1898 St. Paul (St. Pauls, Apostles, Saints)

Left: This rendering is based on written documentation for uniform style and color. No visual documentation is known and an artist’s conceptualization is used to create the rendering.

Rendering accuracy: Year: documented    Team: documented

Right: This rendering is based on visual documentation for uniform style and written documentation for color. Minor details may be undocumented or difficult to determine. An educated guess is made to complete the rendering.

Rendering accuracy: Year: documented    Team: documented

Visual documentation on these uniforms:

Photo A

Dated mid-April 1898. Year of photo confirmed by the appearance of players Miller, Carney and Denzer, all of whom only played for St. Paul in 1898. A mid-April 1898 date can be determined by the fact that this image was published in a newspaper on April 24, 1898, in combination with the appearance of players Hollingsworth and Gillen. Hollingsworth was sold before the season started to the Omaha team on April 22, 1898, and Gillen joined the St. Paul team in the days before April 23, 1898, after ending a contract holdout. The photo was most likely taken at the St. Paul ballpark, and the coats and sweaters worn by some of the players can also suggest an April date. Players wore a dark uniform in this photo, with a dark cap and white stockings. The shirt had the city name in white block lettering. The cap had a rounded crown and was in the “newsboy” style. A newspaper report from April 1898 described the team’s road uniform as blue in color with white stockings. Six of the fifteen players in the photo wore the team’s white sweater, four of which wore the sweater under their uniform shirt and with the sweater’s collar on top of the uniform collar. One player wore a light-colored double-breasted coat. One player wore a white cap, not a dark-colored cap.

Top row, from left: D Miller (StP 98, Oma WL 98), L Cross (97, 98), (G Guerrero trainer), W Hollingsworth (dnp, StP 94, 96, 97, Oma WL 98), B Carney (StP 98, Oma WL 98) and H Fricken (97, 98). Middle: H Spies (96-99), J Glasscock (96-98), S Gillen (97, 98), (C Comiskey mgr 95-99), B Glenalvin (97-99), R Denzer (98) and W Preston (StP 97-99, Oma WL 98). Front: B Phyle (95-98), E Burke (98, 99) and F Shugart (96-99). Player IDs from photo. Years with team from baseball-reference.com. Date of Hollingsworth sale from The Sporting Life, April 30, 1898. Info on Gillen holdout from The Sporting Life, April 23, 1898. Info on Guerrero as the team’s trainer from The Sporting Life which reported on April 23, 1898, that “Gus Guerrero, the old-time professional pedestrian, who was known as the ‘Frisco flyer’ when he was following the tan bark circuit, has been engaged by Manager Comiskey for the season to look after the physical condition of the St. Paul players.” Historian Thom Karmik of Baseball History Daily has found that Guerrero was later the trainer for the New York Giants in 1903 and 1904, noting that the Boston Herald said “the New York National League club has had the services of the well-known ‘rubber’ Gus Guerrero, for several seasons, and he has given satisfaction.” Karmik found that during the 1904 season Guerrero attended to an inured knee of John McGraw. The Associated Press said that “Guerrero, a professional, has been spending several hours per day solely on McGraw’s weak muscles and has succeeded in hardening them so that the joint is fairly protected and does not spring at a critical moment.” Karmik also found that the New York Press said Guerrero “wears a baseball shirt labeled ‘New York’ all the time. McGraw says he believes Gus sleeps in it.” The Press also noted the treatment Guerrero would use on an ailing ballplayer: he “steams him, puts him on a slab, massages him, and then rubs in a liniment of his own concoction. […] It is equal parts of witch hazel and alcohol to a quart; with half a teaspoon of oil of wintergreen and a dash of something else that Guerrero says is his secret.” Karmik noted that before he became a trainer, Guerrero was a competitive walker and runner in California during the 1870s and 1880s. The San Francisco Call said that “Guerrero was the one best bet when it came to a foot race, whether for one [mile] or for 500 miles […] and once in 1884 he trundled a wheelbarrow from San Francisco to New York City.” Info on Guerrero from Baseball History Daily, retrieved June 20, 2021. Image from the St. Paul Globe, April 24, 1898. Image scan from Carson Lorey.

Dated mid-April 1898. Detail view of photo A. Detail view showed the team’s dark blue uniform that featured the city name in block lettering across the chest.

Written documentation on these uniforms:
April 1898: “The Saints will fix up when they play away from home. When out of town they will wear blue suits with white stockings, but they consider white suits with red trimmings good enough for the home folks.” From the Kansas City Journal, April 23, 1898. Research from Ed Morton.

July 1898: “The Apostles [are] again disappointing their chief and patrons. […] The Saints are not covering themselves with glory on this Eastern trip.” From The Sporting Life, July 23, 1898. In this report, the newspaper used both of the St. Paul nicknames.

Circa 1898, referenced in April 1899: “Every man who had an eye for the beautiful has groaned inwardly every time he looked at those faded blue suits with white stockings which, in happy days gone by, were white.” From the Kansas City Times, April 17, 1899. Research from Ed Morton. The above was an excerpt from a report describing the 1899 St. Paul uniform and the team’s decision to not wear white stockings that year.

Team genealogy: St. Paul 1895-1899
St. Paul joined the Western League (WL) in 1895 with the transfer of the Sioux City team. The WL operated between 1894 and 1899 and St. Paul played in the league through the 1899 season. The team was transferred to Chicago before the 1900 season when the league reformed as the American League. Information from wikipedia.com