Neil O. Churchill (February 13, 1891 – September, 1969) was a car dealer in

Bismarck, North Dakota Bismarck () is the capital of the U.S. state of North Dakota and the county seat of Burleigh County. It is the state's second-most populous city, after Fargo. The city's population was 73,622 in the 2020 census, while its metropolitan popula ...

who funded an integrated

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...

team in the mid-thirties more than a decade before

Jackie Robinson Jack Roosevelt Robinson (January 31, 1919 – October 24, 1972) was an American professional baseball player who became the first African American to play in Major League Baseball (MLB) in the modern era. Robinson broke the baseball color line ...

broke the

color barrier Racial segregation is the systematic separation of people into racial or other ethnic groups in daily life. Racial segregation can amount to the international crime of apartheid and a crime against humanity under the Statute of the Internati ...

Major League Baseball Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...

Business

Churchill joined Wickham Corwin's Bismarck automobile dealership in 1925 and the company became Corwin-Churchill Motor Co. A colleague said he "was a hell of a salesman—a smart fellow and real promoter." In 1937, when Corwin moved to Fargo, Churchill stayed in Bismarck. When Churchill retired in 1952 he sold his share of the business to the Corwin family. He also owned the Prince Hotel, Bismarck.

Baseball

Immediately after

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

Churchill took up baseball with the Bismarck semi-pro team and became their star player. He bought the team in 1933 and, from his experience of playing against black touring teams, he decided that recruiting black players would strengthen his new team. He called

Abe Saperstein Abraham Michael Saperstein (; July 4, 1902 – March 15, 1966) was the founder, owner and earliest coach of the Harlem Globetrotters. Saperstein was a leading figure in black basketball and baseball from the 1920s through the 1950s, primarily bef ...

to recruit some

Negro league The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans and, to a lesser extent, Latin Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be ...

players. The first three black players to join the

Bismarck Churchills The Bismarck team was an integrated semi-professional baseball team based in Bismarck, North Dakota, in the 1930s. The team played independently of any league because its mixed-race roster was a problem in a period of segregation, and because ther ...

were

Quincy Trouppe Quincy Thomas Trouppe (December 25, 1912 – August 10, 1993) was an American professional baseball player and an amateur boxing champion. He was a catcher in the Negro leagues from 1930 to 1949. He was a native of Dublin, Georgia. Early life H ...

(

Chicago American Giants The Chicago American Giants were a Chicago-based Negro league baseball team. From 1910 until the mid-1930s, the American Giants were the most dominant team in black baseball. Owned and managed from 1911 to 1926 by player-manager Andrew "Rube" Fo ...

catcher Catcher is a Baseball positions, position in baseball and softball. When a Batter (baseball), batter takes their at bat, turn to hit, the catcher crouches behind home plate, in front of the (home plate, home) Umpire (baseball), umpire, and recei ...

, Red Haley (

Memphis Red Sox The Memphis Red Sox were an American Negro league baseball team that was active from 1920 to 1959. Originally named the Barber College Baseball Club, the team was initially owned and operated by Arthur P. Martin, a local Memphis barber. In the la ...

(infielder), and Roosevelt Davis (

Pittsburgh Crawfords The Pittsburgh Crawfords, popularly known as the Craws, were a professional Negro league baseball team based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The team, previously known as the Crawford Colored Giants, was named after the Crawford Bath House, a recre ...

)

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("pitches") the baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of retiring a batter, who attempts to either make contact with the pitched ball or draw ...

. When these proved insufficient to beat Bismarck's great rivals in Jamestown, Churchill recruited

Satchel Paige Leroy Robert "Satchel" Paige (July 7, 1906 – June 8, 1982) was an American professional baseball pitcher who played in Negro league baseball and Major League Baseball (MLB). His career spanned five decades and culminated with his induction in ...

from the Crawfords.

Gus Greenlee William Augustus Greenlee (December 26, 1893 – July 7, 1952) was a highly successful businessman in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, who was born and raised in Marion, North Carolina. After migrating to Pittsburgh as a young man and working in the ...

, the Crawfords' owner, threatened to knife Churchill for the 'theft' of Paige. Paige arrived from Chicago on the day of the game in October 1933. It was the first time that he had played alongside white players. Churchill won his bet of $1000 with a Jamestown politician that his team would win. A rematch was held a few days later in Jamestown before a crowd of 4000. After twelve innings the game was ended, unresolved, by darkness. Churchill challenged Jamestown to a three-game series in Bismarck. Bismarck won that series and the state championship. Next season (1934), Churchill spent $5,000 (using personal and city funds, and federal emergency relief labor) improving on the Bismarck ball park. He built a 3000-seat grandstand, children's bleachers, and a 500-space car park, with a clear view of the game along the outfield fence. Churchill's 1935 team included

Hilton Smith Hilton Lee Smith (February 27, 1907 – November 18, 1983) was an American right-handed pitcher in Negro league baseball. He pitched alongside Satchel Paige for the Kansas City Monarchs between 1932 and 1948. He was inducted into the National B ...

(who joined the team in early June), and Ted "Double Duty" Radcliffe (who joined on June 21 after securing his release from the Brooklyn Eagles).

Politics

Churchill was mayor of Bismarck from 1939 to 1946.http://www.bismarck.org/uploads/doc_Bismarck_Mayors_1876_to_now_12_07.doc

References

* Roper, Scott C. 1994. "A Summer in North Dakota: Uncovering Satchel Paige's 1935 Season." Baseball Research Journal 23, 51–54. {{DEFAULTSORT:Churchill, Neil 1891 births 1969 deaths Negro league baseball executives Mayors of Bismarck, North Dakota Baseball in North Dakota 20th-century American politicians