns were the natural fan favorites of people in Siouxland. But Minor League Baseball and local leagues drew most of the attention of the residents of the area.
The Sioux City Soos was the Minor League affiliate of the Chicago White Sox. Their uniforms were often hand-me-down and mended uniforms became the Soos uniforms.
Sioux City, South Sioux City, and other towns had semi-professional teams. Men would go to work and play some serious baseball, producing a few major leaguers. Sioux City had an All-Nations team that included Native-Americans and African-Americans players, a decade before the Major League crossed the color line.
Barnstorming Negro League teams visited the area to our local teams. But that wasn’t all, New York Yankee greats Babe Ruth, and Lou Gehrig came to Sioux City to demonstrate their skills. The two giants of the game each chose a team of local players to play an exhibition game. This gave the residents the chance to play along-side major league players. This type of activity spread good will for the game to people who never saw pro players. Who knows how many Yankee fans were made during these games.
You can read more about the history of Baseball in Siouxland in the notebook titled Baseball. Ask our reference staff at the South Sioux City Public Library to bring over the notebook from the Sides Room.
Written by: Dan Nieman, Reference Library Director @ the South Sioux City Public Library