How Billy Sunday Became A Famous Ball Player
Vivid Incidents in the Career of the Great Ball Player-Evangelist
As Related by "Ma" Sunday to
FRED LOCKLEY
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Billy Sunday is perhaps the most famous of ex-big leaguers. Beginning life without a single advantage he fought his way to prominence in the athletic world while his fame as an evangelist fairly circles the globe. Read his early hardships and later success.
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F
ROM professional ball player to world famous
evangelist is a big jump, but that is the
jump that "Billy" Sunday has made. Recently I visited Billy Sunday and "Ma" Sunday
on their ranch in Hood River Valley, near the
base of Mt. Hood, in Oregon. Billy told me innumerable incidents of his baseball days, but
what I was after—the story of Billy's boyhood,
I got from "Ma"
Sunday. As we sat
on the steps of their
summer house with
the wonderful panorama of the Hood River
Valley spread out before
us. she told me of Billy's
boyhood, his early struggles, his young manhood,
of their courtship and of
his successes on the diamond and in the pulpit.
This is the story as she
related it to me:
My husband, Billy Sunday, was born in Ames,
Iowa, on a farm on the 19th of November, 1862.
Billy's father was 35 when he died.
He was a
soldier in a Northern regiment. When his wife
wrote him of the expected arrival of the baby, he
wrote back and said: "If the baby is a boy, I
want him called William Ashly Sunday." Billy's
father planned to come back to see him, but he
died without getting home, so Billy never saw his
father. Mrs. Sunday was only 21 years old. She
was left a widow with three little boys. She found
it pretty hard sledding to support her three babies.
She married not long after her husband's death.
Her new husband did. not want her to keep the
children, so she sent Ed and Billy to the Soldiers'
Orphan Home in Glenwood, Iowa. Presently the
Glenwood Home was overflowing with orphans,
and a hundred of them, including Ed and Billy,
were sent to the Orphans' Home at Davenport,
Iowa. Billy was just a little tot. The boys had
told him all sorts of stories about the new home
he was going to, so he decided to run away and
go back to his mother. Mr. Pearce, the superintendent of the home, was in charge of the children who were being transferred. He happened to
sit down between Ed and Billy, so Billy had no
opportunity of getting away.
Occasionally at the Orphans' Home, Billy was
late for a meal. When this happened, he was required to sit at the table with the others and
watch them eat, but was not allowed to have anything to eat himself. Every boy was supposed to
earn him way. Billy was small, his job was to
make beds, work in the laundry, scrub the steps,
wash dishes, and when he was older, work on the
farm.
Ed was two years older than Billy. When the
orphans reached the age of 16 years, they were
set adrift, as it was thought they could hustle for
themselves at that age. When Ed was 16, he was
sent away from the home to make his own way.
Will could have stayed two years longer, but he
was so fond of Ed that he left with Ed. Billy's
grandfather, Squire Corey, lived at Ames, Iowa.
You probably have heard of him.
He gave 20
acres of his farm to help start the Iowa Agricultural College at Ames.
When Billy was a little chap, he had been very
sickly, and until he was two and a half years old,
he had been carried around on a pillow. In those
days traveling doctors used to go through the
country, stopping at different farm houses to sell
medicine, and to treat anyone who needed their
services. One day a traveling doctor, a Frenchman, drove past, and stopping at the gate, called
out: "Anybody sick here?" Billy's grandmother
said she had a sick baby and asked him what he
would charge to prescribe for him and furnish
the medicine. He said, "If you will put myself
and my horse up for dinner, I will call it square."
He examined Billy carefully and told them what
to do for him. He was an herb doctor. They
followed his directions, and within a few months,
Billy was strong and husky and was able to walk,
something he had never been able to do before.
His grandmother died when Billy was three
years old. Missing Billy the day after her funeral,
they hunted for him and finally found him lying
in the freshly fallen snow on his grandmother's
grave, sobbing as though his heart would break.
They sent him to the orphans' home.
When Billy was 14 he left the orphans' home,
and went to work on Squire Corey's farm. One
day Squire Corey sent Will and another boy named
Roy to the barn to get a neck yoke. They had
some dispute as to who should carry it and, in the
scuffle, the rod came off of the neck yoke. Squire.
Corey scolded the boys so harshly that Billy decided to leave. He borrowed a horse, and rode
seven miles to the next town. He got a job there,
working as a roustabout in a hotel. After he had
been there a while, the hotelkeeper let him off for
a day. He stayed away two days, so when he returned, he was tired. Billy had nothing in sight
and no money. The wife of the hotel proprietor
let him sleep in the barn and sneaked food out to
him when she could.
Billy heard of a farm a few miles out where he
could got a job. He walked out, sized the place
up and came back without applying for a job. He
explained that the farm was so run down, and
everything looked so uncared for and shiftless, he
didn't want to work there.
Billy next wont to
Nevada, Iowa, the county seat of Story county.
He struck Col. John Scott for a job. Col. Scott
said, "I don't know whether Sophia, my wife, will
give you the job or not. You better go see her."
Billy went to see Mrs. Scott, but when she saw
how slight he was. she shook her head and said,
"You are too small. I am very particular and
there is a lot of work to be done."
Billy said,
"Can't you try me and see? I am sure I can do
your work." Mrs. Scott said, "All right, let's see
how quickly and how cleanly you can scrub those
steps." When she came back a few minutes later,
the steps were scrubbed and they were scrupulously
clean. She couldn't have picked out a job that
Billy could have done better, as for years at the
orphan asylum, his job had been scrubbing floors,
and they were very particular. Mrs. Scott hired
him at once. She told him that his duties would
be to take care of 21 Shetland ponies, milk two
cows, get in the wood, cut the grass in summer
and sweep the snow off the walks in winter, keep
Billy Sunday has never lost his love for baseball the fires going, do any other chores that were
and occasionally finds the opportunity to
needed, and get the breakfast on Sunday morning.
get into a good game
320
B ASEBALL M AGAZINE for J UNE
day for Marshalltown
in the game with Des
Moines.
She told
Adrian, her nephew,
about Billy's remarkable playing.
She
asked him to give Billy
a chance on the White
Stockings. Capt. Anson
wasn't
very
keen
about it, but he promised that he would try
him out. Next spring,
that was the spring of
1883, Capt. Anson sent
fur Billy to come to
Chicago. He told him
he would give him a
trial and see if he
could keep the pace
with fast company.
Billy landed in Chicago with less than a
dollar in his pocket.
He had been told to
report at Spaulding's
store, which was the
headquarters for the
baseball gang. He got
there at seven thirty
Billy Sunday being carried off the ball field from a game in which he
participated some years ago
in the morning, and
sat. on the curbstone until the store was opened.
Billy had been required to help in the kitchen at
Along about 10 o'clock, Tom Burns, Fred Pfeffer,
the orphan asylum, so he was a pretty fair cook.
Ed Williamson, Old Silver Flint, Ten Thousand
Mrs. Scott taught Billy during the four years he
Dollar Kelly and Capt. Anson turned up. Billy
remained with her to be a most excellent cook. If
introduced himself and Capt. Anson said, "I hear
the devil always finds mischief for idle hands to
you can run. We will go over to the ball grounds
do, he surely passed Billy up, for he had mighty
and see if there is any truth in the report." Pfeffer
little time on. his hands. He went to school durwas the crack runner of the team. They dug up
ing these four years, working for his board. He
a uniform for Billy, but didn't happen to have
graduated when he was 18.
any running shoes to fit him. Billy said, "That is
In those days, there used to be great rivalry
all right, I can run barefooted and beat him." They
between the hose teams of the different fire comall laughed at his confidence, but he made good
panies. Marshalltown and Muscatine, Iowa, were
and easily outran Pfeffer. Capt. Anson signed him
old-time rivals. The people at Marshalltown had
up and said he would use him for an emergency
heard that Billy was a very swift runner, so they
man. The first year they let Billy soak in the
came over and asked him to come to Marshalltown
atmosphere of a winning team, for to jump a boy
so that he could run on their hose team. They
from the country lots to a winning team was a
were scheduled for a contest with Muscatine. Billy
pretty sudden rise. Capt. Anson made him a sort
had to be in Marshalltown 60 days to qualify, so
of advance agent, and business manager of the
he could be a member of their hose team. They
team. He had to take the tickets, secure reservatold Billy they would get him a job at three doltions on the train, see that the baggage was
lars a week in a furniture factory. Billy was a
aboard, plan out the railroad connections, and
sort of a roustabout in the factory, working at putoccasionally play right field in games that were
ting chairs together, and whenever there was a
not important. The second year Billy was with
funeral, he drove the hearse. They put Billy in
the White Stockings, he was playing a good many
as one of the leaders on the hose team. By the
games, and the third year he was one of the regular
time he had stayed there the 60 days to qualify, he
players. Billy was with the White Stockings for
liked Marshalltown so well that he decided to refive years.
main. He lived in Marshalltown for the next two
or three years. While there, he joined the baseOne Sunday afternoon in the summer of 1886,
ball team.
Billy, Ed Williamson, Mike Kelly and Silver Flint
Billy took to baseball naturally.
One time
were sitting on the curb of the sidewalk in Chicago.
Marshalltown played against Des Moines. This
As they sat talking, a gospel wagon drove up and
was in 1882. One of the men on his team got
held a service. After the singing and preaching
drunk, so Billy held down both, center and right
services, the speaker invited the crowd to come to
field. I guess he must have played rather a rePacific Garden Mission. Billy said to his teammarkable game, because he made six out of the
mates, "Come on, fellows, let's follow the band
seven runs scored and Marshalltown won the game.
wagon and hear what more they have to say."
Capt. Adrian Anson, the manager of the White
The other chaps laughed and refused, and one of
Stockings, used to spend his winters in Marshallthem said, "Look out, Billy, you better not take
town. His people lived there. Capt. Anson was the
a chance, they might get hold of yon and spoil
first white child born in Marshall county. His
a good ball player." Billy said, "Well, I will take
Aunt Em happened to see Billy when he saved the
a chance. I haven't anything else on hand. I am
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going to go and hear what they have to say." He
dropped into the mission a night or two later to
pass the time away and was so much impressed
with the evident sincerity of the speakers, that he
went hack again on another night. Mrs. Clark, the
wife of Col. Clark, the founder of the mission,
walked down the aisle and, stopping in front of
Billy, said, "Young man, the Lord loves you, he
wants you to love Him and serve Him. Will you
do it?" Billy said, "Yes," and walked forward and
knelt at the altar rail.
In the spring of 1888, after we were engaged,
Billy was offered $1,800 to go to the Pittsburg
team. He was getting $1,400 with the White
Stockings. We spent a good many evenings in
very earnest discussion as to whether Billy had
better go and get the extra $400 and whether the
$400 was worth being apart all summer, as we
would have to be. Finally we decided that we
needed the $400 extra money to start housekeeping, and so Billy went to Pittsburg. I only saw
Billy three or four times between the spring of
1888 and Sept. 5th, the day we were married.
Billy came to Chicago. We were married next
day, and the same day we went to Pittsburg for
our wedding trip, and next day Billy was in his
uniform, playing ball as usual. He played with
the Pittsburg team for three years, and was then
traded to the Philadelphia Athletics. He signed
a three-year contract, at $3,000 a year. That year
the Brotherhood broke away from the league. The
Brotherhood lasted but one season, the year of
1801. When it broke up, the market was flooded
with hall players. Billy had taken a special course
in Bible training under Secretary Messer of the
Chicago Y. M. C. A. He had put in two winters
in the Chicago Y. M. C. A. working for nothing.
Billy got to feeling that he was more interested
in making money than in being a Christian. I
thought he could be just as useful being a good
Christian ball player, as he could at being a rather
poor preacher. It was a case of fifty-fifty in his
mind where he could be the most useful. He said
to me: "I am going to ask for my release from
my contract to play with the Phillies, then I will
feel that I have done my duty. If it is granted,
I will take up religious work." His release was
refused, however, and they told him they would
have to hold him to his three-year contract.
Several months went by and there was apparently no prospect of his securing his release. He
was getting ready to join his team, when the manager wired him on March 17th, saying, "You can
have your release if you want it." He at once
wired, asking to be released, and the very next day
he went to work for the Chicago Y. M. C. A. at a
salary of $1,000 a year.
He had been getting
$3,000 a year for seven months' work with the
Phillies, while in the Y. M. C. A. he received only
$1,000 for working 365 days a year, to say nothing
of four nights each week. Mr. Messer created the
position of Religious Secretary for him. I think
Billy was the first Religious Secretary in the Y.
M. C. A. That sounds as if none of the others
were very religious, but what I mean is he was
the first Secretary of the Religions department.
He stayed with the Chicago Y. M. C. A. for three
years. The first year he got $1,000, the next year
$1,200, and the third year $1,500. Peter Bilhorn
was a gospel singer for J. Wilbur Chapman, the
evangelist. Mr. Bilhorn lived in Chicago and
naturally he and Billy were thrown together a great
deal in religious work. One day J. Wilbur Chapman
B ASEBALL M AGAZINE for J UNE
asked Mr. Bilhorn to recommend a good
reliable advance agent for him. In Billy's baseball work, he had acted as advance agent, and
knew every railroad in the country. You could
wake him up in the middle of the night and he
could give you the connections of any road in the
eastern or middle western states. Dr. Chapman
offered Billy $40 a week to be his advance man.
He worked at that for two and a half years. During the Christmas holidays Billy was given two
weeks' leave to spend with the children and me
in Chicago.
While he was home, he received a
telegram from Dr. Chapman, saying that he had
accepted a call as pastor of the Bethany church
in Philadelphia. This meant that Dad was out
of a job. It didn't look like a very cheerful
Christmas to us. Three days later, a preacher in
Garner, Iowa, wrote Billy, asking him if he could
come there and spend 10 days in a revival service. Until our first baby came, I had traveled
with Billy right along when he was playing ball.
Wherever we spent Sunday he would usually talk,
either in some Y. M. C. A. or at some church.
While he had been advance man for J. Wilbur
Chapman, he had often filled smaller engagements
for Dr. Chapman. Before Billy and I were married we used to go together frequently to hear
Dwight L. Moody and Ira Sankey. Billy wasted
no time when he received the invitation to conduct the revival service at Garner, Iowa. He
took the next train and
before the 10 days was up
he had received an invitation to go elsewhere.
That was nearly 25 years
ago, and he has kept
steadily at it ever since.
You would be surprised
to learn that my husband
is very sensitive and
bashful. Sometimes people who learn
this,
wonder how he can be
so aggressive in the
pulpit. He feels that he
is doing the Lord's work
and he often says, "Woe
unto me if I preach not
the gospel. I am doing
the Lord's work, and he
will give me courage."
He shrinks from meeting people. It is a very
fortunate thing that I
love this work as much
as my husband, for if I
didn't I wouldn't have
much home life.
He
often says, "I can't help
it, Mother. I may seem
to be neglecting you, but
God's cause is first with
me and always must be."
Billy Sunday practicing inshoots with snow balls from the
summit of Pikes Peak
321
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