Читать книгу No Money, No Beer, No Pennants. The Cleveland Indians and Baseball in the Great Depression онлайн

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By October, almost all the stockholders had agreed in principle to sell their shares. Nevertheless, a select few dragged their feet. Despite the best of efforts, the sale of the team remained in limbo. Alva Bradley kept busy assembling a team of investors. John Sherwin, the president of Union Trust Bank, came officially on board, along with Percy Morgan, the owner of Morgan Lithograph. These men were giants of Cleveland, capable of pumping hundreds of thousands of dollars into the ownership group. They were sportsmen as well. John Sherwin raced horses as a member of the exclusive Gentleman’s Riding Club. Percy Morgan was a skilled golfer, often shooting in the low eighties. When he was not on the golf course Morgan produced billboard advertisements and movie posters for the local theaters. The new Cleveland ownership group represented some of the most prominent men in town, if not the most wealthy.

By early November the remaining stockholders from the Dunn era had been whittled down to one. The lone holdout was W. J. Garvey from Chicago. Mr. Garvey wanted double the price of the Bradley group offer. The men went back and forth with the obstinate Garvey, who refused to budge on his 156 shares. Ernest Barnard, now the president of the American League, kept in touch with the old stockholder, trying to dissuade him from blocking the sale. On November 15, 1927, Barnard telephoned Bradley to let him know the final roadblock had been removed: Garvey had agreed to part with his stock. The next day, newspapers from Seattle to Boston reported that the Cleveland Indians had been sold.