Tom Hayes

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Thomas Henry Hayes Jr (born November 20, 1902 in Covington, Tennessee; died July 20, 1982 in Memphis, Tennessee) was a Memphis businessman and owner of the Birmingham Black Barons from 1939 to 1951.

Hayes was the son of funeral home owner Thomas Hayes Sr and his wife, Florence. He attended Atlanta University; Lincoln University in Jefferson City, Missouri; and the University of Illinois before entering the family business, then known as T. H. Hayes & Sons, in the 1920s. He married the former Helen Meadow in 1929 and had two daughters. He co-founded the Union Protective Life Insurance Company in 1933, and also operated hotels, restaurants and nightclubs in Memphis.

Hayes was also interested in athletics. He coached football at LeMoyne College. In December 1939 Hayes purchased the rights to the Black Barons team from the Negro American Baseball League, which had taken ownership after Henry L. Moore was penalized for sending players to Gus Greenlee and Abe Saperstein's East-West All-Star Game, and then failed to field a team in 1938.

Hayes installed Jim Taylor as manager, and arranged with Bill McKechnie Jr of the Birmingham Barons to resume use of Rickwood Field. He supervised a spring training camp for 25 prospects at Jackson, Mississippi from March 20 to April 20, 1940. He bought buses to lease to the Black Barons for road games, and also purchased the Rush Hotel, where he would put up visiting teams. During the season he tested a range of promotions to entice fans, including a bathing suit contest and race between Jesse Owens and a motorcycle.

In 1941 Hayes forged a partnership with Saperstein, a Chicago promoter who was able to book the Black Barons in exhibitions and barnstorming dates outside of the South. He hired Winfield Welch as road manager. The partnership was fruitful, with the Black Barons winning Negro American League pennants in 1943 and 1944. Pitcher/catcher Ted "Double Duty" Radcliffe recalled that, "every time the Yankees would leave, Birmingham would be in Yankee Stadium with twenty-five to thirty thousand people." Saperstein also secured press coverage for the team in leading newspapers.

Saperstein was also owner of the Harlem Globetrotters basketball team, and used his Negro League connections to scout talent in the South. Notably, Reece "Goose" Tatum and Lorenzo "Piper" Davis starred as Black Barons and as Globetrotters. Satchel Paige and Sam Brison also spent time with both teams.

Hayes signed 17-year-old Industrial League phenom and Fairfield Industrial High School student Willie Mays to the Black Barons on July 4, 1948, paying him $250 a month. The all-around center-fielder became a breakout star for the 1948 team which won another Negro American League pennant before falling to the Homestead Grays in that year's Negro Leagues World Series.

Mays came to the attention of several Major League teams, but many were still hesitant to add a Black player to their roster. The Giants' Carl Hubbell was the most dogged pursuer, but concealed his interest because Mays was still in high school, sending his scouts to Birmingham on the . Counseled by promoter Alex Pompez, Hubbell and Jack Schwarz negotiated with Hayes for Mays' contract. Giants owner Horace Stoneham formalized the offer of $10,000 to Hays for contract rights in writing on June 21. The Giants also paid a $4,000 signing bonus to Mays, who would continue earning $250 a month as a member of their Minneapolis Millers farm team.

A significant share of the $10,000 paid to Hayes went toward replacing the Black Barons' team bus, which had caught fire in New York's Holland Tunnel after a game at the Polo Grounds that June. The integration of the Majors continued to drain talent from the Negro Leagues. By January 1952 only six teams remained in the Negro American League. Hays renewed his lease at Rickwood with then Barons owner Eddie Glennon, but wasn't certain the Black Barons would continue to travel to league games where they often lost money. He hoped that in the worst case he could book opponents individually to sell tickets. Instead, in February 1952 he sold the Black Barons to Baltimore Elite Giants owner William Bridgeforth, who lived in Nashville, Tennessee.

Hayes sold his share of Union Protective Life Insurance Company to the Universal Life Insurance Co. in 1980. He died in 1982 and is buried at Memphis' Elmwood Cemetery.

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