Cumberland Willis "Cum" Posey Jr. (June 20, 1890 – March 28, 1946) was an American baseball player,

manager Management (or managing) is the administration of an organization, whether it is a business, a nonprofit organization, or a government body. It is the art and science of managing resources of the business. Management includes the activities ...

, and team owner in the

Negro leagues The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans and, to a lesser extent, Latin Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be ...

, as well as a professional basketball player and team owner.

Early life

Cumberland Jr. was born into

Western Pennsylvania Western Pennsylvania is a region in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania, covering the western third of the state. Pittsburgh is the region's principal city, with a metropolitan area population of about 2.4 million people, and serves as its economic ...

's Negro elite, the son of Cumberland Willis Posey Sr. and Angelina "Anna" Stevens Posey of

Homestead Homestead may refer to: *Homestead (buildings), a farmhouse and its adjacent outbuildings; by extension, it can mean any small cluster of houses * Homestead (unit), a unit of measurement equal to 160 acres *Homestead principle, a legal concept t ...

, adjacent to

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...

. Posey Sr. worked on

riverboat A riverboat is a watercraft designed for inland navigation on lakes, rivers, and artificial waterways. They are generally equipped and outfitted as work boats in one of the carrying trades, for freight or people transport, including luxury un ...

s and, in 1877, became probably the first African American licensed

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, analyze, build and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while considering the limit ...

in the United States, earning a chief engineer license and the title of, " Captain." "Cap" Posey was a riverboat builder, general manager of the Dexter Coal Company, owner of the Diamond Coke and Coal Company, and industrial partner of

Henry Clay Frick Henry Clay Frick (December 19, 1849 – December 2, 1919) was an American industrialist, financier, and art patron. He founded the H. C. Frick & Company coke manufacturing company, was chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, and played a maj ...

. He was president of the Loendi Social and Literary Club for three years and president of the ''

Pittsburgh Courier The ''Pittsburgh Courier'' was an African-American weekly newspaper published in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1907 until October 22, 1966. By the 1930s, the ''Courier'' was one of the leading black newspapers in the United States. It was acqu ...

'' newspaper for its first 14 years, to 1924.(Williams) The family lived in a palatial

Italianate The Italianate style was a distinct 19th-century phase in the history of Classical architecture. Like Palladianism and Neoclassicism, the Italianate style drew its inspiration from the models and architectural vocabulary of 16th-century Italian ...

mansion on the heights. Despite his commanding wealth, Captain Posey still had to deal with racial discrimination, according to historian William Serrin. In that crucible of race, his son began to excel as a young athlete. In football, Cumberland Jr. was a star player and manager for

semi-pro ''Semi-Pro'' is a 2008 American sports comedy film. The film was directed by Kent Alterman in his directorial debut, written by Scot Armstrong, and produced by Jimmy Miller. It stars Will Ferrell, Woody Harrelson, André Benjamin and Maura Tier ...

sandlot teams in the Pittsburgh area prior to 1910, including the Delaney Rifles and the Collins Tigers.

Basketball

Posey was the best African American basketball player of his time, playing from the early 1900s (decade) through the mid-1920s. His peers and the sporting press considered him an "All-Time Immortal". "The mystic wand of Posey ruled basketball with as much eclat as 'Rasputin' dominated the Queen of all the Russias", observed the Harlem ''Interstate Tattler'' in 1929. Posey led Homestead High to the 1908 city championship, played basketball at Penn State for two years, moved to the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the univers ...

where he earned a pharmacy degree in 1915, and formed the famous Monticello Athletic Association team that won the Colored Basketball World's Championship in 1912. He later played varsity basketball for

Duquesne University Duquesne University of the Holy Spirit ( or ; Duquesne University or Duquesne) is a private Catholic research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Founded by members of the Congregation of the Holy Spirit , image = Holy Gh ...

, under the name "Charles Cumbert", and led the Dukes in scoring for three seasons through 1919. Today he is enshrined in the Duquesne Sports Hall of Fame under his real name. During the mid-1910s, Posey formed, operated, and played for the Loendi Big Five, which became the most dominant basketball team of the Black Fives Era through the mid-1920s, winning four straight Colored Basketball World Championship titles. He retired from basketball in the late 1920s to focus exclusively on the business of baseball and on his weekly sports column in the

, "In The Sportive Realm." He was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2016.

Homestead Grays

In baseball, Posey played with the

Homestead Grays The Homestead Grays (also known as Washington Grays or Washington Homestead Grays) were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro leagues in the United States. The team was formed in 1912 by Cumberland Posey, and remained in continuo ...

in 1911, was manager by 1916, and became owner in the early 1920s. In a quarter-century running the team, he built it into one of the powerhouse franchises of black baseball, winning numerous pennants, including nine consecutively from 1937–1945. In 1910, a group of Homestead steelworkers was organized into one of baseball's greatest clubs by Posey. This team, the Homestead Grays, played many locations such as

Forbes Field Forbes Field was a baseball park in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, from 1909 to June 28, 1970. It was the third home of the Pittsburgh Pirates Major League Baseball (MLB) team, and the first home of the Pittsburgh Steelers ...

and

Griffith Stadium Griffith Stadium stood in Washington, D.C., from 1911 to 1965, between Georgia Avenue and 5th Street (left field), and between W Street and Florida Avenue NW. The site was once home to a wooden baseball park. Built in 1891, it was called Boundar ...

in Washington, D.C. The team won eight out of nine Negro National League titles. Posey, the principal owner of the Homestead Grays, spent 35 years (1911–1946) in baseball as a player, manager, owner and club official. He built a strong barnstorming circuit that made the Grays a perennially powerful and profitable team, one of the best in the East. Posey began playing baseball for the semi-pro Grays in 1911. He soon ended his playing career to become field and business manager. He took control of the Grays in 1920 and turned them into a highly successful regional enterprise as an independent team. The Grays' strong identity in Pennsylvania and surrounding states enabled them to survive the depths of the Great Depression. 1930-31 Homstead Grays

Posey, an aggressive talent seeker with the Grays, at one time or another had over a dozen current Negro leagues Hall of Famers playing for him. He was often accused of raiding other clubs' rosters, enticing their best players to join his team. He suffered a heavy dose of the same in the early 1930s, when he lost several stars to the well-financed Pittsburgh Crawfords. The Grays rebounded and became a member of the second Negro National League in 1935, soon dominating the circuit. Posey's teams reeled in nine consecutive pennants from 1937–1945. Posey unwisely attempted to start the East-West League in 1932, during the Depression, but it did not last the season. He later became an officer of the Negro National League, and was a major force at its meetings throughout the rest of his career. He also was a frequent critic of the league, both before and after joining it, in his regular sports columns for the ''

'', a leading black weekly newspaper. Courier sportswriter Wendell Smith once wrote of Posey: "Some may say he crushed the weak as well as the strong on the way to the top of the ladder. But no matter what his critics say, they cannot deny that he was the smartest man in Negro baseball and certainly the most successful." He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 2006. He was named to the Washington Nationals Ring of Honor for his "significant contribution to the game of baseball in Washington, D.C" as part of the

on August 10, 2010.

Death

On March 28, 1946, Posey died of cancer in

at the age of 55. His hometown of Homestead declared a school holiday in his honor the day of his funeral.

References

* *(Riley.
Cumberland "Cum" Posey
Personal profiles at Negro Leagues Baseball Museum. – identical to Riley, except for notice of 2006 Hall of Fame induction (confirmed 2010-12-12) *Serrin, William (1993). ''Homestead''. New York: Knopf Publishing. *Williams, Rachel Jones (2010).
Cumberland Willis Posey Sr.
, Black History in Pennsylvania. Reprinted from ''Pennsylvania Heritage'' Spring 2010, Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. Confirmed 2010-12-11.

External links