The Browns have been maligned for their initial misguided stab at integration

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For more than strictly financial reasons, the DeWitts were fifa 15 coins undoubtedly sincere in their desire to see a black player succeed in St. Louis. They just didn’t have the wherewithal to accomplish it. The Browns have been maligned for their initial misguided stab at integration, but they did make an honest attempt to recruit black players, and they made inroads in the area before most of their contemporaries.

The Browns also negotiated an option on Negro League star Piper Davis of the Birm- ingham Black Barons at the same time they acquired the rights to Brown and Thompson. Although he was 30 years old at the time, Davis was probably a better candidate to succeed under the difficult circumstances than either Brown or Thompson. He was a talented and ver- satile performer, a speedy line-drive hitter who could play either the infield or outfield. He was also a leader and, unlike Brown and Thompson, there were no questions about his char- acter. In 1948, he would take over as player-manager of the Barons and lead them to the Negro American League pennant. But the Browns wanted Davis to prove himself in the minors. With his Barons still fighting for the pennant, he declined the minor league opportunity, and the Browns let his option lapse.

Around the same time they purchased the rights to Thompson and Brown, the Browns also signed Chuck Harmon, a collegiate basketball star for the University of Toledo.15 Har- mon was assigned to the Browns’ Gloversville-Johnstown affiliate in the Canadian-American League, where Dodger farmhands Roy Partlow and Johnny Wright had broken the color bar- rier the previous year. They would be the only big league franchise besides the Dodgers to have a black player in their farm system in 1947.

The DeWitt brothers purchased controlling interest of the franchise from Muckerman in 1949, but little changed for the grievously under-funded operation. They had to sell off their few quality players just to stay in business. In 1948, they had moved up to sixth place with the same record as the previous year and then ended up seventh in both 1949 and 1950.