The Pecan Park Eagle

Outfielder Eddie Knoblauch models the uniform of the 1947 Texas League and Dixie Series Champions Houston Buffs. The breastplate buffalo logo was my all time favorite design. Several other clubs wore buffalo logos, most notably the 1931 Texas League Champions of Dizzy Dean’s big local year, but none were as detail-classy as the ’47 version. The red trip and socks of that Knoblauch year were burgundy red, with the buffalo appearing in natural shades of brown and a departure in color and style from the parent club St. Louis Cardinals.

Yesterday I received this sincere and heartfelt note from friend and Early Houston Baseball research colleague Steve “Iron Man” Bertone. (When our SABR book is published in 2014 on “Houston Baseball, The Early Years, 1861-1961,” you will see why we affectionately refer to Steve as “Iron Man.” His “only” assignment on the project has been to basically write Volume II of our work, a year by year annual summary for every season of minor league professional baseball in the city’s history that was played, from 1888 to 1961.

Like yours truly, Steve grew up a Houston Buffs fan. Everything he writes on the subject comes both from the head and the heart of personal experience as a lifelong fan of the club and the game from childhood forward, If people like us didn’t care about filling in the holes that exist in our local baseball history wall, and that includes about a dozen or so others additional to Steve and me, we would not be so bound into the volunteer task of producing this work for our local chapter of the Society of American Baseball Research.

The past matters. And baseball has been an important part of our Houston past, documentable to 1861 and the formation of the city’s first baseball organization and probably back to 1836, when the city was founded by two New York brothers and an onslaught of early settlers from the northeastern states that “invented” baseball back there around the same time.

Long wind up. Quick pitch. Here’s how Steve Bertone expressed it to me by e-mail yesterday:

Bill,

We have not been consuming the spirits, but I think we are on to something here. A group of us think that for the Astros last home game as a National League team they should wear throwback Buffs uniforms!  It is every fitting since the game is with the Cardinals and our roster is not much above AA ball. One gentleman suggested that the Cards could play their minor league call-ups to make it an interesting game. Buffs shirts giveaways to the fans that show up.

Get the word out (to) start the movement, we only have a two weeks to get it done! I plan on wearing my Buffs shirt that night.

– Steve Bertone

Hey! I totally support Steve Bertone’s group recommendation that the Astros should pull a major “Carpe Diem” by designating the last official game here against the St. Louis Cardinals as “Houston Buffs Night!”

Because of the Houston Buffs’ long-time history as one of the first farm teams ever owned directly by a major league club (The Cardinals), one  that then immediately bled into direct National opponents as two cities when Houston went big-time in 1962, that last game with the Cardinals represents a night of last goodbyes to a connection that had existed for ninety years.

It was only broken by the decision to send Houston to the American League in 2013. To ignore this “Long Goodbye to the Cardinals” in recognition of St. Louis’s involvement back over time with the Astros, Colt .45’s, and Buffs is nothing less than an unpardonable snub of history on the part of the club.

Notice to what can be done short-term is all the club has to do under the present circumstances. We would love to see the Astros wear Buffs uniforms that special night, but we realize that the logistics of recreating and then making these uniforms available with only a month to go would be tough, but if it’s doable, please do it! It’s still not too late to declare that final game on September 26th as “Houston Buffs Night” and to encourage fans to wear Houston Buffs caps and jerseys – or just to bring stuffed buffalo toys, if they have them. Or maybe pass out Houston Buffs pennants to the first 10,000 fans who show up.

What better way to say it: “Goodbye Buffs! Goodbye Cardinal! Goodbye National League!”

We don’t expect the Astros to do everything for “Buffs Night” at this date. We just hope that they will do something positive with this request, which I know they will know about. The club always has the ability to ignore our past, if they so choose, but we fans also always retain the power to ignore the club’s future, if we feel that our past is being put to sleep as unimportant to their bottom line.

Astros, please show a little all-that’s-possible respect for some kind of conscious acknowledgment of that last Cardinals@Astros game and it’s nearly a century-old significance to the history of professional baseball in Houston.

Of course, if you had time for Buff uniforms, here are three other models:

That’s me modeling a 1932 Buffs road uniform. The cap is a 1954 model.

First baseman Jerry Witte models the shorts uniform worn briefly (How else do you wear shorts?) by the 1950 Houston Buffs.

On “Knothole Gang Night,” catcher Frank Mancuso poses with one of the members as he also models the 1953 Buffs home uniform that was quite popular for several seasons in the 1950s. It resembled the home Cardinals uniform, minus their famous “Two Birds on a Bat” logo.

Let’s Go Buffs and All Their Long Time Fans! Let’s give the Cardinals the goodbye we all deserve in respectful exchange! – And thank you again and again, Steve Bertone and Friends, for making this most worthy suggestion!

Wednesday, September 26, 2012, the Houston Astros play their last official National League home game at Minute Maid Park against their most storied longtime NL rival, the St. Louis Cardinals. Let’s do it right as “Houston Buffs Night!”

Tags: Houston Buffs Night

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