Tredyffrin Easttown Historical Society
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Source: July 1986 Volume 24 Number 3, Pages 111–119

Five Big League Ball Players Who Played for Berwyn

• Amos A. Strunk
• Jack Lapp
• Barney Slaughter
• Bern Garaghty
• Frank Skaff

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During the first half of the twentieth century, The Main Line Baseball League was one of the better semi-professional circuits in the area. It was also one of the earliest such leagues in the country.

The league was formed in 1904 with four teams. In February of that year representatives from West Philadelphia, Ardmore, Berwyn, and Malvern met to establish the league and work out a schedule. (The Berwyn team was represented at the meeting by Harry O. Garber.) With the exception of the 1909 season, when the league did not operate, Berwyn fielded a team in the league from that initial season, in which it won the championship, until 1939.

During these thirty-three seasons a number of fine young ball players wore the Berwyn uniform, and five of them eventually made the jump to the major leagues. Three of these five played for the Berwyn team in the early years of the team; the other two performed for the local nine in the mid-1930s.

Amos A. Strunk

Probably the best known of these former Berwyn players is Amos A. Strunk who, for seventeen seasons, played in the American League with the Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago teams. He also played in five World Series, four with Philadelphia and one with Boston, and five times led all outfielders in the league in fielding.

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Born in Philadelphia on January 22, 1889, Strunk played in the outfield for Berwyn and other semi- professional teams in the Philadelphia area while still in his late 'teens, batting and throwing left-handed.

In 1908, just turned 19, he joined the Anderson team of the Carolina State League, but "jumped" his contract to play with the Shamokin club in the Atlantic League. In the fall of that season, on the recommendation of Lave Green, he became a member of the Philadelphia Athletics, playing in twelve games for them that year. After taking spring training with the A's in 1909, in June he was sent down to Milwaukee in the American Association for more seasoning. There he led the league in batting, and returned to the big leagues for the last few weeks of that season, and for the next fifteen years. He played in 1507 major league games altogether.

Although he had a lifetime major league batting average of .283 in the days of the "dead" ball, hitting better than .300 in three seasons, he was primarily known for his fielding and defensive skills. In August 1913 he was described in a press release as having "justly earned, the verdict of being the greatest defensive outfielder that the game has developed". "An excellent judge of a batted ball off the crack of the bat", it was reported, "his great speed takes him to wallops that other outfielders would never reach, and he has no weakness, to either side, in front or back there by the palings." (He was also described in another report as "one of the fleetest outfielders who ever skipped across the green in pursuit of the wafted pill ...")

His great speed -- it earned him the nickname of "Cupid" from his teammates -- was also evident in his base running. A favorite tactic while he was with the A's was Connie Mack's "famed double squeeze". It was described some years later in an article in the Philadelphia Inquirer: "When Strunk was on second and a teammate was on third, Connie Mack would wave his scorecard for the double squeeze. The man at bat would bunt, the man on third would tear home and Strunk, starting from second, would slide right behind him. Two men would score on the same squeeze bunt!" It was also noted that Strunk "often" could advance from first to third on a routine sacrifice bunt.

The 5'11", 175 pound outfielder -- he was described in a 1911 press release as "a chubby-faced chap" and "a veritable Beau Brummell" -- played for the A's from 1910 through 1917, though he missed much of the 1910 season as a result of a knee injury while sliding into second base. He was back in the line-up for the World Series that year, however, and was also on Connie Mack's World Championship teams of 1911 and 1913, and on the 1914 team that lost in the World Series to the Boston Braves.

In the years following his championship teams, Connie Mack ran into considerable financial difficulties. To solve the problem, he began selling many of his established stars while their market value was still high. In December 1917 Strunk and two other top players, pitcher Joe Bush and catcher Waily Schang, were sold to the Boston Red Sox for three "second-line" players and $60,000.

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As a result, in 1918 Strunk was again with a World Championship team as the Red Sox that year won the World Series. One of the pitchers for the Red Sox was Babe Ruth; later Strunk wrote, "I played with Babe Ruth on the Worlds Championship team of 1918 and he was one of baseball's greatest pitchers", due largely, Strunk observed, to his "control and knowledge of the hitters".

Incidentally, Strunk inadvertently played a part in Ruth's move from the pitching mound to the outfield, and to the changes in the way the game is played that resulted from the Babe's home run hitting. In early June of 1918 Strunk was out of the line-up with a slight injury; to fill in, Ruth played center field, and also hit a home run, in each of the next three games. When it was his turn to pitch the next game, it is reported by Robert W. Creamer in his biography entitled Babe, Ruth told the manager that "pitching was no fun anymore. Hitting was what he liked to do and what he wanted to do". Although he continued to pitch for another year and a half, this was perhaps the real beginning of Ruth's career as a slugging outfielder.

Strunk was traded back to Philadelphia in June 1919. In June of the following year he was sent on waivers to the Chicago White Sox, where he played for four years. In 1921 he had a .332 batting average, his best in the major leagues. He was waived back to the Philadelphia A's again in August 1924, where he was used primarily as a pinch hitter for the balance of the season.

In 1925, after seventeen seasons in the major leagues, Strunk returned to the minor leagues and again played for Shamokin, by then in the New York-Pennsylvania League, batting .396 in 44 games before retiring from baseball.

In his 1507 regular season games as a major leaguer, Amos A. Strunk had 1415 hits, including 212 doubles, 96 triples, and 15 home runs, for a lifetime batting average of .283. He also had 13 hits in the 18 World Series games in which he played, including two doubles and two triples. In addition, he led all the outfielders in the American League in fielding in 1912, 1914, 1917, 1918 and 1920.

After his retirement from baseball, Strunk became an insurance broker, living in Llanerch. He died on July 22, 1979.

Jack Lapp

One of Strunk's teammates on the World Champion Philadelphia Athletics was Jack Lapp, another former player for Berwyn. A native of this area as well, he was always a local favorite.

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John Walker Lapp was born in Frazer (or, as it was reported in several press releases, he "owned" Frazer as "his place of nativity") on September 10, 1884. His father, William Lapp, was a section foreman for the Pennsylvania Railroad. Lapp attended the Maple Grove School in East Goshen Township, where he was soon known for his skill at the popular ball game of "tickly over".

Learning baseball by playing sandlot ball and with the Morstein team, Lapp then joined the Berwyn team, becoming a catcher. He played for the Berwyn nine in the 1905 and 1906 seasons, Berwyn winning The Main Line League championship both years he was with the club. The 1906 title game was played on the home field of the Philadelphia Athletics, then at 21st Street and Columbia Avenue, for a side purse of $400, the backers of each team having put up $200. Lapp, batting fifth, had two hits in the local nine's 9-2 triumph over Ardmore in the game, and caught the attention of the A's scouts.

As a result, in 1907 he started the season with the Portsmouth team in the Virginia League, but before the end of the season he also was with Chester in the Atlantic League and with Syracuse in the New York League. While with Syracuse he became ill with typhoid fever, after which he "jumped" back to Allentown in the Atlantic League, a move which, it was later recalled, "got [him] into a fine pickle". Eventually the matter was straightened out, however, and he was reinstated and sold to the Hazleton team in the same league. He played there most of the 1908 season and was, according to a later press release, "the reigning sensation".(As an indication of how well he stood with the Hazleton fans, several years later "a special train of folk from the coal region came down to Shibe Park," it was reported, "and presented Johnnie with a splendid watch. -- gold, too, with his initials worked into the cover".)

In the fall he was moved up to the major leagues, with the Philadelphia Athletics, playing thirteen games with them at the end of the season. At the start of the 1909 campaign he was sent back down to Newark in the International League to get more experience, but after only three games there he was recalled when Doc Powers, one of the catchers for the A's, died suddenly. Although he appeared in only 22 games for the A's that year, his batting average was a respectable .339. He played with the Athletics for the next six seasons.

While he was not a spectacular player, Lapp was described as "one of the type of players whose work is, as a rule, so steady and smooth that it fails to attract much attention". He also had an excellent throwing arm, as was demonstrated in the two games in which he played in the 1911 World Series, holding the New York Giants' base runners, "considered to be the best base runners in the majors at the time", in check. It was also reported that "on fly balls" he was "without superior in the American League". His .383 batting average in 1911 was also the best among all catchers in the league.

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In March 1913, during the pre-season barnstorming tour of the A's, Lapp was painfully injured when a foul tip hit him directly on his Adam's apple in an exhibition game in Houston, Texas. It was an injury from which he never fully recovered, and he suffered laryngeal trouble for the rest of his life.

Before the 1916 season, Connie Mack "gave" Lapp to the Chicago White Sox as a part of his program "of building up a new team with young players" and to reduce his salary costs. The only stipulation was that the White Sox assume the contract that Lapp had with the Athletics. Lapp started the season with the Chicago team, but at mid-season, plagued by ill health, he retired, after playing in only 34 games.

Altogether, the balding, left-handed hitting backstop played nine seasons in the big leagues. His lifetime major league batting average was .263 as he collected a total of 416 hits, including 59 doubles, 26 triples, and three home runs, in the 565 games in which he played. He was also in five World Series games in the four years that the A's won the American League championship and were in the post-season Series play.

After retirement from baseball, Lapp spent quite a bit of time hunting, although he continued in poor health. He was also a member of the Robert A, Lamberton Lodge, No. 487, F. & A. M.; Oriental Chapter, No. 106, R. A. C; St. John's Commandery, No. 4, Knights Templar; Order of the Moose, No. 54; Berwyn Council, No. 362, 0. of I. A.; and the Burlholme Yearly Association.

On February 6, 1920, after ailing for three years, he succumbed to an attack of pneumonia in his home in Philadelphia. He was 35 years old.

Barney Slaughter

Of the five former Berwyn players who made it to the big leagues, the major league career of Barney (or, more properly, Byron Atkins) Slaughter was the shortest. He appeared in only eight big league games.

Slaughter was born on October 6, 1884 at Smyrna, Delaware. He was graduated from high school there, and later attended Goldey's College in Wilmington. He played ball "from childhood", and started playing semi-pro ball in 1906. A right-handed pitcher, he was a standout with Phineas Pyott's Berwyn team in The Main Line Baseball League in the latter part of the decade.

In 1910 he joined the Phillies' pitching staff, appearing, as already noted, in eight games, in seven of them as a relief pitcher. He pitched a total of 18 innings altogether, giving up 21 hits and walking eleven while striking out seven. His earned run average as a relief pitcher was 2.63, but his overall earned run average was 5.50. In none of the games was he the winning or losing pitcher, but he is credited with one save. He batted five times and had one hit, a single, for a lifetime major league batting average of .200.

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In 1911 Slaughter pitched for Scranton in the New York State League, and subsequently for Louisville in the American Association, Sioux City in the Western League, and Erie in the Central League, before retiring from organized baseball in 1913.

After leaving baseball, he was employed by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, working in the secretary's office for more than 35 years before retiring at the age of 65.

On May 17, 1961 Barney Slaughter died in Philadelphia, at the age of 76.

Bern Garaghty

The careers of the other two former Berwyn players who also played in the major leagues have a number of similarities. Both of them were students at Villanova College when they played for the Berwyn team during the mid-1930s. Both were infielders. Both of them had only brief careers in the majors (though not so brief as Barney Slaughter's!). And both of them were quite successful as minor league managers after their playing days in the big leagues had ended.

Benjamin Raymond Geraghty was a native of Jersey City, where he was born on July 19, 1914. He attended St. Benedict's High School in Newark, and was an all-State selection in both basketball and baseball there before entering Villanova. At Villanova, he was captain of the basketball team and shortstop on the baseball nine. While at Villanova, he also played for Dan Redmond's Berwyn team in The Main Line League.

Upon graduation from Villanova in 1936, he was signed to a contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers, and went directly from the campus to the National League. He played in 51 games for the Dodgers that year, most of them at shortstop, and had a .194 batting average.

A shoulder injury then interrupted his major league career, but during the war years he made a brief comeback to the majors; in 1943 and 1944 he was with the Boston Braves in the National League, playing in 19 games during the two years. Altogether, he played in 70 games in the majors, with a lifetime batting average of .199. A right-handed hitter, he stood 5'11" and weighed 175 pounds.

Returning to the minors in 1945, Geraghty was on the rosters of the Hartford, Syracuse, and Indianapolis teams at various times that season, and at the start of the 1946 season was with the Sacramento team in the Pacific Coast League. Early in the season, however, he went to Spokane in the Western International League, with the prospect of becoming the manager as well as a player. On June 14 the team was involved in a disastrous accident when the bus in which fifteen members of the team were traveling, in an attempt to avoid hitting a car at Snoqualmic Pass, fell down the side of a mountain, killing nine of the players. While Geraghty survived the crash, his playing days were over. At the same time, a very successful seventeen-year career as a manager was begun.

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In 1947 he managed Spokane to a second-place finish. For the next five years he had various assignments in the New York Giants' farm system, managing at Palatka in the Florida State League and at Meridian in the Southeastern League in 1948, at Bristol in the Appalachian League in 1949 and 1950, and promoted to Jacksonville, in the "Sally" League, in 1951 and 1952. When the Jacksonville team was taken over by the Boston Braves organization in 1953, Geraghty was retained as manager, staying with Jacksonville through the 1956 season. In these four seasons, the team finished first three times, in 1953 giving the city its first pennant in nearly 50 years, and second once. Among the young players Geraghty developed at Jacksonville, incidentally, was Henry Aaron, who went directly from the Class A Jacksonville team to the big leagues, and eventually became the major leagues' all-time leading home run hitter.

In 1957 Geraghty was promoted to Wichita, a Class AAA team in the American Association, which had finished seventh the year before. In his first year there he guided the team to the pennant, with a roster only slightly different from that of the previous year. "Hustle is contagious," he noted in attempting to explain his success, adding that it was always his objective to compile a winning record of 20 more wins than losses early in the season so that "it takes an awfully hot ball club to beat you". (At the same time, however, he noted during one winning streak, "We won eight straight games after I hung the rabbit's foot [that his wife had dug out of a closet] in my locker", and when he left it behind on a road trip he had it rushed to him via TWA airlines from Wichita!) Whatever the reason for his success, for his accomplishment he was named Minor League Manager of the Year by The Sporting News.

He continued with the team (in 1959 it was moved to Louisville) throught he 1961 season. In his five years with Wichita/Louisville the team was twice in first place and second three times.

After the 1961 season Geraghty left the Braves' organization to join the Cleveland organization, returning to Jacksonville to pilot the Suns, now an International League team following the transfer of the old Jersey City franchise to there. Again, in his first year his team was in first place at the end of the season, although it lost in the play-offs.

In June the following year, he died suddenly of a heart attack.

As a manager, Geraghty was considered "an excellent tutor of young players", developing a number of star players for the big leagues besides Aaron. At the same time, in his seventeen years as a minor league manager his teams finished in first or second place in all but four seasons. He was also popular as an after-dinner speaker, with a "large supply of very funny and very true baseball stories", and with the press and fans alike.

He died on June 18, 1963 in Jacksonville, just a month and a day short of his 49th birthday.

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Frank Skaff

Frank Skaff, who also played for Dan Redmond's Berwyn team while a student at Villanova, played a total of 38 games with two teams in the big leagues. In his two seasons in the majors, incidentally, he played for two of the best known managers in baseball --Casey Stengel, with the Brooklyn Dodgers; and Connie Mack, with the Philadelphia Athletics.

Born in LaCrosse, Wisconsin on September 30, 1913, Francis Michael Skaff came east to attend Villanova College, where he was a star infielder on the Wildcats' baseball team.

Upon graduation, with a B. S. degree in economics, the 5'10", 185 pound right-hander immediately began a baseball career, playing with Allentown in the New York-Pennsylvania League and Peoria in the "Three-Eye" League before being called up to the Brooklyn Dodgers at the end of the 1935 season.

His tenure with the Dodgers included only six official appearances in the line-up, but his short stay was highlighted by a .545 batting average (six hits, two for extra bases, in eleven times at bat). It has also been claimed that he is the only player to have a 1.000 batting average against pitcher Dizzy Dean, getting a pinch-hit single the only time he faced the great St. Louis Cardinals' Hall of Fame hurler.

(More than three dozen years later, incidentally, Skaff could still recall the way in which Casey Stengel gave signs to his hitters. "I was fresh out of Villanova," he recalled early in 1972, "and had joined the Dodgers in Chicago. I sat on the bench and watched Casey Stengel growing madder by the day because his players kept missing the signs. ... He points to me and says, 'I'll bet this kid, right out of college, can get them. Go ahead, kid, tell them my hit and take signs.'" Whereupon, Skaff reported, he got up and recited them: '"If I'm looking at you, you're hitting. If I'm walking away from you and spitting, you're hitting. If I'm looking at you and spitting, you're not hitting. If I'm walking away from you and not spitting, you're not hitting. Those were exactly what his signs were. I'll never forget them")

Following his brief stay with Brooklyn, Skaff again bounced around the minor leagues, playing for Knoxville in the Southern League in 1936, for Clinton in the "Three-Eye" League and Trenton in the New York-Pennsylvania League in 1937, for Greenville in the "Sally" league in 1938, for Oswego in the Canadian-American League in 1939, voluntarily retired in 1940, and with Charleston in the "Sally" League in 1941.

Voluntarily retired again in 1942, he returned to the major leagues with Connie Mack's Philadelphia A's in 1943, playing in 32 games and hitting .281. Thus, in his two seasons as a player in the big leagues, Skaff played in 38 games, with a .320 batting average overall and a .966 fielding average.

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From 1944 to 1946 he was with the Baltimore Orioles in the International League. In May 1946 he went to Montgomery in the Southeastern League, taking over as manager of the club, then in eighth place. The team finished the season in fourth place and, with Skaff continuing as manager, finished third in 1947 and in first place in 1948. Although he continued to manage various minor league clubs for the next fifteen years, except for 1958, this was the only time he won a pennant.

Overall, as a minor league manager, including stints at various times with Durham in the Carolina League; Savannah, Augusta, and Knoxville in the "Sally" League; Lincoln in the Western League; Birmingham in the Southern League; Buffalo and Ottawa in the International League; and Charleston and Denver in the American Association, his teams finished first once, second twice, third twice, fourth three times, fifth once, sixth twice, seventh twice, and eighth twice.

In 1958 Skaff became a scout for the Detroit Tigers, an assignment he held for several years (in addition to managing in the minor leagues) until 1965. In that year he joined the Tigers as a coach.

At mid-season the following year he took over as acting manager of the team as a replacement for Bob Swift (who in turn was acting manager in place of Chuck Dressen) when Swift was hospitalized. "Skaff is an uncommonly honest man as Detroit manager," it was noted in The Sporting News in September that year, "'I kicked it.' he said recently after holding a runner at third base on the mistaken assumption that an outfield ball had been caught." While his appearance was formidable -- to describe him one newspaper reporter suggested, "Elliot Ness used to shoot people like him" -- actually there was, according to the same reporter, "no nicer, more gentlemanly, more soft-spoken man in the whole game". (Skaff, however, insisted "I'm not as mild as people say I am.") While he was the manager the Tigers won 40 games and lost 39, with their record for the season as a whole 88 wins and 74 losses, finishing third.

In 1967 Skaff returned to the coaching lines with the Tigers, and has served in various capacities with the Detroit organization since then.

The Main Line Baseball League was disbanded in 1942, and for its last six years Berwyn did not have a team in the league. But during the first four decades of the century, spectators at the old Fritz field or the old field where Dogwood Lane is now or at the High School or Easttown Grammar School diamonds in Berwyn saw some pretty good semi-professional and amateur baseball. They saw some pretty good players, too-- among them these five players who played for the local, team and later made it to the big leagues.