Reader’s father, George Meehan, was a pitcher for Cafémen and several other area...
Thurman Barrett demonstrates support of backyard chickens in what appears to have been an unpublished photograph for a May 23, 1930, San Antonio Light story about a court case over city annexation.My father, George Meehan, was a right-handed pitcher for the Public Service Utilities team, among many other teams he played for in the City Major League and other semipro teams throughout the 1930s.
I have many clippings he saved from the San Antonio Light sports sections when he pitched for the Nu-Grape Bottlers, Meggs Filling Station, Harlandale Athletics, Floresville and Beeville teams, among others — whichever team would pay the most or lead to a job. Times were tough during the Depression, and jobs were hard to come by. The teams would take up a collection from the attendees and split up the proceeds. At Beeville, he was given a job with the Highway Department building a bridge in town, lived at the home of the fire chief and pitched for the city team on the weekends. In 1934, the San Antonio Missions went down there to play an exhibition game, and George was the starting pitcher for Beeville. He liked to recall that during this game he struck out Larry Bettencourt, who played for several years in the American League with the St. Louis Browns, on three straight pitches. George got a full-time job with Southern Pacific Railroad in 1937 and pitched on their City League team for a few more years. He retired from SP in 1972 and passed away in 2005 at the age of 98. I am attaching some of his clippings and a picture of the 1936 Bob Jones Café team, taken where they played at Barrett Field, located on the current site of Harlandale High School. A couple of years before he passed away, I asked him to identify the players in the picture, and these are the ones he could remember. In the back row is first baseman Russell “Bull” Curry, third baseman Brian Holder, right-handed pitcher Alcie Hayes and George Meehan . In the front row are right fielder Ed Schaefer , shortstop Leroy Epp, center fielder Jack Brieseke, catcher Eddie Brieseke and left fielder Beverly Otterside. I do not know for how many seasons they played as Bob Jones Café, but several were also with the Harlandale Athletics and Nu-Grape Bottlers during the ’30s, according to newspaper clippings my father saved.The City Major League was formed in 1931, “scrapped from the old City and Saturday leagues,” according to the San Antonio Light, March 28, 1931, with the so-named because nearly everyone else in the amateur leagues played on Sunday afternoon. The new league joined four other amateur leagues — the Parish, Industrial, Commercial and Sunday Morning — and its first teams were the Public Service Utilities, Carmen’s Union 694 Bushmen, Texas Chiropractic College Hawks, Missouri-Pacific Specials and Pierce Tire Masters. Teams from the former Saturday and City Senior Leagues had re-formed under the banner of one of the “weaker leagues,” which made up a City Minor League whose champion would meet the Major League winner for the city title.during the 1930s in San Antonio was a citywide pastime, maybe even a passion, since any local organization with at least nine young or youngish men seemed to be able to raise a team and join a league. Because most players had day jobs, they played baseball on weekends, and some loved the game enough to play more than one day or daypart a week, either regularly or as a substitute.Baseball sponsorship was a bargain for San Antonio businesses in the 1930s, 40s Some of their diamonds - found on as-yet undeveloped private land, high school fields and in city parks — were pretty rough, with undergroomed fields and unshaded seating for the spectators. Support was hyperlocal, with sponsors and fans coming from the area around the ballfield, although players might divide their time between two teams in different leagues, sometimes playing under an assumed name on Team 2 . “Meehan on the mound” was a highlight worth noting of games your father pitched. From 1932, he was with the Harlandale Athletics, a team often described as “powerful,” with lengthy winning streaks. Their home diamond was Barrett Field, usually said to be “in Harlandale” or “on the Pleasanton Road.” In 1936, the team acquired a new sponsor, the Bob Jones Café at 5040 S. Flores St. Yes, it’s Bob’s café, not Bud Jones Restaurant. Robert Lester “Bob” Jones was already in the café when future restaurateur Raymond Lester “Bud” Jones was born, as noted about the family’s connection to Wednesday lunch enchiladas in the Harlandale Independent School District.The Cafémen, as they were called, still called Barrett Field home. It seems to have been unsold land owned by and named after Marcus Thurman Barrett , a lawyer turned real estate magnate. After serving as an infantry officer in France during World War I, he returned to San Antonio, where he practiced law with his brothers, A.P. and Grady Barrett. In 1919, according to his obituary in the Express, Aug. 29, 1967, he “branched to the real-estate business establishing subdivisions in the Harlandale area.” As of the 1931 San Antonio city directory, Thurman Barrett, as he preferred to be known, was simultaneously a partner in the law firm of Barrett, Barrett & Taylor while serving as president of Harlandale Building Co., Harlandale Properties Inc. and Barrett & Co. Investments, all at 429 N. St. Mary’s St. As principal developer of Harlandale after its founders withdrew, Thurman Barrett kept a field office at Southcross and Pleasanton. Although I haven’t found documentation, it seems possible that the Harlandale Athletics were sponsored by Barrett, who was still platting and selling new subdivisions in the area at the time the amateur powerhouse got started.
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