The Foxy Grandpas and the Fun Writing They Inspired
THIS is how you commit to a bit.
I have this wild notion that sports are supposed to be fun. We’re supposed to enjoy our time watching them and reading about them and following them. I know, crazy! Maybe this notion comes from being a Mariners fan, where for most of their existence the concept of “winning” has felt as fake the moon landing or birds or the earth being round (I’m kidding, those three things are real, winning is not). As long as you can have a good time and maybe laugh a little, that’s all we’re really there for.
So I was absolutely delighted to discover an early Seattle professional baseball team that was called the Foxy Grandpas. The team was officially named the Siwashes, a term rational people consider derogatory. It is a Chinook trading jargon word that evolved out of the French word for savages and quickly became a way to refer to the indigenous people on the Pacific Coast. (There’s a current debate about renaming Siwash Rock in Vancouver B.C.)
The Seattle Daily Times first began calling the team the Foxy Grandpas in May 1904. The Times claims credit for the nickname, but the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Tacoma Times also use the nickname, although not as prevalently. The name likely came from a comic strip that ran in newspapers nationwide from 1901 through 1917 called Foxy Grandpa. In the comic, a grandpa outwits the pranks played by his grandsons. The comic was adapted into wildly successful plays and silent films.
I don’t know why the Times began calling the team this. Maybe the players were old? There were complaints that not enough fans were going to watch them, so maybe attaching them to successful entertainment was a marketing ploy? This is the sort of thing I could spend a lot of time looking up, but I’m going to save that for an other day. From what I can tell, the name was bestowed after a Ladies Day game in San Francisco, which our poor grandpas lost 13-2. The Seattle Daily Times game story begins:
That a lot of old married men, some of them old enough to be grandpas, should get nervous just because a grandstand full of women who did not pay to get in where watching them seems a surprising thing, yet that is what happened to the Seattle team yesterday.1
A few days later, following a win in San Francisco, the Times referenced the “friskiness the foxy grandpas have been exploiting here of late.”2 When the team returned to the Northwest, the Times sub-headline read, “Foxy Grandpas Will Have to Brace Up to Beat Tacoma.”3 From there, the name stuck. The best part about the new nickname was the way the Times embraced the bit. The following are excerpts from select game stories.
After a loss, it was written:
Big Overall spanked the Grandpas and sent them runless and almost hitless to bed last night. He held the ancients and honorables safe all the way, and though they struggled desperately against the disgrace of being shut out, youth must be served, and the old-timers had to be content with what “Double O” Overall was generous enough to give them.4
Following a rainy game:
It was mean of Umpire Jack McCarthy to keep the Frisky Grandpas out in the cold rain yesterday afternoon. He is young himself and probably did not realize how those chilly winds stiffen up the joints of the Venerables and he will be sorry when he hears that some of the old gentlemen are laid up with rheumatism or asthma or some of the other ailments that come with age.5
The Foxy Grandpas weren’t all that thrilled with their nickname (note: foxy in 1904 mean sly and wily, not attractive and sexy, in case you were wondering):
This is an instance of how differently men see things. The Times named the Seattle team the “Foxy Grandpas,” and the players didn’t like it. Perhaps the name is a misfit—in that they are not foxy.6
Still, the Times stuck up for their elders, including the time they tried to fit four runners on three bases, suggesting that perhaps there had been a rule that allowed such a thing in olden times:
Those young fans who so heartlessly hooted two Foxy Grandpas yesterday when they were tangled up on the bases like a couple of flies trying to do a sprint across a piece of fly-paper, should be a little more considerate of age. When it is remembered that the rules of baseball have changed a great many times in the last thirty years, it is not to be wondered at that men who have played under practically all the rules since the game began, should sometimes get a little mixed in his dates.7
The fun of the bit waned as the Foxy Grandpas acquired a habit of losing. They ultimately finished in third place in 1904, with an overall record of 115-105 (the season had two parts, and was played into November!) and 13 games behind the Pacific Coast League Champions, the Tacoma Tigers.
The Foxy Grandpas didn’t bring home a title, but they inspired fun writing. I’m not sure how you could ask for more.
“Ladies Rattle Old Timers”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), May 13, 1904: 12.
“Clean Hitting Wins Game”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), May 16, 1904: 10.
“Hard Week Ahead for Wilson,” Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), May 17, 1904: 10.
“Grandpas Easy for Overall”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), June 3, 1904: 11.
“Grandpas Lose In The Rain”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), June 18, 1904: 5.
“Gossip of the Fans”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), June 22, 1904: 9.
“Gossip About The Players”, Seattle Daily Times (Seattle, Washington), August 22, 1904: 11.