Vintage MLB? pants. "HITCHCOCK" stitiched in (Billy or

[cjw]

Great looking pair of game worn, heavy wool baseball uniform pants. I am a little color-blind, but they appear to be an oatmeal or grey in color. I don't know the era..perhaps the 1930's to 1950's? I looked up Hitchcock @ baseball-almanac.com and found two that may be close the same era as the pants. Billy Hitchcock - an infielder that played from 1942-1953 with the Tigers Senators, Browns, Red Sox and Athletics. And a Jim Hitchcock that played one year - 1938 for the Boston Bees. The pants were made by Lowe and Campbell Athletic Goods and are tagged a size 36 and have a dry clean only tag. Could easily be from a minor league team...any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

[ironmanfan]

I'm sorry that I can't be of help, but coincidently I just read last night that it was Billy Hitchcock who gave the nickname of "Scooter" to Phil Rizzuto (which I never knew). It appears as if Hitchcock noted Rizzuto's short legs and said "You're not runnin', you're scootin'." Due to Billy Hitchcock's long tenure in professional baseball, I think there is a good possibility that these might belong to him.

[hitchcock]

After recently purchasing these pants on eBay, I don't think that they are Detroit Tigers road pants...but, for the following reasons, road pants from the 1940 Kansas City Blues of the American Association.

* There is no dark blue piping along the outside leg that one sees on all Detroit Tigers road uniforms of that era.

* I have in my collection, a Kansas City Blues road jersey of Ralph "Buzz" Boyle (outfielder) from this era (1940) that has the "Lowe and Campbell Athletic Goods" (which was actually a subsidary of Wilson Sporting Goods) label in the collar. This jersey also has "Boyle" chainstitched onto a piece of grey felt and then sewn along the inside button path...very similar to the chainstitched "Hitchcock" patch that is sewn in these pants.

* There is also the number "40" that has been chainstitched in red (now faded) on the inside button path of these pants. This probably indicates the year 1940 (Billy Hitchcock played for the Blues in 1939, 1940 and 1941).

* It is unusual for minor league uniforms to have these type identifiers that one would expect to see in only major league uniforms....however, the Kansas City Blues were no ordinary minor league team. They were the top minor league team of the powerful New York Yankees.

I had discussed game used uniforms with Billy and he told me that the home jerseys worn by the Blues were actually Yankee "hand-me-downs" (a common practice in those days) with the "NY" logo on the front removed. Since "Lefty" Gomez (6'2" 173 lbs) worn #11 the previous years with the Yankees...that was probably the #11 Billy (6'1.5" 175 lbs) wore with the Blues in '39, '40, and '41.

George Stanford
b11hitch@aol.com