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AUGUST 29, 1885–OCTOBER 26, 1955

Major League Career

1909; 1911–1912

Time as a Red

1909

Position

PITCHER

FACING A PENNANT-WINNING LINEUP IS NOT ANY PITCHER’S IDEA OF A GOOD TIME, but the Enquirer characterized Jack Bushelman’s one start for his hometown Reds on October, 5, 1909, as “just for fun.” It was the last game of the season, the fourth-place Reds getting ready to call it a day, the Pittsburgh Pirates getting ready to face the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. With Hall of Famer Honus Wagner, Fred Clarke, and Dots Miller stacking the Pirates lineup, 24-year-old Bushelman was due for anything but “fun.”

The Reds wanted to see him against major league hitters, though he wasn’t under contract. He’d spent a few years in the minors and in amateur and semipro ball, building a reputation for an electric arm but inconsistent control—one day a world-beater, the next day infuriatingly wild.

Bushelman grew up in Avondale and starred in baseball and track at the University of Cincinnati. A 6′2″ right-hander, he turned pro at 20, pitching for Class C Winnipeg, though continuing to play for local teams. Joe Gerhardt, his manager for the amateur Cincinnatus Club, recalled a few years later, “Jack in those days was certainly the best youngster I ever saw, only needed experience to be in the place he belongs today. His one weakness was wildness.”

He turned down a few minor league offers in 1909 to pitch for the Shamrocks, the top semipro team in the area, and on July 1, 2,000 people came to the Palace of the Fans to watch him pitch for the Shamrocks in the second night game ever played in a Major League ballpark. A few months later, he made his start for the Reds against the Pirates.

It was the second game of a doubleheader, scheduled for seven innings. The Reds staked him to a run in the first, and he went through the Pirate lineup for three innings without giving up a hit. Due to a walk, a passed ball, and an error by shortstop Roy Ellam, the Pirates scored a run in the second, added two more in the fourth and three in the final inning, though poor fielding by the Reds undermined a decent performance. Of the seven runs he gave up, only two were earned. He surrendered seven hits, walked four, and struck out three.

If his time as a Red didn’t turn heads, he turned quite a few just days later while pitching for the semipro Hamilton Krebs against the Louisville Colonels, champions of the American Association, in an exhibition game in Hamilton. He took a no-hitter into the eighth and gave up only one hit, striking out seven and walking four. Former Red Heinie Peitz, who managed Louisville, signed Bushelman for the 1910 season. Peitz had a reputation for working with pitchers, and hopes were high that under him Bushelman would realize his great potential.

It didn’t happen. After a poor beginning, he ended up with New Bedford in the Class B New England League. After posting a 16–14 record in 1911, he returned to the majors late in the season with the Boston Red Sox, getting one start, on September 11, against Washington and the immortal Walter Johnson. Following a terrible first inning—four walks, a balk, and poor defense led to five runs without a hit—he pitched six scoreless frames, losing 7–1. He made the 1912 team that opened new Fenway Park but was released after three relief appearances, though he notched a Major League victory, on May 13, when he took over for starter Charley Hall, who gave up five runs in the first to the St. Louis Browns. The Red Sox scored nine in the second, and Bushelman cruised into the seventh, when he gave up five runs. The Red Sox won but released him later in the season without another appearance.

He went 26–11 in 1913 at Class B Worcester, but the workload led to a sore arm; two years later, he retired. Handsome, affable, and educated, he enjoyed success in sales in the lumber business, while he and his wife, Helen, raised two sons and four daughters. After moving to Tennessee, the family returned home in 1920, settling in St. Bernard, then to Gate City, Virginia, near the Tennessee border, where they remained for the rest of his life.