Fashion-setter Southworth was decorated hero

Billy Southworth, Jr., (right), shown here with Bob Hope,
is often cited as popularizing the trend of U.S. pilots
wearing major league baseball caps in WWII.

Uncommon commons: In more than 30 years in sportscards publishing I have thrown hundreds of notes into files about the players – usually non-star players – who made up the majority of the baseball and football cards I collected as a kid. Today, I keep adding to those files as I peruse microfilms ofThe Sporting News from the 1880s through the 1960s. I found these tidbits brought some life to the player pictures on those cards. I figure that if I enjoyed them, you might too. 

In my blog posting of Oct. 1, 2014, I detailed some instances of the popularity of major league baseball caps with American aviators in World War II. (I can wait here if you want to go back and read that.)

The column mentioned that the oft-cited trend setter for that fashion was Army bomber pilot Billy Southworth, Jr., former St. Louis Cardinals minor leaguer and son of Cards' manager Billy Southworth, Sr.

The younger Southworth had played in the Cardinals' farm system as an outfielder for six different Redbird minor league teams. He had started in Class D ball in 1936, but by mid-1939 had gotten no higher than Class B ball, where he was named MVP of the Canadian-American League, batting .342 with 15 home runs. He was purchased by Toronto in the International League, the top rung of the Philadelphia Athletics' minor league ladder, for 1940, batting .280 for the season, but with little power.

With American involvement in World War II war looming on the horizon, Southworth enlisted in the U.S. Army as a flight cadet on Dec. 20, 1940. He was among the first pro ball players to enlist in the war.

Southworth's (center) first B-17 was named "Bad Check"
 because "it always came back."

You can find a great biography of Southworth's baseball and military career at:
www.baseballsgreatestsacrifice.com/biographies/southworth_billy_jr.html

Let me pick out a few items that I found of special interest. 

Southworth initially flew a B-17F Flying Fortress named Bad Check (because it always came back). His Cardinals cap must have proven lucky because in 25 bombing missions over Occupied France and Germany circa 1943, not a single member of his crews ever earned a Purple Heart. Despite the craft having been shot up by Nazi fighter planes and anti-aircraft shrapnel on several occasions, the Bad Check's crew never received a scratch.

Southworth also piloted "Winning Run," with its cardinal
 nose art. The ship "always came home" from bombing runs.

Southworth completed his combat tour in another B-17, named Winning Run (because it always came home). As a combat pilot he'd earned the Distinguished Flying Cross and the Air Medal with three oak leaf clusters, all before the age of 27.

After returning to the U.S. in late 1944, he began flying the new B-29 Superfortress. He was promoted to Lt. Col. and deputy commander of a new task force of the 2nd Air Corps.

On Feb. 15, 1945, Southworth was piloting a B-29 out of New York when engine trouble developed and he overshot the runway at LaGuardia Field. He crashed into Flushing Bay and was killed; five of his crew survived.

You might think that having never played major league baseball, Southworth didn't have a baseball  card. But you'd be wrong. 

In the 1922 American Caramel Co. card set known as E-121, Billy appears in a miniature Boston Braves uniform on his father's card. He was four or five years old when the photo was taken.

Billy was often photographed with his father. The last time the two were together was on Nov. 25, 1944, when they attended the Michigan-Ohio State football game. Young Southworth had attended OSU.

Young Billy had dashing movie star good looks and, indeed,
had been promised a Hollywood screen test after the war.

WWII pilots sought pro ball caps

Baseball caps from pro teams were highly sought by pilots and
crew during World War II.  T/Sgt. Bob Caron, tail gunner on the
Enola  Gay, wore a Brooklyn Dodgers cap on the mission to
bomb Hiroshima.

In my reading of microfilm of The Sporting News from 1944-45, I’ve noticed several items indicating that baseball caps from professional teams were highly prized by U.S. pilots.

Besides the prestige of wearing a cap formerly worn by a ballplayer, there was a practical side. Pilots found that the peaked visors of a baseball cap provided better protection from the sun’s glare than did the standard-issue headwear. Also, the professional ballcaps fit more snugly than Uncle Sam's version, giving the pilot and crew a better fit for their headsets.

Billy Southworth, Jr., (right) shown here with Bob Hope, wore a St. Louis
Cardinals baseball cap for much of his distinguished WWII flying career.

The trend was said to have started with Billy Southworth, Jr., son of the St. Louis Cardinals manager. The younger Southworth had played his way up to the top rungs of the Cards' minor league chain between 1936-40. He became a highly decorated bomber pilot in World War II, often wearing a Cardinals' cap in cockpit. He died in 1945 in a stateside plane crash.

Anybody who had a contact within a professional baseball organization from whom caps could be procured earned instant admiration from the flight crews.

Typical of the items carried by TSN of this subject was this short piece from the “In The Service” column of the April 27, 1944, issue.

White Sox Caps to Pay

Another Visit to Japan

            Chicago, Ill.—Back in the winter of 1913-14, when Charley Comiskey and John McGraw took their respective White Sox and Giants on a trip around the world, White Sox caps were worn by Tris Speaker, Sam Crawford, Herman Schaeffer and Urban Faber when they played in Tokyo, Yokohama and other Japanese cities. Some American airmen, wearing White Sox caps, now hope to pay another visit to Nippon’s big cities in the not-too-distant future.

            At the request of the former White Sox pitching star, Captain Ted Lyons of the Marines, Jimmie Dykes, Chicago manager, sent two dozen Sox caps to Ted in a fighting sector in the Southwest Pacific. They are to be used by fighting pilots from the base. For good measure, Dykes included Ted’s old White Sox shirt, with the familiar “16”on the back, the number which endeared Lyons to Chicago fans for 20 seasons with the Hose.

I don’t have it at hand, but I recall a 1945 TSN article about a “lucky” Brooklyn Dodgers cap worn by a B-17 pilot in Europe.

Wearing the Brooklyn cap, the pilot had brought his ship and crew through an unusually high number of bombing missions. He was hospitalized with some internal ailment or other and was visited by his crew prior to their next mission. He forgot to give the cap to the pinch-hitting pilot. The plane and its crew of 10 were lost.

Another noteworthy case of WWII pilots requesting pro ball caps was related by St. Louis Cardinals manager Billy Southworth in 1943. 

He received a request for St. Louis Cardinals caps from the commander of a Marine fighter squadron in the Pacific. The commander said that if Southworth would provide the caps, he and his pilots would shoot down one Japanese fighter for each cap received. 

Southworth sent the caps and later learned that the unit had splashed 48 Zeros by early 1944. The flying leathernecks' unit was Maj. Pappy Boyington's "Black Sheep Squadron."

The impetus for bringing this posting to fruition was an episode of Pawn Stars that I watched last night. Somebody was trying to get an inordinate amount of cash for a couple of autographed photos related to the Enola Gay and its crew.

I noticed that the one of the B-29 crew (it wasn’t pilot Col. Paul Tibbets) was wearing a Brooklyn Dodgers cap on that Aug. 6, 1945, mission that delivered the first atomic bomb over Hiroshima.

The airman wearing the Dodgers cap was T/Sgt. Bob Caron, the plane’s tail gunner. It was appropriate he had the cap since he was a 1938 graduate of Brooklyn Technical High School.