Willard Jessie Brown (June 26, 1915 – August 4, 1996) was an American baseball player who played as an outfielder in the Negro leagues for the Kansas City Monarchs and in Major League Baseball (MLB) for the St. Louis Browns, where he was one of the league's first African American players. Often called "Home Run Brown" for making history as the first Black ballplayer to hit a home run in the American League, Brown's other nicknames included "Sonny", due to his preference for crowded Sunday games, and "Ese Hombre" ("That Man"), due to his offensive dominance playing in the Puerto Rican Winter League.

For the Monarchs, Brown led the Negro American League in hits for eight seasons (1937–39, 1941–43, 1946, 1948) and runs batted in (RBI) seven times during his career. His eight times leading a league in hits is tied with Ty Cobb for most in baseball history while his seven times leading in RBI for a league is tied for second-most in baseball history with Josh Gibson; Gibson and Brown also finished in the top two in batting average in five seasons each, the most in Negro league history.

In 1947, Willard Brown and fellow Monarchs player Hank Thompson both signed with the St. Louis Browns, becoming the third and fourth Black ballplayers in the MLB and marking the first time two African Americans played as teammates on the same MLB team. Brown is a member of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

Early life

Brown was born in Shreveport, Louisiana on 26 June 1915. He grew up in Natchitoches, Louisiana and in Shreveport. Brown's father was a mill laborer who became the owner of a cabinetmaking shop. Brown was a batboy in spring training for the Kansas City Monarchs, as the Negro league team held its workouts in Shreveport.

Baseball career

He began his baseball career in with the Monroe Monarchs, a minor Negro league team in the Negro Southern League. In , he signed with the Kansas City Monarchs, for which he would play in six out of the next eight years. A rookie season of 56 games played with a .379 batting average, ten home runs, 81 hits, and 60 RBI (for which he led the latter three categories) proved to be the beginning of a career full of raw power.

During his pre-war baseball years, he established himself as having the most raw power in Negro league history, and possibly in the history of baseball. He hit home runs more often than the better known Josh Gibson, causing Gibson to give Brown his nickname.

He also hit for a batting average of .374 in and regularly hitting over .350. Brown was one of the fastest players in baseball in the late 1930s and 1940s, as well as a solid outfielder. From 1937 to 1946, Brown helped lead the Monarchs to six pennants in ten seasons. He finished second in batting average three times during this period (1937, 1939, 1943).

Brown left the Monarchs for the first time in 1940, swayed by the Mexican Leagues (as devised by Jorge Pasquel), who raided 63 players with the promise of more money ($1,000 per month); Brown played in Nuevo Laredo.

In the 1942 season, the Monarchs met the Negro National League champion Homestead Grays in the 1942 Negro World Series, the first Negro World Series between the Negro American League and the Negro National League since 1927. Brown stole a base in Game 2 and hit a home run in Game 3 while collecting seven hits in sixteen combined at-bats in four official games (an exhibition game and a game later not counted by the league was also played).

In the winter of 1941-42, he moved to the Puerto Rican leagues in Humacao. He also played parts of 1943-44 in the California Winter League. He served in the U.S. Army in 1944, seeing service in Europe before returning to the Monarchs in 1946 after being released from duty as a technician fifth grade.

Brown entered the baseball record books again on August 13, 1947, when he became the first African-American player to hit a home run in the American League: an inside-the-park homer off Detroit Tigers pitcher and future Hall of Famer Hal Newhouser.

He was featured on several baseball cards during his playing days, including ones from Toleteros that were inserts in packages of tobacco. Buck O'Neil described Brown as the "most natural ballplayer I ever saw”.

Brown was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006. The same year, he gained induction into the Caribbean Baseball Hall of Fame as part of their first class.

In 2013, the Bob Feller Act of Valor Award honored Brown as one of 37 Baseball Hall of Fame members for his service in the United States Army during World War II.

Notes

See also

  • List of Negro league baseball players who played in Major League Baseball

References

  • and Baseball-Reference Black Baseball, Mexican League, and Minor League stats and Seamheads