Three new books recall Penobscot Indian’s career

INDIAN ISLAND (AP) – The story of Louis Sockalexis, the Penobscot Indian whose meteoric career in major league baseball was cut short by alcoholism more than a century ago, had been forgotten for decades.

But thanks to a software developer in Ohio, a bartender-turned-writer in New York City and a former English teacher in Maine, the “Deerfoot of the Diamond” is getting another turn in the public eye.

Three full-length biographies – Sockalexis’ first ever – have been published within the past year, spurring fresh interest in the outfielder whose brilliance inspired the nickname of the Cleveland Indians.

The books chronicle a gifted athlete whose exploits at Holy Cross and Notre Dame propelled him to the majors in 1897. Sockalexis’ blazing speed and rifle arm complemented his hitting and fielding abilities. He captured the imagination of fans and emerged as perhaps the most exciting player of his time.

“He was Paul Bunyanesque,” said Ed Rice, author of “The First Indian.” “He was one of those players, like a Bo Jackson, whose peers were in awe of him.”

But his career began to flicker early in July of his rookie season when he injured his right foot after taking a tumble from the second floor during a night of heavy drinking in Cleveland’s red light district. He was on the bench for most of the remainder of the season but finished with a batting average of .338.

Over the next two seasons, he played only 28 games, bringing his total to 94. After his release from Cleveland, he bounced around New England’s minor leagues, where his battles with the bottle continued.

Sockalexis died in 1913 when his heart gave out while working as a logger in northern Maine. Two years later, Cleveland officially became the Indians.

David Fleitz, author of “Louis Sockalexis: The First Cleveland Indian,” said he first heard of his subject when the team came under attack from Native American groups for its nickname and its logo of Chief Wahoo, the Indian with the bright red skin and big toothy grin.

“That brought attention to the name and to Sockalexis,” said Fleitz, a Society of American Baseball Research member from Bowling Green, Ohio, who writes baseball books as a sideline to his software job. He had finished a book about Shoeless Joe Jackson and was looking for a player whose story had not been told before.

Brian McDonald’s introduction to Sockalexis came through a student in a college class he taught in New York. The woman was researching alcoholism and drug abuse in sports and found Sockalexis through a Web search.

“When she told me about him, my ears perked up. I thought that’s a great book,” McDonald said. He had already written a book about three generations of his family who served in the New York Police Department and was ripe for another project, which emerged as “Indian Summer.”

Rice, who lives in Bangor, has the longest acquaintance with Sockalexis, having first heard of him while still in grade school. Rice’s father was an executive at an Old Town shoe factory within sight of the old one-lane bridge to Indian Island and was familiar with the legend of Sockalexis throwing a baseball across the Penobscot River.

Believing that Sockalexis’ remarkable gifts could have put him among baseball’s all-time greats, Rice wanted to spread the word about his long-forgotten hero. He put in 18 years of research before completing his book, which was the third Sockalexis biography to hit the market, after Fleitz’s and McDonald’s.

Tall and handsome – a shade under 6-feet and 195 pounds – Sock, as he was known, stood out from among the much smaller players of his era. His athletic prowess went beyond baseball. He ran 100 yards in 10 seconds flat and was known as a ferocious tackler when he played football at Holy Cross.

It was only 21 years after Custer’s Last Stand that Sockalexis reached the big leagues and prejudice against Indians remained strong. He was subjected to constant jeers, war whoops and cat calls, but he took abuse with grace and gradually won over his tormentors by his on-the-field skills and demeanor.

All three authors plowed a lot of the same ground in researching the biographies. Newspaper archives in Cleveland, Bangor, Worcester, Mass., and South Bend, Ind., were a prime source, along with The Sporting News and Sporting Life. Socklexis never married and left no family members to carry on his story.

One issue addressed in the new books is whether Sock was the first Native American in the majors, a title that an earlier researcher gave to James Madison Toy. Fleitz accepts Toy’s Indian ancestry, while Rice is skeptical and proclaims Sockalexis as the first. They agree, however, that Toy did not look like an Indian and did not present himself as one.

The Sockalexis saga also can become intertwined with the ongoing controversy over the Cleveland Indians nickname and logo. In general, the authors accept the continued use of the name Indians but find the cartoonish Wahoo a bit over the top and wouldn’t mind seeing him go.

Even on Indian Island, where his grave is marked by a granite monument with a bronze plaque similar to those in the Hall of Fame, memories of Sockalexis have diminished with time.

As a child, tribal governor Barry Dana heard elders tell stories about Sockalexis and his second cousin, marathoner Andrew Sockalexis, who finished fourth in the 1912 Olympics in Stockholm. The two, buried in nearby graves, were honored nearly 20 years ago when an ice arena bearing their name was built on Indian Island. The facility has since been converted to a high-stakes bingo hall.

Dana says that while the first-hand memories of Sockalexis are long gone, his legend among tribe members survives.

“I think his memory is well loved here, cherished and respected,” he said. “We take pride, and focus on the fact that he was a great athlete … We don’t focus on the alcoholism.”