The Catcher Was a Cahuilla: A Remembrance of John Tortes Meyers (1880-1971)

NATIVE American athletes achieved their greatest recognition in modern sports during the period from the turn of the century through the 1920s (Oxendine 1988). Among the notables were several Californians. For instance, Antonio Lubo, Elmer Busch, and Peter Calac all served as gridiron captains under...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of California and Great Basin anthropology 2002-01, Vol.24 (1), p.21-39
Main Author: KOERPER, HENRY C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Athletic competition
Baseball
Baseball statistics
Business structures
Cigarettes
Games
Halls of fame
Native Americans
Sports
White people
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Summary:NATIVE American athletes achieved their greatest recognition in modern sports during the period from the turn of the century through the 1920s (Oxendine 1988). Among the notables were several Californians. For instance, Antonio Lubo, Elmer Busch, and Peter Calac all served as gridiron captains under Coach "Pop" Warner at Carlisle Indian Industrial School (Koerper 2000), where at various times they were teammates of the legendary Jim Thorpe (Peterson n.d.; Steckbeck 1951). Calac was Luiseño, Busch was Pomo, and Lubo was a Santa Rosa Mountain Cahuilla. Another athlete with ties to the Santa Rosa reservation, John Tortes Meyers (Fig. 1), developed into one of the best baseball catchers of his era. A roommate of Thorpe when the two played for the New York Nationals (Giants) (Fig. 2), then managed by John McGraw, "Chief" Meyers counted as battery mates at New York and elsewhere, Baseball Hall of Fame pitchers Christy Mathewson (see Robinson 1993), Rube Marquard (see Hynd 1996), and Walter "Big Train" Johnson (see Kavanagh 1995). For his many accomplishments, Meyers became the first Californian inducted into the American Indian Sports Hall of Fame, presently housed at Haskell Indian Nations University in Kansas. This biographical overview chronicles the life of this gifted and courageous athlete who tenaciously embraced his Indian identity while operating mostly in a white world.
ISSN:0191-3557