LLOYD, John Henry ("Pop")

(b. 25 April 1884 in Palatka, Florida; d. 19 March 1965 in Atlantic City, New Jersey), baseball player who was a superstar shortstop in African-American baseball during the era of racial separation.

Lloyd was reared by his grandmother after his father died and his mother remarried. He left school with only an elementary education to work as a delivery boy to help support the family. He gravitated toward baseball and, in his spare time, played with an amateur local team. When he was a teenager, Lloyd traveled to Jacksonville, Florida, to work as a porter for the Southern Express Company and to play with a semiprofessional team called the Young Receivers. While playing on the sandlots of Jacksonville he was discovered by a trio of players that included Rube Foster, the man who later was known as the father of the Negro Leagues. A year later, in 1906, after having advanced another level in the semiprofessional ranks to the Macon (Georgia) Acmes, Lloyd was signed to play in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, with the Cuban X-Giants, a team considered to be among the best African-American ball clubs of the time. From that point on he dominated the professional ranks, quickly earning recognition as a star player.

Lloyd was a complete player who could run, field, throw, and hit with power. He was a consistent .300 hitter and often exceeded .400. He was called the Black Wagner, and the Pittsburgh Pirates superstar shortstop Honus Wagner said that he was honored by the comparison. Acknowledged as the best African-American player during the so-called dead-ball era (usually considered the first two decades of the twentieth century, when an almost soft ball was used for play), Lloyd was always in demand by the top ball clubs. This permitted him to play wherever it was most financially advantageous and, wherever he went, championships usually followed.

He played for Sol White's champion Philadelphia Giants (1907–1909), Rube Foster's champion Chicago Leland Giants (1910), Jess McMahon's champion New York Lincoln Giants (1911–1913), and Foster's champion Chicago American Giants (1914–1915, 1917). While he was with the Lincoln Giants, Lloyd was the playing manager and, in 1918, he was given the reins of Nat Strong's Brooklyn (New York) Royal Giants. From that point on he was usually at the helm of a ball club in addition to being a star player.

The Negro National League (the first African-American league) was organized in 1920. A year later Lloyd left the Royals to become the playing manager for the league's Columbus (Ohio) Buckeyes franchise. In 1923, when the rival Eastern Colored League was founded, Lloyd took the helm of the Hilldale (Pennsylvania) franchise and guided the team to the league's inaugural pennant. Despite winning the championship, Lloyd was not in good graces with the owner and, after the season, was dismissed for alleged dissension on the team. Subsequently he was the playing manager of the Bacharach Giants of Atlantic City before returning to the Lincoln Giants in 1926 to serve in the same capacity until the franchise folded after the 1930 season. In that final season the Lincolns dropped a hard-fought eastern championship series to the Homestead (Pennsylvania) Grays, who featured a rookie slugger named Josh Gibson. After the demise of the Lincolns, Lloyd continued to play professionally through 1932. He also played twelve intermittent winter seasons in Cuba between 1908 and 1930. In one memorable Cuban series in 1910 against Ty Cobb's Detroit Tigers, Lloyd led all hitters with a batting average of .500.

As a player, Lloyd was an aggressive competitor, in contrast to his genial demeanor off the field. He generally refrained from using alcohol, tobacco, and profane language. As a manager Lloyd was a master at building confidence and motivating young players. The respect he earned, both as a person and a manager, was reflected in his selection as the manager of the East squad in the inaugural East-West game in 1933. This was the Negro Leagues' All-Star game, which became the biggest African-American sports attraction in the country.

After ending his professional baseball career Lloyd settled in Atlantic City, where he worked as a custodian, first for the post office and then for the public school system, while still continuing his role as a baseball ambassador. Lloyd and his wife, Nan, had no children, but he devoted a large part of his life to working with the youth of Atlantic City, projecting a fatherly image and instilling in them good values and a solid work ethic. In his latter years he was affectionately known as "Pop" and was beloved by the youngsters he nourished. Lloyd was a playing manager on the sandlots with the Johnson Stars and the Farley Stars until the age of fifty-eight; he continued as a nonplaying manager for several more years. Later he served as the Atlantic City Little League commissioner.

On 1 October 1949 the Atlantic City government dedicated the John Henry Lloyd Park. In his speech at the ceremonies Lloyd said, "I do not consider that I was born at the wrong time. I felt it was the right time, for I had a chance to prove the ability of our race in this sport … and … we have given the Negro a greater opportunity now to be accepted into the major leagues with other Americans." After a two-year illness Lloyd died from arteriosclerosis in Atlantic City, just one month before his eightieth birthday. He is buried in the Atlantic City Cemetery in Pleasantville, New Jersey.

The beloved elder statesman of African-American baseball posthumously received baseball's highest honor in 1977, when he was inducted into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. By his superlative performance on the baseball diamond and his personal dignity and righteous living, Lloyd demonstrated to a prejudiced society the worthiness of African Americans to participate in the American national pastime, and created a greater awareness of the need for racial equality.

Two excellent sources of information on Lloyd are "The Black Wagner," in Bob Peterson, Only the Ball Was White (1970), and James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues (1994). Other useful sources include David Porter, ed., The Biographical Dictionary of American Sports: Baseball (1987); John Holway, Blackball Stars (1988); and Mike Shatzkin, ed., The Ballplayers (1990).

James A. Riley